June is Bustin' Out All Over; Plus - Henry Lewis, Pioneering Black Genius Instrumentalist and Conductor from LA
Every June I think of this song from Rodgers & Hammerstein's Carousel, since I was in the orchestra for a high school production (our band director made a point of disclaiming the show's handwaving of domestic abuse...).
What a show...and isn't it a little timely, mm...? But I wouldn't have bothered writing a post just for that, I don't have that kind of drive or energy anymore...
I also happened to get a very interesting factoid in a newsletter today from Action St. Louis:
On June 1st, 1968, the 1st Black instrumentalist in a major symphony orchestra, Henry Lewis, became the 1st Black musical conductor of an American orchestra.
And what's more, the major orchestra Henry Lewis joined in 1948 was none other than his hometown LA Philharmonic:
Sixteen-year-old double bass player Henry Lewis made history in 1948 when he was hired by the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Lewis was the first African American appointed to a major symphony orchestra and one of the youngest players in LA Phil history, period.
His early experiences with the orchestra sparked a lengthy career that saw him achieve a multitude of firsts in the orchestral music world. When he died in 1996, his New York Times obituary dubbed him the Jackie Robinson of classical music.
Also among those firsts:
When Lewis stepped onto the podium in 1961, he made history in more ways than one. He became the first native Angeleno to conduct the Philharmonic on a subscription series concert and the first Black conductor to lead a major orchestra on a regular season concert.
By the way, the orchestra he took over in 1968 was the New Jersey Symphony - it sounds like it was quite a tenure:
With the appointment of Henry Lewis as music director in 1968—making Lewis the first Black music director of a major symphony orchestra—the New Jersey Symphony entered a new era of high-profile musical activity. Notable highlights of the Lewis years included the New Jersey Symphony’s Carnegie Hall debut with famous soprano (and Lewis’ wife) Marilyn Horne, who became a regular guest soloist with the Orchestra during Lewis’ tenure; a performance at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, during the venue’s inaugural season in 1971; three outdoor concerts dedicated to the memory of Martin Luther King, in a vacant lot on Prince Street—the site of the 1967 Newark Riots—in 1968; and a concert at the Garden State Arts Center (now PNC Bank Arts Center) with Luciano Pavarotti making his American orchestral debut. (The Orchestra would perform with Pavarotti again in 1984, in the first classical music program ever performed at Madison Square Garden.)
And here he is in person in an educational film called The Symphony Sound with the U.K.'s Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, which he himself apparently wrote, and...let's just say, give this to your friends who don't like European Classical Music: