“Eric Salzman, a composer and music critic who championed a new art form, music theater, that was neither opera nor stage musical, died on Nov. 12 at his home in Brooklyn,” writes Neil Genzlinger in Sunday’s (11/26) New York Times. “Mr. Salzman was a music critic for several publications, including The New York Times…. From the 1960s until well into this century he composed exploratory works, many of them created collaboratively, that mixed music, text, dance and other elements in ways not generally seen on mainstream stages. He also presented and championed such works by others, most notably by helping to found the American Music Theater Festival in Philadelphia in 1984. Mr. Salzman was the author of, among other books, ‘20th-Century Music: An Introduction’ … first published a half-century ago…. His varied résumé also included time as music director for WBAI-FM in New York in the 1960s…. Among the [American Music Theater Festival’s] featured works was ‘Strike Up the Band!,’ Mr. Salzman’s ‘reconstructed and adapted’ version of a satirical musical with a score by George and Ira Gershwin that had not been staged in 50 years.”
Posted November 28, 2017
