With Netflix's 'Maestro' release, musicians remember Leonard Bernstein's time in Indiana

The subject of the new film "Maestro" is Leonard Bernstein, the towering 20th-century conductor and composer who transcended labels just as much as he did genres. But for all of his famous connections to elite East Coast and international ensembles, Bernstein held a soft spot for Indiana, where he found respite, maintained close friendships and worked with students.

In 1976, he attended a festival of his music at Butler University. Later, he found much-needed peace composing at a residence off Lake Monroe and working with Indiana University students.

Hoosiers who knew Bernstein remember a man who played fast-paced word games, who smoked cigarette after cigarette, and who, on at least one occasion, drew mustaches on dinner guests with the cooled and charred cork of a wine bottle.

As "Maestro" — set to be released Friday in select Indianapolis theaters and Dec. 20 on Netflix — shares the story behind the romance of Bernstein and his wife Felicia Montealegre Bernstein, Hoosiers shared their own memories of the conductor's Indiana connections.

"He was the kind of person that, when he talked to you, you were the only person in the universe at that time," said Alfred Savia, artistic advisor and principal conductor of the Indianapolis Opera.

Bernstein's quick 1976 Butler visit

Savia stepped up to the podium on a February evening, ready to conduct "Facsimile," a complex musical work about three people in a love triangle. In the audience sat its iconic composer.

The then-Butler graduate student remembers giving the downbeat to the Greater Indianapolis Youth Orchestra — and then Bernstein himself approaching him afterward backstage.

"First thing he said: 'How the hell did you get those kids to play "Facsimile?"' because it's such a difficult piece," Savia said. "And then the other thing he did was straighten out my tie because it was crooked. He said, 'You can't be a maestro with a tie like that.'"

Savia had met Bernstein earlier that day when he came to Indianapolis in time for a rehearsal of "Mass: A Theater Piece for Singers, Players and Dancers." The 22-year-old student saw tears stream down the maestro's face after the Butler symphony and conductor Jackson Wiley had finished a run-through in Clowes Memorial Hall.

Afterward, Bernstein sat backwards in a chair on stage and spoke with students about the work, even pushing back another appointment so he could stay with them.

The encounter offered a boost for Savia's career. Bernstein later granted him a recommendation to attend Tanglewood, home of the prestigious festival and music institute in western Massachusetts.

Bernstein invites IU students to Israel

The next year, Bernstein worked with another group of Hoosier students. His first opera, the one-act "Trouble in Tahiti," was to mark his 30th anniversary conducting the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra.

And the trouble at that time was that Bernstein needed young people — rather than older professional musicians — to perform the story of a young suburban husband and wife who continually fall into arguments as they struggle to fill their souls against a backdrop of post-war consumerism.

Indiana University's opera program had a reputation for its comprehensive approach and attention to detail in the art form. So Bernstein's manager called Charles Webb, then dean of the Jacobs School of Music. Soon, the composer's representatives had seen the students perform and invited them on a tour in Israel.

An excerpt from the opera's interlude is on the soundtrack for "Maestro."

The composer's respite in Bloomington

Webb thought he'd received a prank call when the person on the other end of the line told him Bernstein was interested in staying in Bloomington. But as the person kept talking, the former dean of the Jacobs School of Music realized it was real.

The famous composer was in a slump, pulled between too many conducting engagements, and he wanted peace to work on an opera.

"We found one of our friends who had a house out on Lake Monroe, and I told Mr. Bernstein about that, and he thought that would be a perfect place for him to read and to write and to compose music," Webb said.

So Bernstein worked at night and then brought his freshly written ideas for Jacobs School students to perform back to him. Over about two months in 1982, "A Quiet Place" — part of which is also on the "Maestro" soundtrack — took shape.

"That is what you need as a composer to refocus you, to reinvigorate you, to see something accomplished," said Constance Cook Glen, a teaching professor and director of the Jacobs Music in General Studies program. "We can look at that time at IU as pivotal for him."

What's more, a friendship based on mutual respect and fun quickly developed between the larger-than-life composer and the dean — a pianist in his own right who was skilled enough to transcribe a piece into a remote key on the fly while playing.

"First and foremost, the passion for music would be one reason that they bonded," said Charles' son Malcolm, who was 14 years old when he met Bernstein.

Bernstein christened his friendship with the Webb family in music, too. Part of his 1988 song cycle "Arias and Barcarolles" is "Mr. and Mrs. Webb Say Goodnight."

IU students performed 'Mass' for Bernstein's birthday

Bernstein called on Jacobs School students again in 1988. The Boston Symphony asked the composer what he'd like to hear for his 70th birthday, and he requested his "Mass."

Written for the 1971 inauguration of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., the work was composed against a backdrop of the Vietnam War and fight for civil rights. "Mass'" eclectic combination of musical styles and presentation of faith were among the reasons many rejected it, Glen said. She's teaching an online class about Bernstein for anyone who's interested.

The theatrical work calls for street singers, a formal choir and a celebrant who's questioning his faith, among other performers. But Tanglewood — the summer home of the symphony — didn't have the personnel for such a massive work.

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Enter about 250 Jacobs School students. The composer expressed more than his gratitude in remarks afterward.

"This is one of the finest performances I've ever seen," video footage from a 1997 documentary shows Bernstein saying. "I don't mean only of 'Mass.' I mean of anything."

How musicians describe Bernstein's distinctive conducting style

Hoosiers have been among the plethora of musicians who witnessed Bernstein's highly physical and emotional conducting style live — an aspect actor Bradley Cooper practiced for years as he studied for his role for "Maestro," he said at a New York screening.

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In 1972, Bob Goodlett performed Gustav Mahler's Ninth Symphony under Bernstein's baton at Tanglewood. The conductor enthralled musicians while using his entire body to communicate how he wanted them to play.

"When it was a big (loud) fortissimo landing ... or something, he would often get airborne. I mean, his feet would leave the podium and he'd be a few inches off the ground," said Goodlett, the assistant principal bass for the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra.

When Savia sat with a group of fellow conductors at Tanglewood in 1977, he heard one ask Bernstein how he planned out his expressive gestures.

Bernstein said "I don't," Savia said. "He said, 'No, honestly, I study the music, and I react spontaneously to what's happening in the music.'"

The Fairfield studio's home at IU

The studio at the Bernsteins' Fairfield, Connecticut, home became a respite away from the composer's crowded New York life, as Philip Ponella, IU's Wennerstrom-Phillips Music Library Director, detailed in a 2017 podcast.

While Bernstein's manuscripts and letters went to institutions including the New York Philharmonic and Library of Congress, the Bernstein family gifted about 2,000 artifacts to Indiana University's Jacobs School of Music in 2009.

The Bloomington collection includes the everyday items that surrounded him while he worked. Among them are mostly ordinary items: his desk, reading glasses, Afrin nasal spray, a sagging yellow couch.

And then there's the extraordinary: a conducting stool given to Bernstein by the Vienna Philharmonic. As the story goes, it was said to have used by iconic composer Johannes Brahms and even fellow titan Mahler, according to Ponella.

Visitors can see the collection by appointment or via IU Archives Online. For the former, contact Ponella at pponella@indiana.edu or 812-855-2170.

If you go

What: "Maestro," starring Bradley Cooper and Carey Mulligan

In theaters: Starting Friday at the Kan-Kan Cinema and Brasserie (kankanindy.com) and Landmark Theaters (landmarktheatres.com)

Streaming: Dec. 20 on Netflix

The Bloomington Herald-Times contributed to this report.

Contact IndyStar reporter Domenica Bongiovanni at 317-444-7339 or d.bongiovanni@indystar.com. Follow her on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter: @domenicareports.