Urban renewal projects were the great hope for the performing arts in 1961. For "Throwback Thursday," here's an excerpt from "A Year in Music," in which WQXR program director Abram Chasins and the conductor Erich Leinsdorf discuss how the forthcoming opening of Lincoln Center and other U.S. venues would bring new visibility for artists.
"The Lincoln Center project is unquestionably important not only per se as a center for the performing arts," said Leinsdorf. "It's almost important that it should focus so much attention on the performing arts in the entire country." He went on to cite the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC and the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles, each of which followed the "arts campus" model (also championed by Robert Moses).
Philharmonic Hall (now Avery Fisher Hall) opened in 1962, followed by the New York State Theater (now David H. Koch Theater) and the Metropolitan Opera House, in 1964 and 1966, respectively.
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"Some sweet day the arts in our country will be represented at even the highest levels of government," Chasins enthused. "I think that The Lincoln Center should have a tremendous influence." (The center was not without controversy, as some area residents worried it was pushing out working-class people to build a fancy arts venue for the affluent.)
Leinsdorf asks: "What is going to happen with the places which are being vacated by the constituents of The Lincoln Center?" While the audio of their conversation unfortunately cuts off at this point, his rhetorical question was answered in part when the old Met Opera House was demolished in 1966. Carnegie Hall, of course, was saved from the wrecking ball in 1960.
The Austrian-born Leinsdorf conducted the Boston Symphony during the opening weekend of Philharmonic Hall performances in September 1962 (along with the Philadelphia Orchestra led by Eugene Ormandy and the New York Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein). Eight years later he led the inaugural performance of the Juilliard Theater, a performance of Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress.
Audio: WQXR Archive Collections