Copland Fanfare for the Common Man

Copland Fanfare for the Common Man Program Notes

Aaron Copeland wrote Fanfare for the Common for the Cincinnati  Symphony  Orchestra  Music  Director  Eugene  Goosen’s 1942-43  season, when commissioned  as part of 18  concert-opening  fanfares.    Copeland, having  finished  the  fanfare,   took  some  time  to  consider  a  title.    Early  thoughts  were  Fanfare  For  the  Four  Freedoms,  after  FDR’s  1941  Four  Freedoms  State  of  the  Union  Address,  or  Fanfare  for  Democracy.  Copland  later  said  he  turned  on  the  radio  by  chance  and  heard  a  speech  given  by  Vice-President  Henry  Wallace:  DzSome  have  spoken  of  the  American  Century:  I  say  that  the  century  on  which  we  are  entering—the  century  which  will  come  out  of  this  war—can  be  and  must  be  the  century  of  the  common  man…those  who  write  the  peace  must  think  of  the  whole  world  …  there  can  be  no  privileged  peoples.  It  was  these  progressive  tendencies  (and  a  curious  association  with  Theosophy  and  Stravinsky’s  Rite  of  Spring  set  designer  Nicolas  Roerich)  that  would  see  Wallace  dropped  from  FDR’s  1944  ticket  in  favor  of  the  more  middling  Harry  Truman,  who  assumed  the  presidency,  while  Copland’s  fanfare  became  far  more  popular  than  anyone  else  mentioned  here.

Aaron Copeland

Born: November 14, 1900, Brooklyn, New York, NY

Died: December 2, 1990, Sleepy Hollow, NY