- Person
- Leonard Bernstein
- Lived
- 1918–1990
- Field
- Music
- From
- American
The story
Leonard Bernstein and his wife, the Costa Rican-born actress Felicia Montealegre, shared a long commitment to civil liberties and human rights. Raised in Chile, Felicia became the first chair of the Women's Division of the New York Civil Liberties Union in 1963, and in the 1970s she worked behind the scenes for Amnesty International in Chile during its period of political turmoil. Amnesty, founded to campaign for people imprisoned for their beliefs, became a cause the couple supported together.
In October 1976 Bernstein conducted the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in Munich, with the Chilean pianist Claudio Arrau as soloist, in a concert to benefit Amnesty International. Arrau had once been Felicia's piano teacher when she first arrived in New York. The concert was filmed by Unitel, the company with which Bernstein recorded many of his performances.
Felicia died in June 1978. The following year Bernstein conducted the Berlin Philharmonic for the first and only time, in two charity concerts for Amnesty International. The invitation had come from the orchestra itself, and the programme was Mahler's Ninth Symphony, the work of a composer Bernstein had championed throughout his career. The performances were recorded live and released by Deutsche Grammophon.
To honour Felicia and continue their joint work, Bernstein established the Felicia Montealegre Bernstein Fund of Amnesty International USA, which provides aid to human rights activists. He also funded scholarships in her name at the Juilliard School, Columbia University School of the Arts and New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.
His human rights work went beyond the concert hall. In 1974 Bernstein was among the cultural figures who urged Senator Ted Kennedy to raise the case of the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, who had been barred from leaving the Soviet Union, with the Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev. Two days after Kennedy did so, Rostropovich received his exit visa. For Bernstein, music and conscience were never separate.
Why it matters
Bernstein used his fame and his music to raise money and attention for people imprisoned or persecuted for their beliefs, and the fund he created in his wife's name still supports human rights activists.
About Leonard Bernstein
Conductor & composer; "West Side Story," New York Philharmonic, music educator to a generation through the Young People's Concerts.
More about Leonard Bernstein
- Leonard Bernstein turned a prize into a school programmeWhen Leonard Bernstein won Japan's Praemium Imperiale in 1990, he used the 100,000 dollar prize to start an arts-in-education project that became the Artful Learning programme.
- Leonard Bernstein taught classical music to millions on TVLeonard Bernstein, the first American-born music director of the New York Philharmonic, wrote and hosted 53 televised Young People's Concerts, shown in more than 40 countries.
- Leonard Bernstein brought Mahler's symphonies back to lifeLeonard Bernstein was a critical figure in the modern revival of Gustav Mahler, recording his symphonies and helping make them central to the orchestral repertoire.
- Bernstein's Harvard lectures linked music and languageIn 1973 Leonard Bernstein gave six Charles Eliot Norton Lectures at Harvard, The Unanswered Question, applying ideas from linguistics to explain how music communicates.
- Bernstein's Ode to Freedom marked the Berlin Wall's fallOn Christmas Day 1989 Leonard Bernstein conducted Beethoven's Ninth in East Berlin to celebrate the fall of the Wall, changing the word joy to freedom for an audience of about 100 million.
- Leonard Bernstein founded the Pacific Music Festival in 1990In his final summer, 1990, Leonard Bernstein founded the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan, which has since trained more than 3,200 young musicians.
- Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story reinvented the musicalLeonard Bernstein's score for West Side Story, which opened on Broadway in 1957, fused jazz, Latin rhythms and symphonic technique and is still performed around the world.
- Bernstein's Young People's Concerts taught millions musicFrom 1958 to 1972 Leonard Bernstein presented 53 televised Young People's Concerts, often called the most influential music education series ever produced for television.
- Leonard Bernstein was an early champion of AIDS researchLeonard Bernstein took part in one of the earliest AIDS fundraisers in 1983 and later helped raise the first million dollars for amfAR's community-based clinical trials.
- Leonard Bernstein led a Journey for Peace to HiroshimaIn 1985 Leonard Bernstein took the European Community Youth Orchestra on a Journey for Peace tour, performing at the Hiroshima Peace Ceremony on the 40th anniversary of the bombing.
Sources
- Leonard Bernstein Wikipedia
- Felicia Montealegre Wikipedia
Another act of tikkun olam. This is part of tikkun olam, the Jewish idea of repairing the world, and every one of us can add to it.