Bernard Jacobson

Bernard Jacobson ([email protected]), until recently a contributing editor of Fanfare Magazine, has spent periods as music critic of the Chicago Daily News, visiting professor of music at Roosevelt University in Chicago, director of Southern Arts in Winchester, England, promotion director for Boosey & Hawkes Music Publishers, program annotator and musicologist for the Philadelphia Orchestra (where he worked for eight years with Riccardo Muti and created the Orchestra’s chamber-music series), artistic director of the Residentie Orkest in The Hague, and artistic adviser to the North Netherlands Orchestra. He took over responsibility for program notes and pre-concert lectures for the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia beginning with the 2001-2002 season, and reviews regularly on the Internet at musicweb-international.com.

Born in London in 1936, Mr Jacobson studied philosophy, history, and classics at Oxford. In addition to books on Brahms and on conducting, his publications include A Polish Renaissance (a study of the music of Panufnik, Lutos»awski, Penderecki, and Górecki, published in 1996 by Phaidon Press), articles and reviews including entries in Encyclopaedia Britannica and The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, a booklet documenting Carnegie Hall’s 2000 Perspectives series in celebration of Daniel Barenboim’s 50th year on the concert stage, and translations from ten languages. He is currently working on a study of the music of Panufnik in collaboration with Philip Greenwood, and on a memoir covering a critical career spanning nearly half a century. Mr Jacobson’s English version of Siegfried Matthus’s Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke, presented by Glyndebourne Touring Opera in 1993, has also been produced in New York; he has translated Matthus’s Judith for a Santa Fe Opera production and Hans Werner Henze’s La Cubana for its English premiere at Sadler’s Wells Theatre. His poetry has been set to music by the American composer Richard Wernick and the Englishman Wilfred Josephs.

Mr Jacobson has performed as narrator in his own translation of Stravinsky’s L'Histoire du soldat with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra. With the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra (conducted by Edo de Waart) and Radio Chamber Orchestra (conducted by Ingo Metzmacher) he has narrated works by Theo Loevendie and Virgil Thomson in the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, and the Cologne Philharmonie. His linking narration for Mendelssohn’s Antigone was given its first performance by Claire Bloom at the 1991 Bard Festival; he subsequently performed it himself with the San Jose Symphony in California, where he returned to narrate Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex during the 1997/98 season. He has recorded the role of Noah in Stravinsky’s The Flood under Oliver Knussen’s direction for Deutsche Grammophon, repeating it in his 1996 debut at the BBC Promenade Concerts in London, and is the speaker in the Nonesuch recording of Schoenberg’s Ode to Napoleon, a work he also performed at Almeida Opera in London in 1992, with Klangforum Wien at the 1995 Vienna Festival; and with Ignat Solzhenitsyn and the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia in 2003.

Bernard Jacobson Curriculum vitae

625 NE Vena Street
Bremerton, WA 98311
USA
tel (360) 373-9389
[email protected]

Personal Born 2 March 1936, London, England; UK citizen; married

Full-time posts held:

Artistic Director, Residentie Orkest (Hague Philharmonic), 1992-94
Program Annotator and Musicologist, The Philadelphia Orchestra, 1988-91
Manager, Publications & Educational Programs, The Philadelphia Orchestra 1984-88
Director of Promotion, Boosey & Hawkes Ltd, London, 1982-84
Deputy Director of Publications, Boosey & Hawkes Ltd., 1979-81
Director, Southern Arts Association, Winchester, England, 1973-76
Music Critic, Chicago Daily News, 1967-73. Classical Promotion Officer, EMI International, London, 1962-64.
Liner-note Writer, Philips, Holland, 1960-62.

Part-time posts:

Teaching & Lecturer at BBC Symphony Orchestra Lutos»awski Festival, London, 1997.
Lecturer at symposium on Cherubini, Ravenna Festival, 1991
Lecturer, Temple University, Philadelphia, 1986-90
Lecturer (in German) at Brahms Symposium, Leipzig Gewandhaus, 1983
Visiting Professor of Music, Roosevelt University, Chicago, 1972
Lecturer in Fine Arts, University of Chicago, 1971
Substitute instructor and chorus conductor, Bronx Community College, New York, 1971
Lectures for Yale, Boston, Southern Methodist, Northern Illinois, DePaul, and Temple universities, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Vassar College, Chicago City Colleges, ISCM, and other bodies; pre-concert talks for orchestras and concert series in Philadelphia, Chicago, Reading (PA), Charlottesville (VA), Fairfax (VA), and elsewhere

Other

Program annotator and lecturer, Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, 2001-

Activities

Member, board of directors, Theodore Presser Co. 1996-2004
Artistic Adviser, North Netherlands Orchestra, 1994-96
Associate, Joy Mebus Artists’ Management ,1993-94
Artistic Committee member, Utrecht Conservatoire, 1993-94
Music Advisory Panel member, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, 1987-88
Panel member, Pennsylvania Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts, 1989/1991
Independent evaluator, National Endowment for the Arts, 1985-91
Board of Management & Music Advisory Panel member, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, 1973-76
Member of Jury, first John Player Conducting Competition, Portsmouth, England (selecting Simon Rattle as winner), 1975
British Government delegate & member of Drafting Committee, Council of Europe symposium on Support for the Arts, Yerres, France, 1975
Music Advisory Panel member, Illinois Arts Council, 1967-73
Assistant producer, RCA recording sessions, 1967
Performing Narration in Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex with Leonid Grin and the San Jose Symphony Orchestra, California, 1998
Noah in Stravinsky’s The Flood with Oliver Knussen and BBC Symphony Orchestra at Henry Wood Promenade Concerts, London, 1996 (also recorded role with Knussen and London Sinfonietta for DGG)
Narration in Mendelssoh’s Antigone (own English text) with Leonid Grin and San Jose Symphony Orchestra, California, 1994
Narration in Thomson’s The Plow that Broke the Plains with Ingo Metzmacher and Netherlands Radio Chamber Orchestra in Amsterdam Concertgebouw, 1994
Narration in Loevendie’s The Nightingale with Edo de Waart and Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra at Concertgebouw and (in German) at Cologne Philharmonie, 1994
Recitation (in Italian) in Berio’s Laborintus II with Residentie Orkest, 1993
Recitation in Walton’s Façade, Philadelphia Orchestra Chamber Music Concerts, 1991
Narration in Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale (own English version), Philadelphia Orchestra Chamber Music Concerts and elsewhere, 1986/1990/1991
Narration in Schoenberg’s Ode to Napoleon, recorded by Nonesuch 1968 (also performances in Baltimore, London, Tampere, Graz, Vienna and Philadelphia)

Broadcasts

Intermission features, WFMT-syndicated Philadelphia Orch. broadcasts, 1984-86
Own weekly program, "Music Showcase," on WFMT, WQXR, etc., 1966
Frequent television & radio appearances on BBC, WABC, WHYY, etc.

Critical posts

Editorial & Contributing Editor, Fanfare, 1997-2005
Reviewer, Stereo Review, 1970-73
Contributing Editor, High Fidelity/Musical America, 1966-69
North American correspondent, Music and Musicians, 1964-67
Netherlands music correspondent, The Times, London, 1960-62

Publications

Andrzej Panufnik and His Music, with Philip Greenwood, in preparation
The History of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra: Northwestern University Press, in preparation
Star Turns and Cameo Appearances: An Allobiography, in preparation
A Polish Renaissance: A biographical and critical study of the music of Panufnik, Lutos»awski, Penderecki, and Górecki: Phaidon Press
Singers on Singing, in preparation
Conductors on Conducting: Columbia Publishing Company
The Music of Johannes Brahms: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press
Articles in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 1980, and Dictionary of 20th Century Music, Dutton, 1974
“Sonata” in Encyclopaedia Britannica, 15th edition, 1974
“The Songs” in The Chopin Companion, edited by Alan Walker, Norton paperback, (first published as Frédéric Chopin, London, New York)
Two for Jan, poems for songs by Richard Wernick: Theodore Presser Company
Ball of Sun, poem for song by Richard Wernick: Theodore Presser Company
Death of a Young Man, poems for song-cycle by Wilfred Josephs, commissioned by and performed at 1971 Harrogate Festival: Basil Ramsey
Annotations for New York Philharmonic, London Symphony, Royal Philharmonic, Edinburgh Festival, La Scala Milan, Carnegie Hall, EMI, etc.
Translation For VEB Deutscher Verlag für Musik/B. Schott's Söhne, Mainz: Siegfried Matthus’s Judith (from German text of Friedrich Hebbel) and Die Weise von Liebe und Tod des Cornets Christoph Rilke (from German text by Rilke)
For English Music Theatre and B. Schott's Söhne, Mainz: Hans Werner
Henze’s La Cubana (from German text of Hans Magnus Enzensberger)
For Theodore Presser Company: Three Gretchen Songs from Faust, by Stanley Walden (from German text of Goethe)
Operas by Hindemith and Ton de Leeuw, and texts and articles from French, German, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, Polish, Swedish, Finnish, Latin, and Greek

Education

Scholar of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, 1956-60; BA, Literae Humaniores, 1960; MA 1962

Biographical references

International Who’s Who in Music, Dictionary of International Biography, Who’s Who in America, The Blue Book, etc.