Music: After Toscanini

Arturo Toscanini had a birthday last week, and as usual refused to take the slightest formal notice of the event. On his 87th birthday, when he was scheduled to rehearse his NBC orchestra, he stayed home and let a visitor take his placeĀ—and newspapers suggested that it was, among other things, the Maestro's way of avoiding congratulations from his musicians.

But the visiting conductor, who led the NBC Symphony in its broadcast this week, was the brilliant conductor of the Boston Symphony, Alsace-born Charles Munch (TIME, Dec. 19, 1949). And Munch's visit to Manhattan was something more than the Maestro's way...

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