Minnesota Public Radio music host, Mindy Ratner talks with conductor Yakov Kreizberg about the renowned conductor/composer Leonard Bernstein. Kreizberg leads the Minnesota Orchestra in the second part of the Bernstein Festival, a two-week event exploring Leonard Bernstein's legacy as a conductor, composer, pianist and educator.
Bernstein is perhaps most famous for his “Young People's Concerts,” his works such as "West Side Story," "Candide," and "On the Waterfront," as well as his interpretations of various classical works.
SPEAKER 1: He was the first American conductor of the first American to lead a very, very important American orchestra, such as the New York Philharmonic. So here is this incredibly interesting personality I happen to know, a man of many talents, a man of great strengths, and some very unusual weaknesses.
A man who was tormented and vain and passionate and exciting and lovable and difficult and charming and what not. What best to use as a kind of a idea to present? And I had no illusions whatsoever that in two weeks we could barely touch the surface. We could barely touch the tip of the iceberg.
We could dedicate a whole season to Leonard Bernstein and still not really get all that deeply into what it is that he was, an American legend.
SPEAKER 2: I know for myself when I was a kid growing up in New York. Jewish, in a household in which at least one parent had an appreciation for classical music. Leonard Bernstein was my hero, and I used to watch those young people's concerts and watch him jump all over the podium. And just it was as if sparks flew out of him. And I just thought it was the most exciting thing I'd ever seen or heard.
SPEAKER 1: I agree. I agree. He had an extraordinary gift of bringing music to the level of the people who sometimes had absolutely no experience with classical music. He could make the most complicated things seem simple and easy to grasp, and for that I think we should always be grateful to him.