Victor Herbert: A Theatrical Life »

Neil Gould is Artistic Director of the Victor Herbert Festival, held each year at Saratoga Springs, NY, and has directed Victor Herbert productions in San Diego, Chicago, Baltimore, and New York City. Currently editing new editions of Herbert's major piano-vocal scores, he lives in Poughkeepsie, New York.

Victor Herbert is one of the giants of American culture. As a musician, conductor, and, above all, composer, he touched every corner of American musical life at the turn of the century, writing scores of songs, marches, concerti, and other works. But his most enduring legacy is on a different kind of stage, as one of the grandfathers of the modern musical theater.Now, Victor Herbert has the biography he deserves. Neil Gould draws on his own experience as a director, producer, and scholar to craft the first comprehensive portrait in fifty years of the Irish immigrant whose extraordinary talents defined the sounds of a generation and made contemporary American music possible.Mining a wealth of sources—many for the first time—Gould provides a fascinating portrait of Herbert and his world. Born in Dublin in 1859, Herbert arrived in the United States in 1886. From his first job in the orchestra pit of the Metropolitan Opera, Herbert went on to perform in countless festivals and concerts, and conduct the Pittsburgh Orchestra. In 1894, he composed his first operetta, Prince Ananias, and by the time of his death in 1924, he'd composed forty-two more—many of them, such as Naughty Marietta, spectacular Broadway hits. Along the way, he also wrote two operas, stage music for the Ziegfeld Follies, and the first full score for a motion picture, The Fall of a Nation.Gould brilliantly blends the musical and the theatrical, classical and popular, the public and the private, in this book. He not only gives a revealing portrait of Herbert the artist, entrepreneur, and visionary, but also recreates the vibrant world of the Herbert's Broadway. Gould takes us inside the musicitself—with detailed guides to each major work and recreations of great performances. He also makes strong connections between Herbert's breakthrough compositions, such as the operetta Mlle. Modiste, and the later contributions of Rudolf Friml,Sigmund Romberg, Jerome Kern and other giants of the musical theater.As exuberant as Herbert himself, this book is also a chronicle of American popular culture during one of its most creative periods. For anyone enraptured by the sound of the American musical, this book is delightfully required reading.

1 Ireland, My Sireland 1

2 In Old New York 18

3 Oh, My Name Is Victor Herbert - I'm the Leader of the Band 62

4 Pittsburgh - Heaven and Hell 84

5 Coda Brilliante 157

6 Paterfamilias 169

7 Oyez! Oyez! Oyez! 190

8 A Theatrical Musician at Work 233

9 Act One 247

10 Entr'acte I: Ace of Clubs 307

11 Act Two: Scene One 322

12 Operetta as Social Document 342

13 Act Two: Scene Two 368

14 Entre'acte II: Uncrowned Kings 433

15 Act Three: Scene One 444

16 An Opera Manque 462

17 Act Three: Scene Two 474

18 Media vitae in morte sumus 508

19 Postlude 525

20 February 1, 2003 547

App. A Stage Compositions by Victor Herbert 549

App. B Published Instrumental, Choral, and Miscellaneous Works 558

Abbreviations 569

Notes 571

Bibliography 597

Index 599