The Real Toscanini: Musicians Reveal the Maestro (Amadeus)

Cesare Civetta's new book has a great deal of new material which provides some remarkable insights into this complex, sometimes contradictory and tormented genius. Although this volume sometimes quotes from B.H. Haggin's The Toscanini Musicians Knew, there are other interviews with surviving orchestra members and colleagues conducted by Civetta himself. The organization by topic, political, personal and musical is extremely helpful. New to many of us is the quotations from Giuseppe Valdengo's "Scusi, conosce Toscanini?" also printed under the title "Ho cantato con Toscanini" in 1962. Valdengo was pricipal baritone in some fo Toscanini's most important opera recordings. The translations of passages from the book into English are phenomenally informative. Valdengo recorded ,literally, many of his conversations with the Maestro. Toscanini may have erupted at his artists in rehearsal but he could be extremely genial and friendly in private. The discussions with Valdengo are like spending an evening with the Maestro and are revelatory. For one thing, though Toscanini hated making recordings, he seems to have been very knowledgeble about old recordings, historical even in his day, and advising Valdengo to study selected discs by Fernando de Lucia, Nazzareno de Angelis and others. He greatly admired Battistini and Tetrazzini. There are other surprises: some critics deprecate Renato Cellini's conducting of RCA's famous 1952 recording of TROVATORE (Milanov, Barbieri, Bjoerling, Warren) but Toscanini admired it tremendously for Cellini's innate sense of Verdian color and tempo transitions.The book also serves as a useful corrective to the sound of Toscanini's sometimes technically imperfect recordings and reveals a man that most musicians loved working with, despite his volcanic temper, the artistic high point of their lives.

The Real Toscanini - Musicians Reveal the Maestro, is a multifaceted, comprehensive and intimate portrait of a great conductor told in the words of those musicians who were closest to him. Based on interviews with 50 musicians who played for or were otherwise connected with Toscanini, plus supplemental material, the book offers insight into what it was like to be in the presence of the maestro. These musicians, top flight players all, almost to a person characterized their time with Toscanini as not only the high point of their musical lives, but of their lives as a whole. The book presents a coherent view of the maestro, one in which his artistic values are inseparable from his moral discipline and generosity of spirit. The Toscanini who demanded as much from his players as from himself, is the same Toscanini who unflinchingly defied Mussolini, and refused to return to Germany after 1931 despite his great love for Wagner's music and for conducting at Bayreuth. Highly recommended for musicians and non-musicians alike.

The author presents The Maestro through the eyes of many of the Singers and Orchestral musicians who worked with him. He shows the many sided personality of a great conductor; he could be extremely demanding and a very autocratic in the pursuit of musical perfection, but at other times he could be thoughtful and full of praise for a musician whom he thought very well of. Lots of quotes about Toscanini from many of the famous musicians of his time. They were from his later years when he conducted the NBC Symphony and out into retirement.Lots of good stuff, but after awhile the continued stories of adoration of the musicians gets a bit tiresome. Not much about his personal life of the man...I would like to know more about his life with his family and others.Worth the read, but it could have been better.

My five star rating is based on my personal interest in the subject matter. If someone is not a fan of Toscanini or the era in which he performed in, then this book may seem repetitious and more of a hagiography than anything else. As other reviewers have noted, this work is not a biographical account of a person's life, but a compilation of interviews and references to other's memoirs that give an insider's look at a great figure of 20th century classical music. Some background in music appreciation or musical training itself would be a helpful thing for getting the most out of this work. Very high recommendation for those who desire more information about Toscanini than can be obtained from the existing biographical works available.

Rather than a straight forward biography, this fascinating book focuses on the philosophy, self-discipline, and musical technique of Maestro Toscanini. Through an extensive series of interviews, a thoroughly rounded portrait emerges of a complex man who constantly strove for excellence in himself and expected the same from his collaborators, and who could be generous and loyal as well as demanding. I was especially interested in the chapter on his contribution to the world of opera. One of the many strengths of this book is the marvelous way that it is organized. A quick review of the chapter headings and sub-headings make it easy to find any specific quote or topic that you may be looking for. Highly recommended.

I'd pick this book to be my favorite on Toscanini, for it gives more details on Toscanini'sapproach to performing than any book I know. I understand Toscanini the musician better reading this book than any other.The musicians who worked with him speak with clarity and insight.There is no substitute for those who worked for him on what it was like to work for him.Obvious statement and this book drives the point home.

I loved this book because it affirmed what I knew from my teacher Fred Zimmermann: that Toscanini was inspiring because he expected everything from his musicians but even more from himself. It was wonderful to read the descriptions of rehearsals and concerts from the musicians I knew and respected for their life-long devotion to music.