January - 21st Century Music

Shortly after the inauguration of President MiguelAleman in 1946, Chavez was appointed director of anew administrative body called the Instituto Nacional deBellas Artes.From January 1947 until 1952, Chavez served asdirector-general of the National Institute of Fine Arts. Inhis first year, he formed the National SymphonyOrchestra.Due to his new responsibilities, however, Chávez had togive up his position with the Orquesta Sinfonía deMéxico, whose charter was dissolved in 1949, and hisoutput of new compositions was also significantlydiminished. Perhaps his most notable work from thisperiod was his Concerto for Violin and Piano (1950).Chávez retired from the Instituto Nacional de BellasArtes in 1952. During the 1950’s and 1960’s hereceived a number of commissions for new works,including three symphonies: Symphony No. 4(Louisville Symphony Orchestra), Symphony No. 5(Sergei Koussevitsky Foundation), and Symphony No. 6(Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts).In May 1953, he was commissioned by Lincoln Kirstein,director of the New York City center of Music andDrama, for a three-act opera to a libretto by ChesterKallman based on a story by Boccaccio, to be titled TheTuscan Players. Intended to be finished in August 1954,it was first postponed to April 1955, but only finallycompleted in 1956, by which time the title had beenchanged twice, first to Panfilo and Lauretta, then to ElAmor Propiciado. The City Center waived its rights tothe first performance, which was given under the titlePanfilo and Lauretta in the Brander Matthews Theatre atColumbia University in New York on May 9, 1957,under the baton of Howard Shanet. Stage direction wasby Bill Butler, scenic design by Herbert Senn and HelenPond, and costumes by Sylvia Wintle. The principalsingers were Sylvia Stahlman, Frank Porretta, CraigTimberlake, Mary McMurray, Michael Kermoyan, andThomas Stewart. The opera would be revised twice moreand the title changed again to Los Visitantes (TheVisitors), for productions in 1968 and 1973, in MexicoCity and Aptos, California, respectively.In the fourth lecture, Repetition in Music -- he describesa mode of composition already observable in many ofhis compositions since the 1920's, in which "the idea ofrepetition and variation can be replaced by the notion ofconstant rebirth, of true derivation: a stream that nevercomes back to its source; a stream in eternaldevelopment, like a spiral."He resumed administrative duties in 1969 when heaccepted the post as Secretariat of Public Education, andafter he had harshly criticized the current teachingmethods of the Conservatorio Nacional, Mexico’s newpresident Luis Echeverría appointed him to develop acomprehensive curriculum for the public schools andbestowed on him the post of Head of the MusicDepartment of INBA and music director of the OrquestaSinfónica Nacional. A dispute with the orchestramembers’ union led to his resignation from both posts.His orchestral Discovery (1969) was commissioned bythe Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music. From thenext year to 1973, he served as the Festival's MusicDirector.Most of his final years were spent in New York City, ashe remained disillusioned with the state of musical lifein Mexico. He took an apartment directly across fromthe Lincoln Center in 1974, where he resided until hisdeath. He gave his final performance conducting thepremiere of his Concerto for Trombone on May8, 1978,in Washington, DC.Carlos Chavez died on August 2, 1978, while visitinghis daughter Ana in the Coyoacan suburb of MexicoCity.His manuscripts and papers are housed in the MusicDivision of the New York Public Library for thePerforming Arts and in the National Archive of Mexico,in Mexico City.From 1958-1959, he was the Charles Eliot Nortonprofessor at Harvard University, and the public lectureshe gave there were published as Musical Thought(1961).3