Boris Goldovsky - Students and proteges include ( among many others ), Sources

Pianist, conductor, and opera producer, born in Moscow, Russia. German-trained in music, he performed solo on piano with the Berlin Philharmonic at the age of 13. In 1930 he went to the USA to perform concerts and teach, but by the end of the decade he had diverted his talents and energies to producing operas. He ran the opera programme at Tanglewood (1942–62) and founded the New England Opera (1946) and the Goldovsky Opera Institute (1963), both Boston-based. In 1977 he became head of the opera department at the Curtis Institute. He was well known to a broad public as a commentator for the Metropolitan Opera broadcasts, but to several generations of American opera singers he was known for promoting opera in English and for demanding that singers be truly able to act their roles.

He trained at the Moscow Conservatory.

He moved to Philadelphia in 1930, and taught at the Curtis institute for several years.

He moved again to Boston in 1942, where he became director of the opera department at the New England Conservatory of Music.

The famous Sarah Caldwell became his assistant in Boston, and worked with him for several years.

He became a protege of Koussevitsky at Tanglewood circa 1943 ( see the "Recollections" ).

In January 1945, Goldovsky began the "New England Opera Theater" under "the sponsorship of the New England Conservatory ( see p 102 of "Measure by Measure" by Bruce Macpherson and James Klein pub by NEC Trustees in Boston 1995 ).

During a Metropolitan Opera tour visit to Boston circa 1946, Goldovsky participated in an opera quiz event designed to promote the New York opera.

In 1946, he was named director of the opera program at the Tanglewood Music Center in the Berkshires.

In the 1940s and '50s, he and Gladys Childs Miller were the "starmakers" at New England Conservatory ( "Measure by Measure" page 109 ).

In 1954 he received a Peabody Award for Outstanding Contribution to Radio Music.

In 1968 he wrote "Bringing Opera to Life" about operatic acting and stage direction.

In 1975, the National Opera Association published "Touring Opera : a Manual for Small Companies", by Boris Goldovsky and Thomas Wolf, with a foreword by Sherill Milnes.

In the late 1970s, he started teaching at Curtis again.

In 1979, Houghton Mifflin published "My road to opera : the Recollections of Boris Goldovsky," ( ISBN 0395277604 OCLC: 4516063 ).

The end of the Goldovsky company was reported in the New York Times in 1984 ( "OPERA: GOLDOVSKY COMPANY'S FAREWELL" - By EDWARD ROTHSTEIN, N.Y.T., March 19, 1984 ).

The University of Indiana published transcripts of his intermission commentary from the Metropolitan Opera radio shows in 1984.

In 1985, he retired from teaching at Curtis.

He has been credited in several recordings, including a Boston Symphony Orchestra recording of Wagner's "Lohengrin", conducted by Leinsdorf.

Other famous associates include Mario Lanza, and Leonard Bernstein, and Mary Beth Peil.

Students and proteges include ( among many others )

Sarah Caldwell, who became a famous impresario and conductor in her own right;

Phyllis Curtin, who sang at the Met and at leading European venues;

Rosalind Elias, who also sang at the Met and in Europe;

Peter Feldman, who performed for radio and television.

Sherrill Milnes.

Sources

Sources include resources from the Spaulding Library at New England Conservatory and elsewhere, such as Goldovsky's "Recollections" and "Measure by Measure", an authorized history of the conservatory.