In a 2018 interview in the Times, the composer and author Ned Rorem—then 95—quipped that it would be "rather cute" if he lived to be 100. Rorem will turn 99 in October, but why wait to celebrate this American treasure? If you are not yet familiar with Rorem's musical and literary works, the library has several of his books and recordings. I hope that this short essay will provide our patrons with an introduction to this extraordinary American musical and cultural icon.
Ned Rorem was born in Richmond, Indiana in 1923, but moved with his parents and older sister to Chicago while he was still an infant. At the age of 8, he began his formal studies in music taking piano lessons, and by age 11, he was studying with the Chicago composer and pianist, Margaret Bonds. Rorem has repeatedly stated over the course of his long career that his early musical education was "absolutely right" in that [Bonds] emphasized contemporary music over the more orthodox approach of focusing on the classics. He further emphasized that this approach was somewhat of an anachronism in that his early training was typical of every century except the 20th, wherein one would learn the contemporaneous art first and foremost, and only thereafter would one acclimate to the past.
It was during his studies with Bonds when Rorem received an early introduction to the music of Debussy and Ravel, thus laying the foundation for his later Francophile musical influences. At the age of 17, Rorem entered the Music School at Northwestern University and subsequently transferred two years later to the Curtis Institute in 1943 where he studied with Gian Carlo Menotti. He completed his formal studies at the Julliard School earning his BA and MA in 1946 and 1948, respectively. During his early days in New York, Rorem became an apprentice to another prominent writer and composer, Virgil Thomson. In exchange for orchestration lessons and a modest stipend of $20 per week, Rorem served as Thomson's copyist. Rorem writes that he "learned more from Virgil in six months" than at any time during his prior conservatory studies. This statement, undoubtedly full of hyperbole, is consistent with Rorem's strident and self-assured pronouncements that so often permeated his essays, criticism, diaries, as well as his polemical discourse as a public intellectual.
Rorem's diaries, perhaps represent the most significant portion of his literary output, beginning with The Paris Diary (1966) which chronicles his decade-long stay in France beginning in 1949. It also represents a pioneering work in Gay literature as Rorem writes about his homosexuality at a time when such openness on the topic was inconceivable. For Rorem, this unprecedented candor was not so much a revelation, but simply a fact of life: "I just wrote about all that because so what? I didn't understand why anybody, including my parents, was particularly impressed. But I guess nobody else was doing it." Other diaries followed, chronicling his life and social circles—both musical and literary—through 2005. These volumes include The New York Diary, The Final Diary (subsequently republished as The Later Diaries of Ned Rorem), The Nantucket Diary, and Lies. His literary output also includes his 1994 memoir, Knowing When to Stop, in addition to several volumes of essays and criticism. His prose style is unrelentingly honest, acerbic, bellicose, and often witty, and when one considers the vanguard of intelligentsia with whom Rorem associated, his writings often assume a measure of "high gossip." As Rorem explains, "it was always a tossup whether I would be a composer or a writer, so I became a little of both." As it turned out, he became a lot of both.
Musically, Rorem mostly eschewed the parlance of the atonal languages that predominated modern art music. Regarding Arnold Schoenberg, the composer and inventor of the 12-tone system (serialism), he writes that the "great composers of the 20th century...do not include Schoenberg." Rorem's own musical language tends to be more economically spare in texture, tuneful, and above all else, tonal—that is to say, French. Rorem frequently scorned and ridiculed those composers of the latter half of the 20th Century who switched styles after it became stylistically fashionable to compose tonal music again, thus prompting his frequent iteration of likening himself to the Prodigal Son's brother: “I had never gone astray." Even this pronouncement is not entirely consistent with the stylistic diversity of Rorem’s output. Even though he never identified with the sodality of his post-war modernist contemporaries—composers such as Elliot Carter, Pierre Boulez and Milton Babbitt—he was nonetheless, capable of maintaining two sets of books, thus occasionally dipping his toes into the complexity of modernism. One notable example of this aesthetic contradiction includes his 1974 orchestral work, Air Music, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1976. The circumstances surrounding the creation of Air Music were particularly astonishing, as the music was adapted from a score Rorem originally composed for the 1971 feature film, The Panic in Needle Park (Al Pacino's first leading role). As an afterthought, it was decided by the film's director to not include any music in the film—a professional disappointment that devastated Rorem at the time. After some negotiation between Rorem's publisher, Boosey & Hawkes and the film's producers, Rorem was able to reacquire the rights for the soundtrack and later repurpose it into Air Music. For Rorem,"[having] won the Pulitzer has been totally satisfying. It's a once-in-a-decade refashioner, carrying the decree that bitterness is henceforth unbecoming. And if you die in shame and squalor, at least you die Official."
An appropriate primer to the music of Ned Rorem lies is in his many songs, of which he has composed some 500, thus establishing himself as one of the most important composers of art songs since Franz Schubert—also earning him the oft-used moniker, “America’s Schubert.” There are many recordings available, but among the finest is the album Songs of Ned Rorem recorded by the American mezzo-soprano, Susan Graham (this album also streams on Hoopla). Otherwise, Rorem has composed in all genres, including symphonic works, opera, choral, and chamber music. His books number around 15, and they are important in providing so much revelatory documentation about an artist's life and his associates during a tremendous period in America's cultural history.
What follows is not exhaustive, but rather a curated linked list of some of Ned Rorem’s books and recordings that are available at the Wilmette Public Library.
Selected Books by Ned Rorem available at WPL:
The Later Diaries of Ned Rorem, 1961-1972
Knowing When to Stop: A Memoir
Setting the Tone : Essays and a Diary
Selected Recordings by Ned Rorem available at WPL:
Evidence of Things Not Seen : Thirty-Six Songs for Four Solo Voices and Piano