Aaron Copland talks about his history as a composer. Guggenheim Foundation helped propel his career.
Aaron Copland talks about his history as a composer. Guggenheim Foundation helped propel his career.
SPEAKER 1: I came back from Paris. And I thought, I'd better open a music studio and try and get some pupils and harmony lessons and such. And I wasn't able.
My family's helped to rent an apartment on West 74th Street. And then, I waited for the pupils, and nobody came. And after about three months, I decided, well, this is not going to work.
SPEAKER 2: All the time, you were composing. And it was quiet. You didn't care.
SPEAKER 1: Too quiet.
SPEAKER 3: So what did you go do next?
SPEAKER 1: Say what?
SPEAKER 3: What did you go do next?
SPEAKER 1: Well then, some delightful man by the name of Mr. Guggenheim dreamed up the idea of founding something called The Guggenheim Foundation.
SPEAKER 3: Don't tell me he asked you to take his money.
SPEAKER 1: I got the first scholarship for music. And this was January, I guess, 1925.
SPEAKER 2: You were in the right place at the right time.
SPEAKER 1: Right. And they started it at the right time, from my standpoint. Still going strong, by the way.
SPEAKER 2: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: And then, that was renewed. So my first two years after coming home, except for those grim three months-- actually when I came home-- I came home in June. I took a job in a summer hotel playing a piano in a trio.
SPEAKER 3: In a summer hotel.
SPEAKER 1: In a summer hotel. Piano, violin, and cello.
SPEAKER 2: Up in the mountains, do you mean?
SPEAKER 1: Up in the mountains. It's all in the Borscht Belt. The equivalent.
I remember the man who owned the hotel was a big music lover. And the trouble was he was running this hotel for the first time that summer. And they had very few guests. And at dinner time, with about three people in the dining room, we had to play. And he would stand right next to us and criticize the tempo, and concentrate on our playing because he didn't have anything else to concentrate on.
SPEAKER 2: What a memory of your first job.
Digitization made possible by the State of Minnesota Legacy Amendment’s Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund, approved by voters in 2008.
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