Encountering David Diamond Once Again

In the first semester of my second year at Juilliard I took a class with David Diamond that was devoted to studying fugues. It was 1977, and I was at the impressionable age of eighteen. David Diamond was sixty-two, and he was considered old-fashioned at the time since his music was diatonic and tonal. I thought he was really interesting, and I used to talk to him (or, rather, listen to what he wanted to say to me), even though my flute teacher thought he was crazy,

He told me about his mother being Emma Goldman's seamstress.

(I had to go to the library and find out who Emma Goldman was)

He must have told me other things, but what sticks out most in my mind (aside from the stories in this blogpost) was his vehement recommendation that I read Cyril Scott's Music: Its Secret Influence Throughout the Ages.

The book was in the Juilliard library, and I read it immediately. Part I discusses the problems of musicality, pure music, inspiration, and invention. Part II has discussions about Handel, Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Chopin (one chapter called "the Apostle of Refinement," and another called "Chopin, the Pre-Raphaelites and the Emancipation of Women"), Schumann, Wagner, and Strauss.

Then we get to Part III: ESOTERIC CONSIDERATIONS--THE MUSIC OF THE DEVA OR NATURE SPIRIT EVOLUTION. The chapters in this section are about musicians and the higher powers, the occult constitution of man, Franck, Grieg, Tchaikovsky, Delius, Debussy, Ravel, Scriabin ("a Deva-exponent"), the "hyper-moderns," Moussorgsky and the Sublimation of Ugliness, and popular music.

Part IV is labeled "Historical." Here we get opinions on the music of India, Ancient Egypt, Greeks, Romans, Folksong, Polyphony, the Reformation, and the section culminates with "A cursory View of the Musical Effects in England from the Pre-Elizabethan Days to those of Handel.

Part V: SOME OCCULT PROGNOSTICATIONS has a single chapter that is aptly called "The Music of the Future."

Last night I got to perform David Diamond's Rounds for String Orchestra. The recording below is not of my orchestra, but it is what our performance of this piece aspired to be.



The first time I read through the viola part I noticed that the main subject of the piece (you can hear it seventeen seconds into the above recording) is very similar to the 1926 hit song, "Every Little Breeze Seems to Whisper Louise."



A few months ago Michael and I were watching a documentary about Louise Brooks that was on a DVD of one of her movies. It's not this one, but I'm leaving it here anyway (for people reading this who don't know who Louise Brooks is, and for me to watch later).



The documentary we saw had an interview with David Diamond, who knew Louise Brooks well. If I noticed the resemblance between the subject of the Rounds and the melody of "Louise," David Diamond certainly would have noticed (while he was writing the piece). Homage, perhaps?

This morning I went searching around the internets to see if I could find more about David Diamond, and I came across a tribute to him in the MacDowell Colony newsletter, where they have reprinted a story that he told there in 1991. After reading this story I now understand David Diamond's personal fascination with the Cyril Scott book.

Odd musical (or hyper musical) forces might have been in place that fall semester of 1977 that would allow me the honor of being a kind of spokesperson for Diamond in 2020 (both in my musical community and on this blog). Or, then again, I might have been the only person to go to the library and actually read the book he recommended.

Here's David Diamond's story:
[click on the image for a larger view]