Beveridge Webster

Beveridge Webster (1934).
Photo by Carl Van Vechten

Beveridge Webster (May 13, 1908, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania – June 30, 1999, in Hanover, New Hampshire) was an American pianist and educator.

Biography

Beveridge Webster initially studied with his father, who was director of the Pittsburgh Conservatory of Music.[1] In 1921, at the age of fourteen, he began five years of study in Europe, first at the American Academy at Fontainebleau,[1] then at the Paris Conservatory with Isidor Philipp and Nadia Boulanger. He also studied in Berlin with Artur Schnabel.[2]

He made his New York debut in November 1934 with the New York Philharmonic performing Edward MacDowell's Piano Concerto No. 2.[2] In 1937, he gave the New York Philharmonic premiere (on short notice, replacing Dushkin) of Stravinsky's Capriccio, under Stravinsky's baton.[3]

Webster was best known as an interpreter of French composers, especially Maurice Ravel (who he met in Paris as a student) and Claude Debussy. He premiered an early version of Ravel's Tzigane in 1924, and in 1975 he celebrated Ravel's centenary by performing the complete Ravel piano solo oeuvre at Juilliard.[4] In 1968, over a three-concert series at The Town Hall, he commemorated the 50th anniversary of Debussy's death with the first complete survey of the composer's piano works in New York.[2]

Webster gave premieres or made first recordings of many contemporary works, including pieces by Louise Talma, Roger Sessions, Roy Harris, Aaron Copland and Elliott Carter.

A Time magazine article from 1937 said of Webster, "Dark, well-knit, young Beveridge Webster is a good swimmer, takes pride in his tennis, likes to play poker or bridge with his great good friend Igor Stravinsky. He boasts of the little slam he once made against Sidney Lenz."[1]

In 1937, novelist Willa Cather attended a recital at New York’s Town Hall by Webster, and wrote him a brief letter praising his performance, "That was the third time I had heard you play the Schumann, and this week I thought there was a kind of larger freedom in your treatment and a careless care in shooting the rapids (a queer figure of speech, but if you’ve ever seen the Canadian canoe men shoot rapids, you will know that I mean something (not velocity) which I am unable to say in technical musical language)."[5]

He taught at New England Conservatory from 1940 to 1946 and at the Juilliard School from 1946 to 1990.[2] His students include Michel Block, Robert McDonald, Jahja Ling, Sylvia Glickman, Steven Graff and Hao Huang. He made a substantial series of recordings issued on LP by Dover Publications and at least one, billed as the first installment in a complete traversal of Schubert's piano sonatas, for MGM Records, released as E3711.

Beveridge Webster had two children. One, Michael Webster, was formerly the principal clarinetist of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. He played under the baton of Aaron Copland for a performance of Copland's Clarinet Concerto. Michael Webster now teaches at the Shepherd School at Rice University in Houston, Texas.

References

  1. ^ a b c "Maestro & Prodigy". Time. January 25, 1937. Archived from the original on December 22, 2010. Retrieved June 26, 2008.
  2. ^ a b c d Kozinn, Allan (July 7, 1999). "Beveridge Webster, a Pianist And a Longtime Teacher, 91". The New York Times.
  3. ^ Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra (Program notes to New York Philharmonic concert).
  4. ^ Kozinn, Allan (July 7, 1999). "Beveridge Webster, a Pianist And a Longtime Teacher, 91". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved June 30, 2023.
  5. ^ "Cather's Evolving Ear: Music Reheard in the Late Fiction". Cather Studies, Vol. 12, P68-88. University of Nebraska Press. 2020.