Adolf Busch: The Life of an Honest Musician – Two Volume Revised Edition Set
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Volume 1: 1891–1939
Volume 2: 1939–1952; Appendices 1–12
Includes two CDs: Busch the Performer; Busch the Composer
Extent: 1432 pages
Composition: Royal octavo, 2 vols of 702 & 730 pp.
255 b/w illus.
Monumental biography of one of the major musicians of the twentieth century.
Revised edition: Adolf Busch (1891-1952) was an all-round musician and a moral beacon in troubled times. As first violin of the Busch String Quartet, founded in 1912, he was the greatest quartet-player of the last century and he led a famous conductorless orchestra, the Busch Chamber Players. He was also the busiest solo violinist of the inter-War years, regularly performing major concertos with such conductors as Nikisch, Toscanini, Weingartner, Walter, Furtwängler, Boult, Wood, Barbirolli and his elder brother Fritz. He was, moreover, an outstanding composer whose works enjoyed performances in Germany and further afield. Frequently he appeared as soloist and composer in the same concert.
His courageous decision to boycott his native country from April 1933 – despite Hitler’s efforts to persuade ‘our German violinist’ to return – drastically reduced his income and damaged his career as soloist and composer. In 1938, because of Mussolini’s race laws, he imposed a similar boycott on Italy, where he was wildly popular. The following year he emigrated with his quartet colleagues to the United States, where he was not fully appreciated, although he had many successes with a new chamber orchestra and founded the Marlboro summer school.
This biography, based on more than thirty years’ research, examines Busch’s exemplary behaviour in the context of a tumultuous era. Volume One traces his progress from childhood in Westphalia, through friendships with Fritz Steinbach, Donald Tovey and Max Reger, early triumphs in Berlin, London and Vienna, years of maturity and fulfilment, rejection of Hitler’s Germany and close bonds with British musicians and concert-goers in the 1930s. It ends just before his move into American exile. Volume Two follows Busch through the Second World War, his return to give concerts in Europe in the late 1940s and his founding of the Marlboro summer school in Vermont shortly before his untimely death. A series of appendices consider Busch as violinist, violist and teacher, his taste and repertoire, his interpretations, his colleagues, his celebrated recordings and his compositions.
This revised edition now features full colour covers and additional photographs added to the generous quantity presented in the first edition. Information from Scottish composer, Erik Chrisholm, which has come to light since the first edition gives a delightful picture of Busch and his colleagues in the early 1930s. The appendices and indexes have been thoroughly updated and the discography has been overhauled to reflect the large number of fresh reissues of Busch’s recordings as well as new recordings of his compositions.
Simon Wynberg :
“This is a magisterial account of Busch’s life and times, and it is impossible to imagine anything surpassing it. But this is only part of its substance. Tully Potter’s substantial detours into the lives and attitudes of colleagues and contemporaries, are of equivalent value. There are fascinating discussions about Fürtwangler, Tovey, Serkin and Casals for example, which add an unusual and variegated richness. The detailed biographical portraits of Busch’s family and colleagues in Volume II further augment this wealth of detail.” —ARC Ensemble
Eric Herdan :
I hope the reprint will happen. I’d be glad to have this!
ClassicalNet :
‘Toccata Press is expressly dedicated to tackling important subjects that other publishers have failed to address.” And so it does in this mammoth title. […]
To call it a “labor of love” (on which Potter apparently worked for over a quarter of a century) is in no way to diminish the author’s insight and scholarship. Although his admiration of, and commitment to, the varied work of Bush emerges consistently and unobtrusively at every turn, this is a scholarly edition. Assertions and sources are footnoted (conveniently at the bottom of the page on which they are needed); the indices are exhaustive, accurate – and very full, at 118 pages. […] Thorough, exhaustive and easy to use in the extreme. The biographical narrative reads well and contains well-balanced details, history, reflection and analysis. […]
Chapters range in length from just a dozen pages on Busch’s family to nearly a hundred on Bush’s periods spent in Vienna and the USA. It really is hard to imagine any aspect of the life and work of Busch that’s not covered in this study. Musical illustrations and extracts from scores are present when they add something. But the narrative can easily be read without intimate or advanced knowledge of music theory. Potter is expert at interpreting technicalities and explaining their significances to us. This adds immeasurably to the positive impact of the two volumes. They are substantial and authoritative, yet accessible to the non-specialist, and to those otherwise unfamiliar with Busch’s work and world. […]
If you are looking for the definitive repository of material on Adolf Busch and/or a near-exemplary biography of a great musician that combines restrained interpretation and explanation with factual discourse so well-conceived and written that it’s likely to become a classic, then this will fit the bill without reservations. As a contribution to musical scholarship in an area central to the development of twentieth century performance too, Adolf Busch: the Life of an Honest Musician is sure to succeed and earn a place at the top of the list. Recommended without hesitation.’
—Mark Sealey, ClassicalNet
Tempo :
‘Tully Potter’s epic narrative – a real labour of love which has preoccupied him for the past 40 years.’
―Erik Levi, Tempo
Gramophone :
‘Every great musician deserves his or her Tully Potter.’
―Rob Cowan, Gramophone
BBC Music Magazine :
‘Adolf Busch had an enormous impact on music in the first half of the 20th century – a fact which has been in danger of being forgotten. […] These two massive, copiously illustrated volumes, Tully Potter’s labour of love, should do much to rectify this.’
―Howard Goldstein, BBC Music Magazine
Christopher Wellington, violist and musicologist :
‘I consider you have written the best book on any musical subject that I have ever read.’
―Christopher Wellington, violist and musicologist
Musical Opinion :
‘What a splendid accomplishment this is – surely such a valuable subject could not have been treated, equalled or indeed attempted by any other living musical writer to this standard.’
―Robert Matthew-Walker, Musical Opinion
International Record Review :
‘This is indeed something to celebrate.’
―David Gutman, International Record Review
The Tablet :
‘Justly is Potter able to conclude that “his life shines as a rare affirmation that it is possible to be an honest musician and an honest man”.’
―Rick Jones, The Tablet
Arts Journal :
‘Potter’s book is […] so wonderfully well written and researched that that anyone with more than a casual interest in Busch and his times will find it an unexpectedly easy read.’
―Terry Teachout, Arts Journal
Diapason :
Monumental et fascinant, une reference!’
―Jean-Michel Molkhou, Diapason
Siegener Zeitung :
‘Dieses Buch darf als kleine Sensation gelten.’
―Dr Helge Grünewald, Siegener Zeitung
All Things Strings :
‘…a sweep and majesty that is in the tradition of such great British writers as Donald Francis Tovey and critics like Peter Pirie’.
―Laurence Vittes, All Things Strings
The Strad :
‘Potter’s writing is fluid and engaging, and besides exhaustively charting Busch’s remarkable career, he shifts smoothly between personal insights, musical discussion and wider observations.’
―Nathaniel Valois, The Strad
ARSC Journal :
‘These two hefty volumes constitute one of the most important musical biographies to appear in recent years.’
―Dennis Rooney, ARSC Journal
Sunday Times :
‘Now, thanks to Tully Potter’s two-volume biography […], what [Busch] achieved and suffered, what made him the transcendent musician he was – the idealism and moral greatness that suffused his interpretations, above all of Beethoven – are for the first time laid out for all to see.’
―David Cairns, Sunday Times