Flora ⁸ BIGELOW

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Theremin Virtuosa .Lucie Bigelow Rosen (1890 - 1968). Behind Concertista of theremin been born in EUA in 1890, and passed away in 1968. Lawyer of profession, far from the convencionalismos of her time, dragged her husband, Walter Rosen, famous banker, towards the field of the arts, becoming both patron. With the arrival from Lev Termen to New York in 1927, the Rosen was interested in theremin, they provided a study to him, and Lucie learned his handling under the guide of Termen. Between years 30 and 50 he carried out multitude of concerts of theremin everywhere.
     This writing by Lucie Bigelow Rosen was published by Caramoor, along with other material on the occasion of the event they called "Theremania", November 4th, 1995 (many thanks to John M. Snyder for the information.) It is interesting to note that Rosen quotes a 1935 book by italian science writer Domenico Ravalico to illustrate the technicalities of the theremin. Why did she care to translate a quote from an italian book when english language literature about the subject was available to her? And did she find the book during her italian tour? Did she meet Ravalico himself while in Italy? The date of the document is uncertain but since Ravalico's book was published in 1935, it must be subsequent to 1935. (V.S.)
"THE THEREMIN
has neither keys, nor strings, nor sounding pedals, nor any other existing parts that can recall a known musical instrument. The infinite variety of sounds is produced through oscillations of inaudible frequency between two electric magnetic fields of high frequency. When the hands, or any foreign body, enter the magnetic fields, or approach the antennae, the inaudible waves become audible through the coupling of the two oscillations, crudely speaking.
From "Misteri e Prodigi delle Radio Onde"--Ravalico.
The development of this technique, almost of a very musical dancer, and of the new instruments, proceeds of course as they are used more and more. The modern instrument has a range of five octaves, six or more changes of tone colour as the violin or cello have on their open strings, or with mutes; a prodigious dynamic range not possible to any other instrument, that is most effective with a group or orchestra and in the largest space, for the tone does not change, or fade, or die except as the player wills; and a quicker reaction to the fingers, so that faster passages can be added to its repertoire. But the characteristic beauty of the theremin-tone will be always looked for in the singing-passages which it can render more beautifully than any other instrument.
It is the earnest desire of those who are working with this instrument that it shall cease to be a novelty. One does not bring out a new violin or piano every year, though these have undergone great changes, as any one familiar with the history of instruments knows. We should never again hear the foolish remark, "Oh yes, I heard a theremin ten years ago, it is not new." We would be surprised if any one said they did not need to hear Gieseking because they had seen a piano in school, or Toscanini because they had already heard a band. The relative difference is the same, between what was possible ten years ago on the electrical instruments and now, and no one can predict what will be possible in the future, except that as we study them, more and more possibilities appear.
The only impossible thing to imagine is that these new resources should not be irresistibly fascinating to a real musician, or that one example of them should not be heard where any audience for living music is found".
Lucie Bigelow Rosen
 
The Theremin was the precursor of the Moog synthesizer............................ROD 2008

 
                              Lucie Bigelow Rosen performing

  

Lucie Bigelow Rosen (1890 - 1968) was a well known Theremin player and evangelist (nicknamed by the New York Times as the “Théremin’s high priestess”) who performed extensively in concert halls worldwide in the 30's to the 50's, including a Carnegie Hall engagement with the Philadelphia Orchestra.
With the help of her husband, the banker Walter T. Rosen, she financially supported Léon Theremin's work who, in turn, built for her a custom theremin. Rosen collected many works for theremin, both her own transcriptions and commissions.
It is the case of Bohuslav Martinů, who was entrusted by her to compose a piece for theremin. Martinů started working on this job in the summer of 1944 and finished his "Fantasia" for Theremin, oboe, string quartet and piano on October 1 and dedicated to Mrs. Rosen, who premiered the piece as theremin soloist in New York on November 3, 1945, along with the Koutzen Quartet and Robert Boom. (V.S.)

From Time Magazine 08 July 1966:

     Slowly, solemnly, a procession of cowled monks and acolytes filed through the cloisters, chanting "Te lucis ante terminum." They entered a Spanish Renaissance courtyard and mounted a small stage shaded by a red-and-white-striped awning. "Good souls," the abbot sang, "the brothers have come today to show you a mystery."
     So, in fittingly reverent fashion, began the U.S. premiere last week of Benjamin Britten's Curlew River at the Caramoor Festival in Katonah, N.Y. Styled as "a parable for church performance," the hour-long piece is based on a medieval No drama, Sumidagawa. It is a simple tale of a demented mother in search of her lost child, and it unfolds like a morality play in slow motion, all the more compelling for the stark economy of its movement and action.
     The all-male cast, headed by Tenor Andrea Velis as the madwoman, masterfully performed Britten's difficult, often eerie sing-speech style of vocal writing. The score was as delicate and intricate as a spider web, interlaced with the chatter of small untuned drums and plunking strings reminiscent of Oriental music. The most impressive achievement was that, in mixing such disparate elements as modern dissonances, a morality play and No drama, there was no clash of styles but rather a smooth melding into what is a new and wholly engaging musical form.
     Strange Wailings. Curlew River could not have had a more ideal setting. The leafy courtyard, surrounded by the 40-room Italian villa on the 180 wooded acres of the Caramoor estate, brims with old-world flavor. Many of the arched columns and the massive iron gate are treasures brought from Europe. The rooms opening off the courtyard and beyond are filled with one of the world's richest private collections of Renaissance art: 15th century French tapestries, hand-carved ceilings, and a commode from the palace of Frederick the Great. Evening concerts are held in a 1,500-seat outdoor theater, a short walk away from the main house through a medieval gate from the palace of the Cappellettis (Shakespeare's Capulets) in Verona. The stage of the   Venetian theater is built around three dozen 9th century Greek and Roman columns that were smuggled out of Italy several years ago and subsequently bought by the owners of Caramoor.
     On the afternoon of the performance, seated in a back row with her shawl around her shoulders, was the grande dame of Caramoor herself: Mrs. Lucie Bigelow Rosen. A sprightly woman in her late 70s, she is the widow of Walter Rosen, a multimillionaire investment banker who built Caramoor (from the Italian for "dear love") in 1930 and spent the rest of his life filling it with art treasures. He was an amateur pianist, and she made music on the theremin (an electronic instrument that is played by waving the hands over a magnetic field to produce strange, mellifluous wailings).
     The Rosens started the Caramoor Festival in 1946 to present "things that people cannot get elsewhere, things that not everybody will want to hear." The festival was pretty much a local affair until Conductor Alfred Wallenstein was appointed music director in 1958. He enlisted such singers as Marian Anderson and Jan Peerce as well as some of the finest U.S. instrumentalists, and Caramoor soon became a summer haven for lovers of new and rarely heard music. In 1963, Julius Rudel, the enterprising head of the New York City Opera, became festival director, enlivened Caramoor further with excellent performances of Carl Orff's Die Kluge and Donizetti's Requiem for Bellini.
     Gaudy Necklace. At a time when music festivals are battling each other with bigger-and better-than-ever promotion campaigns, Mrs. Rosen prefers to keep the Caramoor atmosphere small and intimate. Only recently did she allow the festival to be advertised, although she is still wary of expanding programs at the sacrifice of quality. As a result, Caramoor today is a small, brilliant gem in the busy and often gaudy necklace of summer music festivals. "Money can destroy a civilized way of life," says Lucie Rosen, brushing back her bangs, "but it can also preserve it. There is nothing quite so dull as a person with money who has no idea how to use it."

HISTORY OF CARAMOOR

Caramoor is the legacy of Walter and Lucie Rosen, who established the estate and built a great house as its centerpiece, filling it with treasures collected on their travels. Walter Rosen was the master planner, bringing to reality his dream of creating a place to entertain friends from around the world. Their legendary musical evenings were the seeds of today’s International Music Festival that is held annually on the estate.

Walter Rosen’s friend Charles Hoyt first introduced the Rosens to the estate. Hoyt’s mother had an estate in Katonah, a village in the town of Bedford, New York that she was looking to sell.  It was named after her – “Caramoor” for Caroline Moore Hoyt. Charles Hoyt, a collector like Walter Rosen, certainly knew of his love for things Italian. The Hoyt estate, which was more than 100 acres, had a beautifully laid-out Italianate garden, with rows of tall cedars mimicking the ubiquitous cypresses of Italy. The Rosens fell in love with this garden, still found at Caramoor today, and bought the property.

The Caramoor property was purchased in 1928 by the Rosens as a summer home and country retreat.  Both were passionate collectors and accomplished musicians. From 1929 to 1939, Mr. Rosen designed and built the rambling stucco villa now known as the House Museum.

The Rosens furnished their mansion with their vast collection of European and Asian art and furnishings.  Noteworthy are the 15th-century Spanish Alcove in the Music Room imported from Toledo; an eight-paneled 18th century green jade screen from China – one of only two in the world; a relief from the studio of Donatello; tapestry from 14th-century Florence; terra cotta reliefs from the studio of Della Robbia, Ming vases and a gilded bed once owned by Pope Urban VIII.

The Rosens had two children, Walter and Anne.  During the Second World War in 1944, while flying for the RAF, Walter was killed returning from a raid in Germany.  His absence from the house was keenly felt, and it prompted his parents to act on their previously discussed plans to preserve the artistic and musical heritage of Caramoor.

In 1945, the Rosens bequeathed the Caramoor estate as a center for music and art in memory of their son. The next year the Music Room was opened to the public for three summer concerts. The International Music Festival grew from those intimate concerts the Rosens shared with their friends at their home. After Walter Rosen died in 1951, Lucie Rosen continued to expand the Festival.  During the 1950s, outdoor concerts were presented in the Spanish Courtyard. Caramoor’s fame continued to grow and seats became impossible to obtain. Prompted by The New York Times critic Howard Taubman, Lucie Rosen decided to make Caramoor more available to the public, and she had a larger space – the Venetian Theater – constructed.  The theater opened in 1958. 
 
The Caramoor museum was created in 1970, two years after Lucie Rosen’s death. The Rosens’ daughter, Anne Stern, and many professionals continued the task of cataloguing, conserving and interpreting the collection for several years afterward. In 1971 the house was opened to the public.  In 1974 a new wing was added to include rooms and objects d’art from the Rosens’ New York City residence. 

What is known today as the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts was originally created by a foundation established by the Rosens to operate the estate in perpetuity.  Lucie Rosen once said that people feel they have gone to another country and another time when they visit Caramoor. Because the Rosens were touched by this, by the obvious pleasure their friends took in Caramoor’s beauty, they decided to leave their home as a legacy for all to enjoy after they had gone. It is to the vision and energy of this inspirational couple that thousands owe their enjoyment of Caramoor each year.

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Flora Bigelow Dodge and her family, in the UK

by Ed Miller, Secretary of Ferring History Group 

In      In 1912 Flora, her son John Bigelow Dodge (Johnny), and her new husband, the Hon. Lionel Guest, came to London. Lionel’s courtesy title ‘Honourable’ was due to his being the son of a Baron, and Flora
acaquired this honorific when she married him. She also acquired many aristocratic in-laws (Lionel was the grandson of the Duke of Marlborough) and social and political contacts (Lionel’s brothers were
susuccessful politicians and his cousin was Winston Churchill). They lived in a very fashionable part of London and Flora (rather more than her husband) figured in the social columns of the Times even before
thtthe First World War.

WWhen that war broke out on 4 August 1914, Lionel, Flora and Johnny were in Canada, for the wedding of his sister Lucie. The three of them returned to London immediately. Flora wrote to Churchill to ask if he could get Johnny a commission. Although a US citizen at that time, Johnny was immediately made a Sub-Lieutenant in the Royal Naval Division, a naval land force created by Churchill. He served in the same battalion as Rupert Brooke and Arthur Asquith, the Prime Minister’s son. Lionel joined the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve, then transferred to the Royal Flying Corps, and ended the war as a Major at the Air Ministry. Flora busied herself attending many social and charitable functions (her attendances and movements being reported in the Times) but when Johnny was wounded at Gallipoli, she went out to Egypt, where he had been evacuated, to bring him home and supervise his convalescence. Later, Johnny transferred to the Army and ended the war as a Lt. Colonel in France.

After the war, Johnny went on mysterious travels to the Middle East and Russia (where he was arrested as a spy). These travels are described in some detail in Tim Carroll’s book, ‘The Dodger’. Flora had an ever more busy social life, constantly appearing in the ‘Court Circular’ column of the London Times. Lionel returned to his business interests, and Johnny to his work as a stockbroker.

 

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