Music: New Friends

Two years ago the New York Philharmonic-Symphony’s board of directors were casting about for a successor to Maestro Arturo Toscanini, just retired. Shortly after they signed up Germany’s famed Wilhelm Furtwangler it was announced from Berlin that Conductor Furtwangler had accepted the high, Nazi-dominated post of Generalmusikdirektor at the Berlin State Opera. Thereupon irate Philharmonic-Symphony subscribers demanded, and got, Conductor Furtwangler’s immediate resignation from the Philharmonic-Symphony post (TIME, March 23, 1936).

Leader of these irate subscribers was Ira Hirschmann, bright-eyed, bushy-haired vice president of Manhattan’s Saks-Fifth Avenue department store. Fed up with the system of wealthy patronage which controls the destinies of most U. S. symphony orchestras. Rebel Hirschmann decided to launch his own musical organization, founded the New Friends of Music Inc. Scheduling a series of concerts devoted exclusively to chamber music, music’s New Friends offered no stars but gave steady subscribers a chance to hear all the important chamber music Beethoven and Brahms ever wrote.

Last spring, as the New Friends of Music concluded their second successful season without benefit of Park Avenue patronage, Ira Hirschmann announced, for the season of 1938-39, that the usual array of chamber-music events would be augmented by 1) a brand-new, 36-man chamber orchestra, and 2) a conductor: Fritz Stiedry of Vienna’s Volksoper and Leningrad’s Philharmonic.

Last week the New Friends’ new orchestra and new conductor made their opening bow to Manhattan audiences. The new orchestra was notable for its youth (85% of its players are under 25) and for its five women instrumentalists. A packed house attended the opening, found the youthful orchestra well-stocked, found Conductor Stiedry something to shout about.