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Nothing but the Best: The Struggle for Perfection at the Juilliard School
The Juilliard School is said to be the best music school in the world.
There in one building in the heart of New York City the most talented young musicians in the world converge. They come wanting to be the best. They come with optimism and enthusiasm, but they come also from coddled child¬ hoods, at the most vulnerable time in their lives, to one of the most brutal cities in the world, to one of the most competitive professions in the world, to a life where expression is everything but must be kept within strict bounds, to a life where the most basic human needs must be repressed.
This is the story of life at Juilliard: the nerve-racking audition, the constant pressure, the encounters with godlike teachers who terrify while they enchant, the agony of endless hours of lonely practice, the joy of artistic triumph, the tenuous friendships and romance between people bound by an obsession with something other than each other, up until the day the students must confront the harsh real world—only to discover that the "best" they sought with such passion may not even exist.
This book—the first on this remarkable institution—penetrates the white marble facade of the school and shatters the myths surrounding it. The author, who spent most of her life there, reveals through true stories the dark underside of the school. The stories are shocking, intimate, humorous, and ultimately touching. They add up to an unforgettable portrait of the best and the brightest at one of the mo. powerful institutions in the world, and offer insight into what it means to want, almost more than life itself, to be a world-class musician.
There in one building in the heart of New York City the most talented young musicians in the world converge. They come wanting to be the best. They come with optimism and enthusiasm, but they come also from coddled child¬ hoods, at the most vulnerable time in their lives, to one of the most brutal cities in the world, to one of the most competitive professions in the world, to a life where expression is everything but must be kept within strict bounds, to a life where the most basic human needs must be repressed.
This is the story of life at Juilliard: the nerve-racking audition, the constant pressure, the encounters with godlike teachers who terrify while they enchant, the agony of endless hours of lonely practice, the joy of artistic triumph, the tenuous friendships and romance between people bound by an obsession with something other than each other, up until the day the students must confront the harsh real world—only to discover that the "best" they sought with such passion may not even exist.
This book—the first on this remarkable institution—penetrates the white marble facade of the school and shatters the myths surrounding it. The author, who spent most of her life there, reveals through true stories the dark underside of the school. The stories are shocking, intimate, humorous, and ultimately touching. They add up to an unforgettable portrait of the best and the brightest at one of the mo. powerful institutions in the world, and offer insight into what it means to want, almost more than life itself, to be a world-class musician.
239 pages, Hardcover
Published January 1, 1987
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