“Taking advantage of artists to inspire national optimism, the Kennedy White House made art glamorous. In return, art became a crucial factor in the new Camelot,” writes Mark Swed in Thursday’s (11/21) Los Angeles Times. Friday, November 22 marks the 50th anniversary of Kennedy’s assassination. “Despite an unprecedented explosion of the arts in America over the last half-century, artists have never again been afforded such national prominence…. Art was there from the beginning for the Kennedy administration. The great, barrier-breaking, African American contralto Marian Anderson sang at the inauguration. My favorite photo of the Kennedy era is a picture of Bernstein and Frank Sinatra backstage at an inaugural ball as they waited to go on, each trying to appear cooler than the other.… John Steinbeck, W.H. Auden and Robert Lowell were on hand. In all, the president—no doubt at the urging of the first lady, Jacqueline Kennedy—invited 50 writers and artists and musicians to the inauguration…. Bernstein treated the White House as a second home. Aaron Copland was always welcome. The revered cellist Pablo Casals was accorded the kind of reception that the pope would typically get.” WQXR’s blog on Monday (11/18) includes a “JFK and Classical Music” timeline of works written about John F. Kennedy. “
Posted November 22, 2013
