Leonard Bernstein Discusses Humor in Music and Conducts Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks

1961 album

Leonard Bernstein Discusses Humor in Music and Conduct Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks

Studio album by Leonard Bernstein, New York Philharmonic
Released	1961
Genre	Spoken word, Classical music
Label	Columbia Masterworks

Leonard Bernstein Discusses Humor in Music and Conducts Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks is an album from Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic. It was released in 1961 on the Columbia Masterworks label (catalog number ML 5625).

The work

Leonard Bernstein, at the time chief conductor of the New York Philharmonic, ran a series of education about musical topic. The topic "Humor in Music" was one of the lectures with music played by the orchestra.

On the "A" side of the album and a portion of the "B" side, Bernstein reviews the use of humor in classical music, include the use of dissonant notes, non-musical noises, "wrong notes", and musical overstatement, and the role of bassoons and the squeaky E-flat clarinet as the orchestra's jokesters. On the "B" side, Bernstein conducts the New York Philharmonic in a performance of Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, a tone poem by Richard Strauss.

The spoken portion of the album was remastered in 2013 and is available on YouTube.^[1]

Reception

Bernstein received the 1962 Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album for the album.^[2]

Track listing

Side A

Discussion by Bernstein (piano by Bernstein) [22:15]

Side B

Continuation of discussion [7:40]
Till Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks, composed by Richard Strauss, performed by the New York Philharmonic conducted by Leonard Bernstein [15:05]

References

^ "Humor in Music" (remastered 2013) on YouTube, provided by Sony Classical
^ "Grammy Award Nominees 1962 – Grammy Award Winners 1962". www.awardsandshows.com. Archived from the original on June 2, 2016. Retrieved May 9, 2017.

Leonard Bernstein

Opera and operetta

Trouble in Tahiti (1951)
Candide (1956)
A Quiet Place (1983)

Musicals

On the Town (1944)
- "New York, New York"
- "Lonely Town"
Peter Pan (1950)
Wonderful Town (1953)
- "Ohio"
West Side Story (1957)
- "A Boy Like That"
- "America"
- "Cool"
- "Gee, Officer Krupke"
- "I Feel Pretty"
- "Maria"
- "One Hand, One Heart"
- "Something's Coming"
- "Somewhere"
- Tonight"
- "Tonight Quintet"
A Party with Betty Comden and Adolph Green (1958, collaboration)
The Race to Urga (1968)
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (1976)
The Madwoman of Central Park West (1979, contribution)

Ballet

Fancy Free (1944)
Dybbuk (1974)

Orchestral music

Symphony No. 1 (Jeremiah) (1942)
Symphony No. 2 (The Age of Anxiety) (1948–49, revised 1965)
Symphony No. 3 (Kaddish) (1963)
Fanfare for the Inauguration of John F. Kennedy (1961)
CBS Music (1976)
Slava! A Political Overture (1977)
Divertimento (1980)
Concerto for Orchestra (1986, 1988, 1989, originally Jubilee Games)

Concertante

Prelude, Fugue and Riffs (1948)
Serenade after Plato's "Symposium" (1954)
Ḥalil (1981)

Chamber music

Piano Trio (1937)
Clarinet Sonata (1942)
Dance Suite (1989)

Choral

Hashkiveinu (1945)
Chichester Psalms (1965)
"Olympic Hymn" (1981)
Missa Brevis (1988)

Vocal

Psalm 148 (art song, 1935)
I Hate Music (song cycle, 1943)
La Bonne Cuisine (song cycle, 1947)
"So Pretty" (1968)
Songfest: A Cycle of American Poems for Six Singers and Orchestra (1977)
"My Twelve Tone Melody" (1988)

Piano music

Non troppo presto (Music for the Dance No. 1) (1937)
Music for the Dance No. 2 (1938)
Sonata for the Piano (1938)
Anniversaries (1942—1988)
- Seven Ann. (1942–43)
- Four Ann. (1948)
- Five Ann. (1949–51)
- Thirteen Ann. (1988)
Four Sabras (ca. 1950)
Bridal Suite (1960)
Touches (1980)

Other compositions

The Lark (incidental music) (1955)
Mass (1971)
Opening Prayer (1986)

Film adaptations

On the Town (1949 film)
West Side Story (1961 film)
West Side Story (2021 film)

Books

The Joy of Music

Academy for the Love of Learning
Artful Learning
Bernstein–Mahler cycle
Inside Pop: The Rock Revolution
Leonard Bernstein Festival of the Creative Arts
New York Philharmonic concert of April 6, 1962
Pacific Music Festival
The Unanswered Question (lecture series)
Young People's Concerts
Maestro (2023 film)

Category

v t e Grammy Award for Best Audio Book, Narration & Storytelling Recording
1950s	The Best of the Stan Freberg Shows – Stan Freberg (1958) Lincoln Portrait – Carl Sandburg (1959)
1960s	FDR Speaks – Robert Bialek (producer) (1960) Humor in Music – Leonard Bernstein (1961) The Story-Teller: A Session with Charles Laughton – Charles Laughton (1962) Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? – Edward Albee (playwright) (1963) BBC Tribute to John F. Kennedy – That Was the Week That Was (1964) John F. Kennedy: As We Remember Him – Goddard Lieberson (producer) (1965) Edward R. Murrow - A Reporter Remembers, Vol. I: The War Years – Edward R. Murrow (1966) Gallant Men – Everett Dirksen (1967) Lonesome Cities – Rod McKuen (1968) We Love You Call Collect – Art Linkletter & Diane Linkletter (1969)
1970s	Why I Oppose the War in Vietnam – Martin Luther King Jr. (1970) Desiderata – Les Crane (1971) Lenny – Bruce Botnick (producer) & the Original Broadway Cast (1972) Jonathan Livingston Seagull – Richard Harris (1973) Good Evening – Peter Cook and Dudley Moore (1974) Give 'em Hell, Harry! – James Whitmore (1975) Great American Documents – Henry Fonda, Helen Hayes, James Earl Jones, and Orson Welles (1976) The Belle of Amherst – Julie Harris (1977) Citizen Kane (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) – Orson Welles (1978) Ages of Man: Readings from Shakespeare – John Gielgud (1979)
1980s	Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein, Gertrude Stein – Pat Carroll (1980) Donovan's Brain – Orson Welles (1981) Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Movie on Record – Tom Voegeli (producer) and Various Artists (1982) Lincoln Portrait – William Warfield (1983) The Words of Gandhi – Ben Kingsley (1984) Ma Rainey's Black Bottom – Mike Berniker (producer) & the Original Broadway Cast (1985) Interviews from the Class of '55 Recording Sessions – Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chips Moman, Ricky Nelson, Roy Orbison, Carl Perkins, and Sam Phillips (1986) Lake Wobegon Days – Garrison Keillor (1987) Speech by Rev. Jesse Jackson – Jesse Jackson (1988) It's Always Something – Gilda Radner (1989)
1990s	Gracie: A Love Story – George Burns (1990) The Civil War – Ken Burns (1991) What You Can Do to Avoid AIDS – Earvin "Magic" Johnson and Robert O'Keefe (1992) On the Pulse of Morning – Maya Angelou (1993) Get in the Van – Henry Rollins (1994) Phenomenal Woman – Maya Angelou (1995) It Takes a Village – Hillary Clinton (1996) Charles Kuralt's Spring – Charles Kuralt (1997) Still Me – Christopher Reeve (1998) The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr. – LeVar Burton (1999)
2000s	The Measure of a Man: A Spiritual Autobiography – Sidney Poitier, Rick Harris, and John Runnette (producers) (2000) Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones – Quincy Jones, Jeffrey S. Thomas, Steven Strassman (engineers), and Elisa Shokoff (producer) (2001) A Song Flung Up to Heaven – Maya Angelou and Charles B. Potter (producer) (2002) Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them – Al Franken and Paul Ruben (producer) (2003) My Life – Bill Clinton (2004) Dreams from My Father – Barack Obama (2005) Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis – Jimmy Carter / With Ossie and Ruby – Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee (2006) The Audacity of Hope – Barack Obama and Jacob Bronstein (producer) (2007) An Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore – Beau Bridges, Cynthia Nixon, and Blair Underwood (2008) Always Looking Up – Michael J. Fox (2009)
2010s	The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Presents Earth (The Audiobook) – Jon Stewart (2010) If You Ask Me (And of Course You Won't) – Betty White (2011) Society's Child – Janis Ian (2012) America Again: Re-becoming the Greatness We Never Weren't – Stephen Colbert (2013) Diary of a Mad Diva – Joan Rivers (2014) A Full Life: Reflections at 90 – Jimmy Carter (2015) In Such Good Company: Eleven Years of Laughter, Mayhem, and Fun in the Sandbox – Carol Burnett (2016) The Princess Diarist – Carrie Fisher (2017) Faith: A Journey for All – Jimmy Carter (2018) Becoming – Michelle Obama (2019)
2020s	Blowout: Corrupted Democracy, Rogue State Russia, and the Richest, Most Destructive Industry on Earth – Rachel Maddow (2020) Carry On: Reflections for a New Generation from John Lewis − Don Cheadle (2021) Finding Me – Viola Davis (2022) The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times – Michelle Obama (2023)