Leonard Bernstein’s Omnibus 4 DVD set, the storylines of music

Bernstein was one of the great promoters of the understanding of music, an expert, as well as an enthusiast. Someone’s had the intelligence to release his classical music Omnibus TV shows.

Omnibus includes some of those unforgettable moments in Bernstein's TV career. For those who only know West Side Story but not Bernstein himself, this will come as a surprise. He was a true enthusiast, hyperactive, but he also had a way of making himself understood. His enthusiasm was infectious, but his technical skills were the typical professional sort; he made everything look easy and fun. According to friends, Bernstein was a nice enough guy, but a lecturer at heart, professorial, the “Village Explainer”, providing some mental overloads. (Well, try shutting up a musician on the subject of music. It’ll never happen.) Only an expert, however, can get a reputation like that with his friends though, and this DVD set proves it. Imagine Beethoven’s Fifth opening with a flute. Sound a bit tacky? Unthinkable? According to Bernstein, that’s exactly what it started out with, and the tale unfolds as part of the mentality of music, the storyline effect which Bernstein knew well how to use effectively. Beethoven, the first real user of the sheer power of symphony orchestra’s musical physics, deleted the flute, supposedly as a “feminine” sound where a “masculine” sound was required, but more likely because it would have sounded awful. That huge oceanic power, therefore, didn’t have a canary in the arrangement. There’s another point here. Flutes are beautiful things, but at their lower range they’d get lost in the Fifth, unable to contribute much, and in the higher range, they’d need a harmonic to mix. Flutes and other interests are written in different keys, and for a relatively trivial effect, the arrangement wouldn’t make much musical sense, either. Beethoven wasn’t a trivia fan. This sort of information, which Bernstein backs up with revised scores for symphonies, is one of the few illustrations in musical history of the multi instrument lucky dip problem of working with orchestral scores. Those who don’t play music should understand that arrangements are like trying to make dinner with a few helpful house bricks, if you get it wrong. Some great music underwent this Trial By Tearing Out Of Hair, and Omnibus spells it out. Bernstein also explains the language of the conductor. It’s about time someone did. If you’ve ever wondered why some classical pieces sound so different, there’s your answer. It’s not showmanship, it’s expression. Nuance, gesture, even innuendo, personal perspective on a piece of music, it’s all there. There’s also some work on jazz, for those who haven’t yet caught on to the world’s most influential, most commonly ripped off, form of music. The amount of recycled jazz in popular music has to be heard to be understood. Phrases are swiped as thoroughly as Chopin was swiped for honky tonk in the 19th century. (Most of it’s sped up, or slightly rephrased. I could hardly believe it myself until I read Harpo Marx’s book Harpo Speaks, explaining the techniques, which make well known pieces unrecognizable unless you’re looking for them. By the 20th century it was a way of earning a living for piano players.) Jazz is also one of the only forms of music where the audience are usually as well informed and important as the musicians. This is an audience that knows what it’s listening to, probably plays itself, and is a tough subject for any lecture. Bernstein’s very apt inclusion of probably the most genuine area of modern music is another side to the Omnibus collection which will have music lovers fascinated, and probably unreachable by those in the same room. He also shows the hard work aspect. Music includes a lot of sweat and patience, which is interesting, because most musicians don’t like sweating all over their instruments and have never heard of patience except as a card game. Anyone who’s ever driven themselves nuts wondering why and how a second crept into their beautiful grand scale melody of basic thirds will understand. (It improves your scatology a lot. I can now curse in German, French, Breizh, pidgin Yiddish, Arabic, Sioux, Aboriginal, Russian, and something that may well be English, but the sound…!) This is no minor technical achievement. Apparently Omnibus was saved from the scrap heap, a major cultural service, and there are cuts in the films where some escaped Mensa member did an edit. A bit of presentation, including an unprovoked inclusion of his Handel’s Messiah, with no lecture, has crept in, but Handel’s no great punishment. Thank God for the enthusiasts, because without them music would be just another cultural store dummy, and classical music in particular would be as full of ignoramuses as the modern Vibrator Orchestras. The equation is this: Mindless adherents don’t make music. Enthusiasts, the poor bastards with an instrument and hopes, make music. Omnibus is the Revenge Of The Enthusiasts, long overdue in the cornflake factory of present day packaging. Thank you, whoever put Omnibus together. Bernstein is one of music’s best ambassadors. A very appropriate acknowledgement of one of music’s brightest sons.