Bernstein
Three Dance Episodes from On the Town
Leonard Bernstein was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts in 1918 and died
in New York City in 1990. He composed his musical On the Town in
1944. In 1945 he extracted the Three Dance Episodes for the concert hall,
and he conducted the premiere with the San Francisco Symphony in 1946.
The work is scored for flute, piccolo, oboe, English horn, 3 clarinets,
bass clarinet, E-flat clarinet, alto saxophone, 2 horns, 3 trumpets, 3
trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, piano, and strings.
*****
Fresh from the success of his ballet Fancy Free Bernstein wrote
On the Town, a musical with the same scenario: the adventures of
three sailors on 24-hour liberty in Manhattan. It may come as no surprise
that their “adventures” largely concern women. In a larger sense the
piece is also an homage to New York—as Bernstein called it, “that monstrous
city which its inhabitants take for granted.”
Gabey, the shiest and most romantic of the three sailors, is the focus
of the first episode, “The Great Lover Displays Himself.” Since his arrival
in New York he has seen posters of Miss Turnstiles—the winner of a subway-sponsored
beauty pageant—everywhere. Hopelessly smitten with her, Gabey falls asleep
on a subway car and dreams he is sweeping Miss Turnstiles off her feet.
The music is a riot of brash, jazzy music that is over before you know
it: Alas, Gabey’s dream is short.
The second episode, “Lonely Town,” is a bluesy dance. In the show, Bernstein
explains, “Gabey watches a scene both tender and sinister, in which a
sensitive high-school girl in Central Park is lured and then cast off by
a worldly sailor.”
Bernstein said that the third dance, “Times Square Ballet” is a “panoramic
sequence in which all the sailors in New York congregate in Times Square
for their night of fun.” Lewd and boisterous scenes pass by in rapid succession,
bringing this gem of a work to a close so abruptly that it leaves us wishing
for more.
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