Louis Horst was a musician, conductor, and composer who, through his work with Martha Graham and other pioneers, profoundly affected the development of American modern dance. Here, Soares (Dance/Barnard College), formerly Horst's assistant, offers a carefully chronicled, well-documented account of his life and work. Born in 1884 of German immigrants, Horst was strongly encouraged by his father, himself a musician, to pursue a career in music. Self-supporting as a musician from his teens on, Horst began playing for the Denishawn dancers in 1915—a job that set his life's direction. It was here that he met Graham, and here that he began to consider the relationship between music and dance. By 1925, when Horst left Denishawn to study composition in Vienna, he had a basic philosophy: When dance and music are wed, ``both arts must sacrifice too much at times.'' How the two arts might better serve each other was Horst's concern when, after a year in Europe, he reunited with Graham (their relationship was emotional and physical as well as collegial). Together, they began to alter the world of dance, music, and the relationship between the two. It is no overstatement to say that Graham's work was born of this collaboration. Soares recounts in detail the ensuing, fruitful years, during which Horst accompanied Graham and her cohorts in choreography, teaching, and performing—and at an astounding pace. Graham's marriage to Erick Hawkins eventually brought a sharp rift between the dancer and the musician, but Horst continued to work at a breakneck pace with other choreographers. He died in 1964. Working with full access to Horst's diaries and other sources, Soares does scholarly justice to her material. Readers may miss some of the passion that was a hallmark of this era and of Graham's life and associations (conveyed so well by Agnes de Mille in Martha, 1991), but, still, this is a worthwhile account of an important figure. (Thirty-two b&w photographs—not seen.)
Pub Date: June 1, 1992
ISBN: 0-8223-1226-3
Page Count: 251
Publisher: Duke Univ.
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1992
The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the...
Elie Wiesel spent his early years in a small Transylvanian town as one of four children.
He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.
Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2006
ISBN: 0374500010
Page Count: 120
Publisher: Hill & Wang
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2006
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
