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Saturday Afternoons At The Old Met: The Metropolitan Opera Broadcasts 1931-1950
(Amadeus). In this first of three volumes, Paul Jackson begins a rich and detailed history of the early years of the Metropolitan Opera broadcasts, bringing to life more than 200 recorded broadcasts.
- GenresNonfictionMusic
586 pages, Hardcover
First published December 31, 1992
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About the author
Paul Jackson
3 booksPaul Jackson (1927-2017) was professor emeritus of music and dean emeritus of the College of Fine Arts at Drake University, and studied at the Vienna Academy of Music, with a Ph.D. in musicology from Stanford University.
During the 1950s and 1960s he toured as pianist for many Metropolitan Opera
singers and served as opera house manager for the Central City Opera and Drama Festivals in Colorado. In 1964 he began his long tenure as dean at Drake.
A contributor to Opera News, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, and The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, he is the author of three books covering the opera broadcasts made from New York's Metropolitan Opera from the earliest broadcasts in 1931 to the advent of live television broadcasts in 1976.
(Note: there are multiple Paul Jacksons in the Goodreads database; this is for the opera writer.)
During the 1950s and 1960s he toured as pianist for many Metropolitan Opera
singers and served as opera house manager for the Central City Opera and Drama Festivals in Colorado. In 1964 he began his long tenure as dean at Drake.
A contributor to Opera News, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, and The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, he is the author of three books covering the opera broadcasts made from New York's Metropolitan Opera from the earliest broadcasts in 1931 to the advent of live television broadcasts in 1976.
(Note: there are multiple Paul Jacksons in the Goodreads database; this is for the opera writer.)
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July 15, 2024
A book (and a trilogy) for life.
The Metropolitan Opera began weekly radio broadcasts across the USA in 1931, ahead of its 50th anniversary. At first in league with NBC (later ABC and then CBS, and finally as a solo enterprise), the Met would broadcast most of its Saturday matinee performances - and occasional special events - hosted by Milton Cross for an astonishing 43 years before his death. The broadcasts reached many millions of Americans, bringing elite-level opera performances to people in every part of the country, and from every walk of life. It is a truly astonishing democratisation of the world's greatest artform (in this humble listener's opinion).
The Metropolitan has had its share of detractors, especially from the snootier or more avant-garde sides of the music world. At times in its lifetime, the Met has been seen as a safe and comfortable pair of hands, a house that would prefer to coddle its subscribers rather than reach for anything challenging, an opera house with resources that are the envy of everyone outside of the three 'big' opera countries of Europe and yet has often presented a limited repertoire and been partial to which opera stars it considers suitable. None of these criticisms is without some truth. Yet I stand at odds with many of my contemporaries in my opinion of the Met. Partly it's because I do have (I'm sorry to say) a "subscriber" mentality; I want great opera, and I want it done my way. More than that, I thrive on clear boundaries and closed spaces when it comes to art, which is to say that I greatly enjoy following the careers of the conductors, stars, directors, chorus and orchestra of one house, rather than a house that may take whomever is absolutely gold-star best-of-them-all for any particular production without any ongoing narrative thread. (Perhaps this comes from living in Australia. An isolated island nation forces one to connect with the stories of the creatives who recur throughout one's life, rather than expecting thousands of newcomers to show up every year and impress us with their exacting performances.)
Or perhaps the above makes no sense. Either way, what the late Paul Jackson gave us in this volume and its two successors is a work that rewards slow, detailed reading and listening over many years.
Here, Jackson covers all of the surviving broadcasts from the first twenty years (which is most of them, impressively) in detail. A musicology professor and opera house manager, Jackson's knowledge of opera ran not just to performers and arias but to individual lines and specific notes. He meticulously examines each season, charting out the progress of all involved and the comparative quality of the blessed music being made. This is perhaps not for beginners, although it would still prove a useful guide to them, as Jackson packs the volume with musical terminology and citations to specific moments in the opera (in the original language). It is a guide that is all the more rewarding as one develops their love of the artform, but is a useful key to unlocking the strange world of decades-old radio broadcasts.
When Jackson wrote this book, most of these recordings were only available as bootlegs, unless people happened to live in or near New York City and the libraries that held them. Now, almost all of the recordings discussed are freely available on Youtube or the Met's own (wonderful) streaming service. The book's function has changed, therefore, from an insight into a lost world to a guidebook to a remarkable treasure trove. Here are the singers and conductors who defined opera for a generation in the US, along with plenty of historical material as to how the broadcasts were planned, executed, funded, and furthered.
Jackson's trilogy concludes in 1976, after the death of Cross and just before the Met began adding live television simulcasts to their seasons. The opera broadcasts went on, and indeed remain so as they near their 100th birthday. Four beloved hosts have succeeded Cross; the quality of broadcasts has increased dramatically; radio and television have been joined by cinema and internet streaming options; and the Met's reach has gone global. We have so much to be grateful for, however I must concede that - as a millennial whose interest in opera chiefly lies in the years from 1960 onwards - there are surprises and gems galore to be found in the world of opera from this strange and distant time.
Exhilarating.
The Metropolitan Opera began weekly radio broadcasts across the USA in 1931, ahead of its 50th anniversary. At first in league with NBC (later ABC and then CBS, and finally as a solo enterprise), the Met would broadcast most of its Saturday matinee performances - and occasional special events - hosted by Milton Cross for an astonishing 43 years before his death. The broadcasts reached many millions of Americans, bringing elite-level opera performances to people in every part of the country, and from every walk of life. It is a truly astonishing democratisation of the world's greatest artform (in this humble listener's opinion).
The Metropolitan has had its share of detractors, especially from the snootier or more avant-garde sides of the music world. At times in its lifetime, the Met has been seen as a safe and comfortable pair of hands, a house that would prefer to coddle its subscribers rather than reach for anything challenging, an opera house with resources that are the envy of everyone outside of the three 'big' opera countries of Europe and yet has often presented a limited repertoire and been partial to which opera stars it considers suitable. None of these criticisms is without some truth. Yet I stand at odds with many of my contemporaries in my opinion of the Met. Partly it's because I do have (I'm sorry to say) a "subscriber" mentality; I want great opera, and I want it done my way. More than that, I thrive on clear boundaries and closed spaces when it comes to art, which is to say that I greatly enjoy following the careers of the conductors, stars, directors, chorus and orchestra of one house, rather than a house that may take whomever is absolutely gold-star best-of-them-all for any particular production without any ongoing narrative thread. (Perhaps this comes from living in Australia. An isolated island nation forces one to connect with the stories of the creatives who recur throughout one's life, rather than expecting thousands of newcomers to show up every year and impress us with their exacting performances.)
Or perhaps the above makes no sense. Either way, what the late Paul Jackson gave us in this volume and its two successors is a work that rewards slow, detailed reading and listening over many years.
Here, Jackson covers all of the surviving broadcasts from the first twenty years (which is most of them, impressively) in detail. A musicology professor and opera house manager, Jackson's knowledge of opera ran not just to performers and arias but to individual lines and specific notes. He meticulously examines each season, charting out the progress of all involved and the comparative quality of the blessed music being made. This is perhaps not for beginners, although it would still prove a useful guide to them, as Jackson packs the volume with musical terminology and citations to specific moments in the opera (in the original language). It is a guide that is all the more rewarding as one develops their love of the artform, but is a useful key to unlocking the strange world of decades-old radio broadcasts.
When Jackson wrote this book, most of these recordings were only available as bootlegs, unless people happened to live in or near New York City and the libraries that held them. Now, almost all of the recordings discussed are freely available on Youtube or the Met's own (wonderful) streaming service. The book's function has changed, therefore, from an insight into a lost world to a guidebook to a remarkable treasure trove. Here are the singers and conductors who defined opera for a generation in the US, along with plenty of historical material as to how the broadcasts were planned, executed, funded, and furthered.
Jackson's trilogy concludes in 1976, after the death of Cross and just before the Met began adding live television simulcasts to their seasons. The opera broadcasts went on, and indeed remain so as they near their 100th birthday. Four beloved hosts have succeeded Cross; the quality of broadcasts has increased dramatically; radio and television have been joined by cinema and internet streaming options; and the Met's reach has gone global. We have so much to be grateful for, however I must concede that - as a millennial whose interest in opera chiefly lies in the years from 1960 onwards - there are surprises and gems galore to be found in the world of opera from this strange and distant time.
Exhilarating.
Displaying 1 of 1 review