Anthony Newman (musician)
Encyclopedia
Anthony Newman is an American classical musician. While mostly known for his virtuoso performances on the organ, Newman is also a harpsichordist, pedal harpsichordist, pianist, fortepianist, conductor, writer, and teacher. A specialist in music of the Baroque period, particularly the works of Johann Sebastian Bach
, Newman has played an important role in the movement towards historically informed performance. He has collaborated with noted musicians such as Kathleen Battle
, Julius Baker
, Itzhak Perlman
, Eugenia Zukerman
, Jean-Pierre Rampal
, Leonard Bernstein
and Wynton Marsalis
for whom he arranged and conducted ;In Gabriel’s Garden, the most popular classical record of 1996.
At age seventeen Newman went to Paris, France to study at l'École Normale de Musique. His primary teachers were Pierre Cochereau
, organ, Madeleine de Valmalete, piano and Marguerite Roesgen-Champion, harpsichord. He received a Diplóme Supériere, with the commendations of the legendary pianist Alfred Cortot
.
Newman returned to the United States and received a B.S. in 1963 from the Mannes School of Music having studied organ with Edgar Hilliar, piano with Edith Oppens and composition with William Sydemann
. He worked as a teaching fellow at Boston University
while studying composition with Leon Kirchner
at Harvard University
. He received his M.A. in composition from Harvard in 1966 and his doctorate in organ from Boston University in 1967 where he studied organ with George Faxon and composition with Gardner Read
and Luciano Berio
for whom he also served as teaching assistant.
signed Newman to a recording contract. Clive Davis
, head of Columbia Records, took his cue from the prevailing anti-establishment sentiment among young people and Newman's long hair and interest in Zen meditation and marketed Newman as a counterculture champion of Bach would could draw young audiences. As a result, according to Newman, it took some years for him to "live down" the image created by Davis and to be taken seriously in the classical music world. But Newman did indeed draw young audiences as noted by Time magazine in a 1971 article in which they dubbed him the "high priest of the harpsichord." After recording twelve albums for Columbia Records Newman left along with pianist André Watts
, another of Davis' protégés, when Davis left Columbia in 1979. Newman has gone on to make solo recordings for a variety of labels including Digitech, Excelsior, Helicon, Infinity Digital/Sony, Moss Music Group/Vox, Newport Classic, Second Hearing, Sheffield, Sine Qua Non, Sony, Deutsch Grammophon, and 903 Records. Newman has recorded most of Bach's keyboard works on organ, harpsichord and piano as well as recording works of Scarlatti, Handel, and Couperin. On the fortepiano
he has recorded the works of Beethoven and Mozart. As a conductor Newman has led international orchestras such as the Madeira Festival Orchestra, the Brandenburg Collegium, and the English Chamber Orchestra.
For thirty years, starting in 1968, while Newman continued to record, concertize, compose, conduct and write, he taught music at The Juilliard School
, Indiana University
, and State University of New York at Purchase
.
Although initially intensely interested in composition, he became discouraged by the non-tonal music that was the focus of conservatory composition departments in the 50s and 60s. He returned to composition in the 1980s and developed a post-modern compositional style that took over from where pre-atonal post-modernism left off. He makes use of musical archetypes from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries as well as 20th century archetypes he has devised himself with the intent making new but accessible music. Newman has written music for a range of instruments including organ, harpsichord, orchestra, guitar, violin, cello, flute chamber ensemble, piano, choral music and opera. In 2011, Newman released a 20-CD set of his most important compositions on 903 Records.
Newman is music director of Bach Works and Bedford Chamber Concerts, is on the Visiting Committee for the Department of Musical Instruments at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and is on the board of Musical Quarterly magazine.
- were common in Bach's time and that fast movements were played faster than has been traditionally accepted. Scholarly opposition to Newman's approach was led by Frederick Neumann who had long-held that notes inégal were limited primarily to French performance practice and that Bach, who traveled relatively little, would not have been exposed to this technique. In reviewing Newman's Bach and the Baroque in 1987 Neumann was at first somewhat gracious calling Newman "...a splendid keyboard performer who can dazzle his audiences with brilliant virtuosic feats. He can, and often does, play faster than perhaps any of his colleagues, and shows occasionally other signs of eccentricity." However he takes Newman to task for "careless scholarship" citing misuse of terms such as tactus and misinterpretation of Bach's notation. But his most enthusiastic objections are to Newman's defense of the use of notes inégal in the performance of Bach. Most of Neumann's complaints question the validity of Newman's sources.
Music critics too have been of two minds about Newman's interpretations of Bach. Here are some examples all from the New York Times:
Over time Newman's fast tempos have become relatively common in the performance of Bach's works and his championing of the use of original instruments foreshadowed the historically informed performance movement in America by at least ten years.
Digitech
Helicon
Infinity Digital/Sony
Moss Music Group/Vox
Newport Classic
Sony
903 Records
Khaeon
Newport Classic
Khaeon
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
, Newman has played an important role in the movement towards historically informed performance. He has collaborated with noted musicians such as Kathleen Battle
Kathleen Battle
Kathleen Battle , is an African-American operatic soprano known for her agile and light voice and her silvery, pure tone. Battle initially became known for her work within the concert repertoire through performances with major orchestras during the early and mid 1970s. She made her opera debut in...
, Julius Baker
Julius Baker
Julius Baker was one of the foremost American orchestral flute players.He was well known as a teacher and served as a faculty member at the Juilliard School, Curtis Institute of Music, and Carnegie Mellon University...
, Itzhak Perlman
Itzhak Perlman
Itzhak Perlman is an Israeli-born violinist, conductor, and instructor of master classes. He is regarded as one of the pre-eminent violinists of the 20th and early-21st centuries.-Early life:...
, Eugenia Zukerman
Eugenia Zukerman
Eugenia Rich Zukerman is an American flutist, writer, and journalist. An internationally renowned flute virtuoso, Mrs Zukerman has been performing with major orchestras and at major music festivals internationally for more than three decades...
, Jean-Pierre Rampal
Jean-Pierre Rampal
Jean-Pierre Louis Rampal was a French flautist. He has been personally "credited with returning to the flute the popularity as a solo classical instrument it had not held since the 18th century."-Early years:...
, Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein
Leonard Bernstein August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
and Wynton Marsalis
Wynton Marsalis
Wynton Learson Marsalis is a trumpeter, composer, bandleader, music educator, and Artistic Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. Marsalis has promoted the appreciation of classical and jazz music often to young audiences...
for whom he arranged and conducted ;In Gabriel’s Garden, the most popular classical record of 1996.
Early life
Newman was born in Los Angeles, California. His father was a lawyer and his mother was a professional dancer and an amateur pianist. Newman started playing the piano by ear at age four and could read music before he could read words. He was five when he first heard the music of J.S. Bach (the fifth Brandenburg Concerto) and was "delighted, elated and fascinated" At five he began piano lessons but decided to add organ after hearing his first Bach organ music (Toccata and Fugue in D minor). He had to wait until he was ten to begin organ lessons because before then his feet would not reach the pedals. From the age of ten to seventeen he studied the organ with Richard Keys Biggs.At age seventeen Newman went to Paris, France to study at l'École Normale de Musique. His primary teachers were Pierre Cochereau
Pierre Cochereau
Pierre Eugène Charles Cochereau , was a French organist, improviser, composer, and pedagogue.- Biography :Pierre Cochereau was born on July 9, 1924 in Saint-Mandé, near Paris. In 1929, after a few months of violin instruction, he began to take piano lessons with Marius-François Gaillard...
, organ, Madeleine de Valmalete, piano and Marguerite Roesgen-Champion, harpsichord. He received a Diplóme Supériere, with the commendations of the legendary pianist Alfred Cortot
Alfred Cortot
Alfred Denis Cortot was a Franco-Swiss pianist and conductor. He is one of the most renowned 20th-century classical musicians, especially valued for his poetic insight in Romantic period piano works, particularly those of Chopin and Schumann.-Early life and education:Born in Nyon, Vaud, in the...
.
Newman returned to the United States and received a B.S. in 1963 from the Mannes School of Music having studied organ with Edgar Hilliar, piano with Edith Oppens and composition with William Sydemann
Jay Sydeman
William Jay Sydeman is an American composer. Born in New York, he studied at the Mannes School of Music, where he later taught composition . Winning early acclaim for his avant guard music William Jay Sydeman (born 8 May 1928) is an American composer. Born in New York, he studied at the...
. He worked as a teaching fellow at Boston University
Boston University
Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
while studying composition with Leon Kirchner
Leon Kirchner
Leon Kirchner was an American composer of contemporary classical music. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for his String Quartet No. 3.Kirchner was born in Brooklyn, New York...
at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
. He received his M.A. in composition from Harvard in 1966 and his doctorate in organ from Boston University in 1967 where he studied organ with George Faxon and composition with Gardner Read
Gardner Read
Gardner Read was an American composer and musical scholar....
and Luciano Berio
Luciano Berio
Luciano Berio, Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI was an Italian composer. He is noted for his experimental work and also for his pioneering work in electronic music.-Biography:Berio was born at Oneglia Luciano Berio, Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI (October 24, 1925 – May 27, 2003) was an Italian...
for whom he also served as teaching assistant.
Professional life
Newman's professional debut, in which he played Bach organ works on the pedal harpsichord, took place at the Carnegie Recital Hall in New York in 1967. Of this performance the New York Times wrote, "His driving rhythms and formidable technical mastery...and intellectually cool understanding of the structures moved his audience to cheers at the endings." Based solely on the Times’ review, and without an audition, Columbia RecordsColumbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...
signed Newman to a recording contract. Clive Davis
Clive Davis
Clive Davis is an American record producer and music industry executive. He has won five Grammy Awards and is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a non-performer. From 1967 to 1973 he was the President of Columbia Records. He was the founder and president of Arista Records from 1975...
, head of Columbia Records, took his cue from the prevailing anti-establishment sentiment among young people and Newman's long hair and interest in Zen meditation and marketed Newman as a counterculture champion of Bach would could draw young audiences. As a result, according to Newman, it took some years for him to "live down" the image created by Davis and to be taken seriously in the classical music world. But Newman did indeed draw young audiences as noted by Time magazine in a 1971 article in which they dubbed him the "high priest of the harpsichord." After recording twelve albums for Columbia Records Newman left along with pianist André Watts
André Watts
André Watts is a classical pianist and professor at the Jacobs School of Music of Indiana University.-Life and early performances:...
, another of Davis' protégés, when Davis left Columbia in 1979. Newman has gone on to make solo recordings for a variety of labels including Digitech, Excelsior, Helicon, Infinity Digital/Sony, Moss Music Group/Vox, Newport Classic, Second Hearing, Sheffield, Sine Qua Non, Sony, Deutsch Grammophon, and 903 Records. Newman has recorded most of Bach's keyboard works on organ, harpsichord and piano as well as recording works of Scarlatti, Handel, and Couperin. On the fortepiano
Fortepiano
Fortepiano designates the early version of the piano, from its invention by the Italian instrument maker Bartolomeo Cristofori around 1700 up to the early 19th century. It was the instrument for which Haydn, Mozart, and the early Beethoven wrote their piano music...
he has recorded the works of Beethoven and Mozart. As a conductor Newman has led international orchestras such as the Madeira Festival Orchestra, the Brandenburg Collegium, and the English Chamber Orchestra.
For thirty years, starting in 1968, while Newman continued to record, concertize, compose, conduct and write, he taught music at The Juilliard School
Juilliard School
The Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory which was established in 1905...
, Indiana University
Indiana University
Indiana University is a multi-campus public university system in the state of Indiana, United States. Indiana University has a combined student body of more than 100,000 students, including approximately 42,000 students enrolled at the Indiana University Bloomington campus and approximately 37,000...
, and State University of New York at Purchase
State University of New York at Purchase
Purchase College, State University of New York, is a public four-year college located in Purchase, New York, United States. It is one of 13 comprehensive colleges in the State University of New York system...
.
Although initially intensely interested in composition, he became discouraged by the non-tonal music that was the focus of conservatory composition departments in the 50s and 60s. He returned to composition in the 1980s and developed a post-modern compositional style that took over from where pre-atonal post-modernism left off. He makes use of musical archetypes from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries as well as 20th century archetypes he has devised himself with the intent making new but accessible music. Newman has written music for a range of instruments including organ, harpsichord, orchestra, guitar, violin, cello, flute chamber ensemble, piano, choral music and opera. In 2011, Newman released a 20-CD set of his most important compositions on 903 Records.
Newman is music director of Bach Works and Bedford Chamber Concerts, is on the Visiting Committee for the Department of Musical Instruments at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and is on the board of Musical Quarterly magazine.
Baroque performance controversy
From the beginning Newman's interpretation of the music of J.S. Bach brought disdain from many musical traditionalists. The usual complaint was that he played too fast and that he took excessive liberties with rhythm and ornamentation. According to Newman, the traditional approach to Bach began 100 years after Bach's death and is misguided by a mystique and reverence for the composer that results in performances which are slow, rhythmically restrained and without the vivification of ornamentation. In contrast, Newman's recordings of Bach are known to be exciting even by those who are skeptical of the validity of his interpretations. In Newman's scholarly text, Bach and the Baroque, published in 1985 and revised in 1995, Newman supports his performance of Baroque music with a thorough analysis based on contemporary 17th and 18th century sources. Newman discusses how alterations to the written music - rhythmic variations such as rubato and notes inégale as well as improvised ornamentationOrnament (music)
In music, ornaments or embellishments are musical flourishes that are not necessary to carry the overall line of the melody , but serve instead to decorate or "ornament" that line. Many ornaments are performed as "fast notes" around a central note...
- were common in Bach's time and that fast movements were played faster than has been traditionally accepted. Scholarly opposition to Newman's approach was led by Frederick Neumann who had long-held that notes inégal were limited primarily to French performance practice and that Bach, who traveled relatively little, would not have been exposed to this technique. In reviewing Newman's Bach and the Baroque in 1987 Neumann was at first somewhat gracious calling Newman "...a splendid keyboard performer who can dazzle his audiences with brilliant virtuosic feats. He can, and often does, play faster than perhaps any of his colleagues, and shows occasionally other signs of eccentricity." However he takes Newman to task for "careless scholarship" citing misuse of terms such as tactus and misinterpretation of Bach's notation. But his most enthusiastic objections are to Newman's defense of the use of notes inégal in the performance of Bach. Most of Neumann's complaints question the validity of Newman's sources.
Music critics too have been of two minds about Newman's interpretations of Bach. Here are some examples all from the New York Times:
- "A hiccup effect, or a sudden pause…is it rubato or something else that Mr. Newman applies…whatever it is, it lurches absurdly."
- "His use of rubato as a structural device is particularly subtle – tiny pauses at various key spots to isolate and define vertical blocks within a phrase"
- "…his accents…startle, even outrage…it is like listening to someone who speaks your native language with breathtaking fluency but in a thick accent, sprinkled with outrageous mispronunciations."
- "His free use of rhythm to define larger phrase structures…does serve its purpose admirably in addition to adding a touch of drama to his performances."
Over time Newman's fast tempos have become relatively common in the performance of Bach's works and his championing of the use of original instruments foreshadowed the historically informed performance movement in America by at least ten years.
Personal life
Although raised in a Catholic family, Newman abandoned strict Roman Christianity at age 20 and at 28 became a follower of Zen Buddhism. He has practiced meditation several hours a day since then. Newman was a volunteer at the hospice unit of Stamford Hospital from 1995 to 2004. Since 1968 he has been married to record producer, conductor, organist and harpsichordist Mary Jane Newman. They have three children.Selected discography
CBS Masterworks/Columbia- Anthony Newman, Harpsichord
- Anthony Newman: Music for Organ
- Anthony Newman Plays and Conducts Bach and Haydn
- Anthony Newman Plays Harpsichord, Organ, and Pedal Harpsichord
- Anthony Newman Plays J.S. Bach on the Pedal Harpsichord and Organ
- Bach: Goldberg Variations
- The Well Tempered Clavier Book I
- The Well Tempered Clavier Book II
- Bach: The Six Brandenburg Concertos
Digitech
- Handel: Water Music, Music for the Royal Fireworks
Helicon
- Bach at Lejansk
- Bach In Celebration
- Bach: The Goldberg Variations
Infinity Digital/Sony
- Bach Favorite Organ Works
- Bach: Goldberg Variations
Moss Music Group/Vox
- Bach: The Twenty-Four Organ Preludes and Fugues
- Bach: Toccatas for Harpsichord"
- Famous Organ Works
- Bach: Suite No. 2 in B minor; Telemann: Suite in A minor (with Julius Baker)
Newport Classic
- Bach: Preludes and Fugues for Organ
- Bach: Trio Sonatas
- Beethoven Sonatas (fortepiano)
- Couperin: Two Organ Masses
- Franck: Complete Works for the Organ
- J.S. Bach: Goldberg Variations
- Mozart: Complete Piano Sonatas (fortepiano)
- Romantic Masterworks for Organ
- Romantic Organ, Vol II
- Scarlatti Sonatas
- Solo Organ Concertos
- Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 1 (fortepiano)
- Beethoven: Piano Concertos No. 2 and 4 (fortepiano)
- Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 3 (fortepiano)
- Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5 (fortepiano)
- J.S. Bach: Concertos for One and Two Harpsichords
- Schumann: Piano Concerto
- Beethoven: Violin Sonatas (fortepiano)
- Lutheran Organ Mass
Sony
- Handel: Harpsichord Suites
- Mozart: Famous Piano Sonatas
- Scarlatti: Harpsichord Sonatas
- Baroque Duet (with Wynton Marsalis and Kathleen Battle)
- Grace (with Kathleen Battle)
- Saint-Saëns: Symphony No. 3, 'Organ'
- Bach: The Brandenburg Concertos
- Classic Wynton (with Wynton Marsalis)
- In Gabriel's Garden (with Wynton Marsalis)
903 Records
- J.S. Bach: Six Partitas
- J.S. Bach: Well Tempered Clavier Book 2
- J.S. Bach: Works for Pedal Harpsichord and Organ
- The Music of J.S. Bach
- Selections from Bach's Brandenburg Concerti
- J.S. Bach: Concerto in D Minor, Seven Toccatas for Harpsichord
Khaeon
- Bach: The Well Tempered Clavier, Book 1 (complete piano and organ)
- Bach: The Great Works for the Organ
Selected discography of compositions
903 Records- Anthony Newman: Three Symphonies for Organ Solo
- Anthony Newman: Nicole
- Anthony Newman: Complete Works for Cello and Piano
- Anthony Newman: Complete Works for Violin and Piano
- Anthony Newman: Te Deum Laudamus
- Anthony Newman: Large Chamber Works: Chamber Concerto, String Quartet #2, Piano Quintet
- Anthony Newman: Complete Works for Organ Solo
- Anthony Newman: American Classic Symphonies 1 and 2
- Ittzes Plays Newman: Complete Works for Flute
- Anthony Newman: 12 Preludes and Fugues in Ascending Key Order for Piano Solo
- Anthony Newman: Complete Music for Violin
Newport Classic
- On Fallen Heros: Orchestral Works
Khaeon
- Requiem
Awards
- 1958 French Government Bourse Scholarship
- 1963 Variell Fellowship, Harvard University
- 1964 Winner, International Composition Competition (organ solo), Nice, France
- 1967 Fulbright Fellowship
- 1977 Harpsichordist of the Year, Keyboard magazine
- 1978 Harpsichordist of the Year, Keyboard magazine
- 1981 Classical Keyboardist of the Year, Keyboard magazine
- 1986 Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto chosen Record of the Year by Stereo Review
- 1993 Boston University Distinguished Graduate award
- 2004 Musica Sacra award
- 30 consecutive annual composer awards from The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP)
External links
- http://www.anthonynewmanmusician.org Anthony Newman, musician
- http://www.anthonynewmancomposer.com Anthony Newman, composer
- http://www.bach-newman.com Bach-Newman
- http://www.classical.net/music/recs/reviews/farwood/anthonynewman.php Anthony Newman: The High Priest of Bach is Still Controversial
- http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Bio/Newman-Anthony.htm Biography
- http://www.ljms.org/1786-Curious-Listener-interviews-harpsichordist-organist-composer-and-author-Anthony-Newman.html Interview
- http://www.chambermusicsociety.org/artists/artist/anthony_newman Biography
- http://www.allmusic.com/artist/anthony-newman-q7776/biography Biography
- http://pipedreams.publicradio.org/listings/2011/1132/ A Newman For All Seasons
- http://pipedreams.publicradio.org/listings/2000/2034/ Newman At Large