Bandmaster's Jubilee

The skies dripped intermittently. The trees dripped steadily. Several hundred umbrellas dripped rhythmically above the benches. Suddenly a silver-haired little man skipped nimbly to the front of his band, waved the first downbeat.

He was Edwin Franko Goldman, No. 1 U.S. bandmaster, celebrating his silver jubilee last week. For the 25th summer in a row he was conducting his band in Manhattan's Central Park, in a nightly series of free open-air concerts.

Conductor Goldman, who has encountered all kinds of weather and all sizes of audiences (up to 60,000) in his 1,398 concerts, was unruffled by the wet evening. He knew that of the hardy hundreds who braved the rain, some were there to hear the light, pleasant band numbers: a grand march, a Strauss waltz, a fantasy for cornet. Others came for the tangier items by modern composers: Aaron Copland's An Outdoor Overture (led by the composer), a suite for band by the late British composer Gustav Hoist, works by Percy Grainger, Philip James, Stravinsky. Bandmaster Goldman caters to varied tastes, puts on music undreamed-of in oldtime band-concert days, when the Poet and Peasant Overture was the absolute ceiling.

Free music for city people was Goldman's idea when he founded his summer band concerts in 1918, wheedled $300,000 to support them, mainly from rich New Yorkers. Later the Guggenheim family (copper) adopted them as a private benefaction. But their popular success is due mainly to Bandmaster Goldman's devotion to the sound of reeds and brasses.

Edwin Franko Goldman, 64, took up the cornet at 8, at 17 became solo cornettist of the Metropolitan Opera House orchestra. Goldman might have lived out his days as a virtuoso, but for his experience tootling in summer bands. Shocked at their slipshod playing, their lack of rehearsals, he bowed to an ambition--to bring orchestral nuances to band music. At the first rehearsal of Goldman's own band, the players found their parts a mass of hen tracks in red ink, detailed instructions for phrasing, etc. Said one musician: "This is just like a kindergarten." But one rehearsal converted them. The Goldman Band developed into a precision instrument.

Now successor to John Philip Sousa as top U.S. bandmaster, Goldman finds the world far less attuned to blown music than in Sousa's heyday. The broadcast subtleties of symphonic music and of modern jazz arrangements have eclipsed the concert band. But Conductor Goldman's faith is not shaken. Says he of band music: "I don't believe it's inferior; I just believe it's different."

To swell his repertory, Goldman has composed 85 marches himself. Most popular of his marches is On the Mall. Written for the dedication of a new bandstand in Central Park, it so displeased Goldman that he shelved it. When he finally tried it out at an open-air concert, he directed with one hand, held his nose with the other. The roar of applause so surprised him that he nearly reeled off the stand.

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