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Notes
Historian Eric A. Gordon is the author of Mark the Music: The Life and Work of Marc Blitzstein (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1989). Composer Leonard J. Lehrman has completed or adapted, and has performed, a number of Blitzstein's works. He is also the editor of The Marc Blitzstein Songbook (New York: Boosey and Hawkes, 1999) and the author of Marc Blitzstein: A Bio-Bibliography (Westport Conn. Praeger, 2005).
As Pollack discusses, Blitzstein's sung stage works are hard to categorize, because they embody elements from a number of genres. Terms such as “opera,” “musical theater,” and “play with music” have been used to describe his works. Pollack (and Blitzstein) generally settle on “opera,” recognizing that Blitzstein's approach to the form is unique.
Blitzstein had a deep and long-term interest in the Sacco and Vanzetti case, resulting in two stage works: The Condemned (1932) and the unfinished Sacco and Vanzetti (1964). Lehrman completed the vocal-piano score of Sacco and Vanzetti in 2001 and the orchestral score in 2003.
As Pollack points out, Blitzstein did employ twelve-tone rows in a limited way in several of his last works. However, he never adopted Schoenbergian techniques as the fundamental organizing principles of his music.
Megalopolis (1927) and The Traveling Salesman (1929) are incomplete. Megalopolis incorporates large portions of Blessings of the Bath (1926).
If completed, Charlotte's Web (1959) would have been Blitzstein's eighth film score. Because author E.B. White denied copyright permission for its adaptation, Blitzstein had to abandon work on this project after preparing a scenario and other preliminary material.