The former senior music critic for The New York Times details the career of legendary pianist Vladimir Horowitz (1902-89), who has been the subject of a previous biography (Glenn Plaskin's Horowitz, 1983) as well as of a volume of personal memoirs (David Dubal's Evenings with Horowitz, 1991—not reviewed). Starting with Horowitz's triumphant return to Russia in 1986, Schonberg (The Glorious Ones, 1985, etc.) chronicles the life and music-making of this ``neurotic genius,'' drawing extensively on interviews with Horowitz and his associates. The author establishes appropriate historical and cultural contexts: Horowitz's youth during the Russian Revolution; the start of his European career in mid-1920's Berlin (which Schonberg calls ``a sad, bad, glad, mad city''); and his pianism as compared to that of the 19th-century romantics like Liszt and Anton Rubinstein, as well as to that of his contemporaries. Schonberg also considers changing musical tastes as reflected in varying critical perceptions of Horowitz's style during his lengthy career. Periodically, the author corroborates or disagrees with others' assessments—an intrusion, sometimes, in the text proper, but an asset in the three musicological appendices that preface an extensive Horowitz discography. Schonberg offers insight into the mutually dependent relationship between Horowitz and his wife, Wanda (Arturo Toscanini's daughter), but tends to apologize when accounting for Horowitz's four hiatuses from the concert stage. The author also tempers his subject's opinions on other musicians (e.g., Arthur Rubinstein) by choosing his quotes with kindness. Discussions of Horowitz's peculiar piano techniques (playing with flat instead of rounded fingers, for example) will interest piano devotees, although frequent documentation of individual concert programs proves cumbersome. Reasonably evenhanded, and useful in demythologizing Horowitz's career, but doing little to humanize ``the most potent and electrifying virtuoso of the twentieth century.'' (Sixteen pages of b&w photographs—not seen.)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1992
ISBN: 0-671-72568-8
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1992
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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