NOTHING BUT THE BEST: The Struggle for Perfection at the Juilliard School

by Judith Kogan ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 13, 1987

Appallingly tone-deaf, nosy attempt to snoop around various students of New York's famous music conservatory. Author Kogan is a music graduate of Juilliard, but must have audited writing courses: ""His playing was note-perfect. Nothing was out of place. But it was boring. He wasn't saying anything."" And so it goes, for pages and pages of oversimplistic, affected blather. For those who can penetrate the writing style, there is plenty more reason for complaint. For one, there is a snobby posture, such as calling the Juilliard Cafeteria an ""ultimate Cafe des Artistes."" But worse is the apparently approving recording of bigoted jokes by students, such as an allegedly ""humorous"" song about white male students who like Asian women: ""I got Yellow Fever!. . .I got sushi gonad."" If this is representative of Juilliard's students, perhaps it would be better left unreported. The students also crassly insult children's TV personality ""Captain Kangaroo"" as a purveyor of ""kiddie porn."" The nadir is reached in a prying account of a woeful student romance, where Kogan apparently feels her mandate as reporter impels her to record soap-opera screaming and thrown bottles. Nothing here reflects the main purpose of Juilliard, nor does its approach ever transcend the infantile in order to voice any legitimate criticism of the often tyrannical faculty, and the overrating in general of the programs it offers. Such a healthy critique is much needed, but this sloppy effort doesn't even come close. An off-key disaster.

Pub Date: April 13, 1987

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1987

Categories: NONFICTION