TO GEZA P. ROLIK
Note: Leroy always called Geza Rolik his most faithful correspondent. They exchanged letters
about once a month. Sadly, Geza had already destroyed Leroy's letters, out of grief, when contacted.
This is the only letter he retained.
Nov. 2, 2002
Dear Geza,
As indicated in a recent letter, I think, I've had to get a new typewriter, this one with word processing features, most of which I'll probably not use. No need to buy a computer instead, since Jackie will be taking her computer to the house we should be buying in a few weeks. I must be getting very lazy, or betraying my Luddite tendencies, because I'd rather have a simpler machine - but these days just try to find one.
Actually that composition by Leopold Mozart that I mentioned, the one with four hunting horns and shotgun, doesn't include any orchestral involvement. Just as a piece there's nothing too special about it, except for the instrumentation. (I'm sure the elder Mozart wouldn't much care if it were played on regular horns, though no doubt the shotgun is indispensable. Gage is not indicated.
(Obviously there are many things about this
machine of which I've still to get the "hang".)
The business about whether Mozart (L.) wanted a 12 or 20 or ? gage shotgun puts me in mind of
a very pleasant evening I once spent in the company of Dave Weiss (an old friend, and at that
time, perhaps still, Oboe I in the L.A. Phil.). Besides being an excellent oboist, David plays
musical saw, which he carries in a violin case that also houses his bow. We spent a bit of time
with him playing the saw, in tune and with fairly good articulation given the propensity of the
instrument, and then with him explaining the virtues of the Stanley no. 2 and other such saws.
I had no idea that in Holland they make a saw just for purposes of its use as a musical instrument,
with the brand name of Stradivarius. That timbre, sounding a bit like a proto-Theramin, is one
I don't think I'm likely to use in a composition. But I will confess that if I knew two musical
sawers (sawists?) both of them of David's caliber, and an expert performer on the Glass Harmonica,
I would seriously consider composing a short piece for this eerie trio. (Perhaps "sawyer"
is the correct term, but that bears with it the certain expectation that the musician is actually
going to saw wood, while somehow being musical about it.)
About Theodore aka Ted Stearn,* I'm not entirely certain when I met him for the first time, but it was at USC, and it may have been when we were undergraduates. For certain we knew each other by the time I began work on the doctoral degree, playing and singing in Dahl's Collegium Musicum. Anyway, to cut off all the wool about subsequent classes, encounters, et al, I'll just say that he knows his music, and conducted very well on an occasion during which we were cutting a demo tape of music he had written to demonstrate his versatility as a potential composer for films. I believe you would enjoy him, as a person and as a good fella with whom to discuss music, as well as finding him congenial as a conductor. About the music I've heard which he has composed, he handles everything well, and there is nothing "kookie" about it, just solid writing.
I'm still marveling about all the improvements you've talked about with respect to violin strings. A golden 'E' string, no less. Well, maybe that will make the "Golden Toned" E Major variations in the last movt. Of Brahms' Symphony no. 4 even more golden. (That is how Clara Schumann described them, though admittedly it is mainly trombones, horns and oboe that make them so, since upper strings have mainly occasional figurations.) Well, if James Galway can have a set of matched flutes, made of gold (in some kind of alloy I assume), why not a gold plated 'E' string? At least it's not going to tarnish your fingers as some of my old Jurassic era strings seemed to do.
By the by, I recently added an additional bundle to my stacks of not yet heard CDs. (Many of my unheard previous purchases are still encartoned from my two last moves.) From Daedalus books I received at least 6 double CD sets with Glenn Gould playing Bach, Beethoven and some miscellaneous. Though he doubtless played Bach's Two-Part Inventions too fast, I must say that he made that composer exciting, for those who don't mind such repertoire being played on the piano. (Your research supported my contention that J.S. wrote nothing for that instrument..) But his Mozart is equally impressive, though often overlooked. I had hoped to find the "Waldstein" Sonata among the numerous Beethoven sonatas that he recorded. Alas, that search seems to have been in vain. I believe he would have brought his special energy to that one. I'll just have to be satisfied with Horowitz's recording, which would be hard to beat in any case. - Also in that shipment came chamber music by Ned Rorem, of which I've never heard a note, and symphonies by Nino Rota, of whom I only know only a bit of film music, the "War and Peace" that starred Henry Fonda, Audrey Hepburn etc. Elliot Carter's Quartets with Julliard (3 volumes, 2 CDs each), a 4 CD set with Sandor playing solo piano music by Bartok, Puccini's La Rondine…well, I won't go on this way. Wanting to hear such things is just further motivation to retire after one more year of teaching, if I can swing it.
Tom Schnauber, a composer friend who is finishing up his doctorate in composition and theory at the U. of Michigan, has sent me a bundle of tapes at which I've been pecking away in ½ hour increments. I was grateful for the chance to hear the capriccios of Zelenka again; he's just kinky enough to keep my interest alive, a top drawer composer of the second tier. But the real ear opener for me was hearing the sizzling tempo in which Casals took the 1st mvt. of the 2nd Brandenburg Concerto. You have to have a high trumpeter with the agility of a fine flutist to take it the way he did, and he's up to that challenge. I'm interested to hear the way Erich Kleiber did the Beethoven 7th, which Tom tells me is very good. I was impressed with what I saw on tape from Teldec, in which Kleiber is rehearsing mvt. 4 of Beethoven's 9th in Prague, and especially, the wonderful things he did with J. Strauss' "On the Beautiful Blue Danube". Also it's good to have some of Stravinsky's later recordings, in stereo, of such loveable things as Four Russian Peasant Choruses, Japanese Lyrics, etc. I.S.'s song literature is by and large wonderful stuff, unaccountably overlooked by most singers. (Maybe, in some cases, the instrumentation argues against frequent performance. He mostly did not write for voice and piano.)
Well, I have to cease for now. My (students) want their midterm exams corrected, and I can not but oblige.
Thanks so much for your many letters, and for being patient with me in term of getting back to you.
Your bud,
*note from Geza Rolik, 5 March 2004
I did find one letter from Leroy; I suppose that I kept it because it's a bit on the humorous side where he writes about his oboist friend that also played the musical saw. In this letter he also writes about Ted Stearn whom I've met and who teaches at Glendale City College.
As you may well know, Leroy was a bit of a comic. Allow me to tell a story about him which happened when he and I were playing in the Loyola Marymount University Orchestra, Leroy playing 1st oboe and I played 2nd oboe:
We had just finished rehearsing a Mozart symphony. Also on the agenda for a forthcoming concert was a five movement suite (by a modern composer whose name escapes me at the moment) on five paintings by a very modern artist named Paul Klee. The music in the suite was dissonant, I mean ear piercing, and not too many members of the orchestra enjoyed playing it. Anyway, Bogidar, our conductor, motioned to Leroy to sound an "a" and said: "Let's tune for the Paul Klee." Leroy brought his oboe up to his lips, and immediately brought it down and asked: "Why?" at which point the entire orchestra burst out laughing, including Bogidar.
That was Leroy.