This Was TOSCANINI

The Maestro, My Father, and Me

By Samuel Antek and Lucy Antek Johnson

Foreword by author and music historian, Harvey Sachs


Great artistry makes brilliant performance seem effortless, but what really goes into the making of timeless music? Fortunately, Samuel Antek, who was a first violinist with the acclaimed NBC Symphony Orchestra for 17 years, captured for posterity what it was like to perform under the baton of the legendary Maestro Arturo Toscanini, widely considered the greatest conductor of the mid-20th century. In his musical memoir, Antek shares his keen observations of Toscanini’s singular approach to music making, his unpredictable moods, his passions, his relentless demands on himself and his musicians, and his unwavering dedication to faithfully interpretating composers’ works. 

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    Now, Antek’s daughter, former television producer Lucy Antek Johnson, brings this stellar work back into print with this new and expanded edition,


     THIS WAS TOSCANINI: The Maestro, My Father and Me (Brown Books Pub Group; Second Edition, August 17, 2021), making Toscanini’s legacy available to new generations of students, musicians, music historians, and classical music fans.


    Samuel Antek, a virtuoso violinist and a conductor of the New Jersey Symphony, takes us behind the scenes during hundreds of rehearsals, concerts, tours and often grueling recording sessions as though we’re actually sitting among the players. We feel the tension and exultation as Toscanini and his musicians strive to reach just the right tone and sonority as they rehearse over and over a particular musical phrase from Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, the horn solo that opens the Oberon overture, or the fiery Dies Irae of Verdi’s Requiem. Illustrated by Robert Hupka’s iconic candid photographs of Toscanini in action, the reader is witness to Toscanini’s painstaking and often explosive process of making beautiful music. You can practically hear Toscanini taunting his orchestra. “Any asino can conduct – but to make music…eh? Is difficile!”


    The unflinching honesty of Antek’s recollections are on every page. As he wrote to his publisher: “I will describe what I have actually seen, felt, and heard Toscanini say. What he asked of us, those of us who made music with him.”


    Antek was only 49 when he died at the height of his own musical career, before he had a chance to complete his manuscript. His wife, Alice, and photographer Robert Hupka edited and designed the first edition of the book, which was published to great acclaim in 1963. Over the decades it has been often quoted, used as a reference for teaching and remains the most comprehensive narrative about playing with the maestro.


    Johnson’s newly written essays introducing her father’s original chapters highlight his own musical rise from first violinist to conductor and musical director of major American orchestras, while sharing her own reflection of what it was like to grow up with such a gifted father and the impact that Toscanini had on their family and her father’s career, creating a remarkable contemporary look into a unique era in classical music history.

This Was Toscanini got the Silver Medal for the IPPY AWARD in the Performing Arts category

About the IPPY Award:

Conducted annually, the Independent Publisher Book Awards honor the year's best independently published titles from around the world. The awards are intended to bring increased recognition to the thousands of exemplary independent, university, and self-published books released each year. 


The "IPPY" Awards were conceived as a broad-based, unaffiliated awards program open to all members of the independent publishing industry, and are open to authors and publishers worldwide who produce books written in English and appropriate for the North American market.


We define "independent" as:

  1. Independently owned and operated (no title per year limit)
  2. Operated by a foundation or university (no title per year limit)
  3. Long-time independents that became incorporated but operate autonomously and publish fewer than 100 titles a year.

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Praise

“Toscanini was not only a genius as a conductor but also a revolutionary of musical interpretation. In fact, he placed the performer totally at the service of the composer, in sacred respect for and fidelity to the written text.”

— Maestro Riccardo Muti


“When This Was Toscanini was first published in 1963, Samuel Antek’s classic account of playing in Toscanini’s orchestra brought the Maestro back to life. In this new edition, Lucy Antek Johnson revivifies not only her father’s text and its subject—along with many of Robert Hupka’s original photos—but also her father’s own remarkable story. This book will fascinate everyone interested not only in Toscanini but in symphonic music and music making in general.”


— Harvey Sachs, Author and Music Historian 


“Few authors can have the combination of gifts and experience, of love and intellect, which Samuel Antek brought to the writing of this posthumous memoir. . . . We can almost hear the hoarse Toscanini voice in his fierce admonitions to the players, his wildly picturesque mixture of Italian and English in an idiom all his own. After the recordings, this book will probably remain the most enduring and endearing monument to the art of Arturo Toscanini.” 


— Edward Downes, The New York Times

Comments from Audience/Attendees of Lucy's Presentations

WOW - Lucy was the most articulate speaker I have heard in the OLLI classes.  

I really could "feel" like I was in the experience of being in the orchestra, and in the family of a musician.


—


Our presenter was knowledgeable about her subject-her father, who had been a violinist in Toscanini's NBC Orchestra and, therefore, had many experiences there with him and was even respected enough to be allowed to conduct the orchestra at least once by Toscanini.  I know her stories about Toscanini and his passion, and emotional feelings conducting since I was on the staff of Carnegie Hall in the 70s (press and public relations) and our House Manager had a display case on the wall full of Toscanini's flung batons! And, I watched the NBC Symphony all the time with my parents. She told us many things I didn't know such as his refusal to conduct in Germany and during Mussolini's reign in Italy, and I say Bravo! to that. 


The use of the classic, memorable photos in black and white of Toscanini were wonderful, and the last minutes with him conducting national anthems and Jan Peerce as the guest opera singer were momentous! My mike wasn't working yesterday, so I regret not being able to contribute to the class. And, I thank her hugely for giving us this gift of remembrances of her wonderful and gifted father and his experiences with Toscanini.  


Wishing her good luck with her book—she also is a very accomplished woman.


Comments from Audience/Attendees of Lucy's Presentations

WOW - Lucy was the most articulate speaker I have heard in the OLLI classes. I really could "feel" like I was in the experience of being in the orchestra, and in the family of a musician.

Our presenter was knowledgeable about her subject-her father, who had been a violinist in Toscanini's NBC Orchestra and, therefore, had many experiences there with him and was even respected enough to be allowed to conduct the orchestra at least once by Toscanini.  I know her stories about Toscanini and his passion, and emotional feelings conducting since I was on the staff of Carnegie Hall in the 70s (press and public relations) and our House Manager had a display case on the wall full of Toscanini's flung batons! And, I watched the NBC Symphony all the time with my parents. She told us many things I didn't know such as his refusal to conduct in Germany and during Mussolini's reign in Italy, and I say Bravo! to that. 


The use of the classic, memorable photos in black and white of Toscanini were wonderful, and the last minutes with him conducting national anthems and Jan Peerce as the guest opera singer were momentous! My mike wasn't working yesterday, so I regret not being able to contribute to the class. And, I thank her hugely for giving us this gift of remembrances of her wonderful and gifted father and his experiences with Toscanini.  


Wishing her good luck with her book—she also is a very accomplished woman.

The presenter was effective, knowledgeable, and personable. A1

I appreciated the instructor's personal connection to the topic.