HARD SZELL

“In 1966, NBC broadcast a Bell Telephone Hour program about George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra called ‘One Man’s Triumph.’ Nowadays, most viewers would find it presumptuous for that phrase to be used as the title of a TV documentary about a hundred-man ensemble whose members included some of America’s top instrumentalists. But no one would have thought to complain at the time–for Szell was universally believed to be solely responsible for the transformation of a merely regional group into a virtuoso ensemble…”