How Frank O'Hara's love for music in his early life shaped his work as a poet.
Today, everyone knows Frank O'Hara as one of the most prominent New York School poets. However, what many people don't know is that poetry wasn't always O'Hara's passion. His love before poetry was music; specifically music performance and composition.
As a child, O'Hara attended St. Paul's grade school, which was run by a strict group of nuns known as the Sisters of Mercy. With the disciplinary fervor of some of the nuns in the Catholic school, O'Hara began to feel irritated and out of touch with the world around him. His only consolation at the time was the piano.
On the first floor of Joseph's Home for Working Girls, a group of nuns from the Sisters of Mercy rann elegant music school known as St. Gabriel's Music Studio. It was at this school that O'Hara took piano lessons once a week for half and hour and learned how to play elementary pieces from a classical music book which was purchased from a nearby music store. O'Hara stated later in life that playing basic Mozart scales was an exhilarating escape.
"A lot of my aversions to Catholicism dumped themselves into my musical enthusiasms." (Gooch)
As his experience level grew and his playing became more sophisticated, O'Hara began taking lessons with an organist at St. John's known as J. Fred Donnelly, whose wife Helen Donnelly prepared O'Hara for his first recital by helping him learn a concerto. The Donnelly's must have had an impact on young O'Hara, because the two appear in one of O'Hara's Rachmanioff birthday poems:
where is J. F. Donnelly and his Russian wolfhounds? where is his wife, Helen? where is the cigar smell and the hootings in the studio while I practice (O'Hara)
As O'Hara matured into a young man, it was through music that he usually chose to express himself. He typically did so at the keyboard in the family room and at recitals sponsored by J. F. Donnelly. His favorite show pieces as a young man consisted of Gershwin's First Prelude, Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto, and Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier.
As O'Hara's talent surpassed the teachings of J. F. Donnelly while he was in high school, he became a "special student" at the New England Conservatory in Boston, which was the foremost musical institution at the time in the Northeast. Here, he took one course a week for one semester during the year of 1944. Because of his title as a "special student", O'Hara wasn't working toward a degree, but rather developing his education in the area of music.
O'Hara's teacher, Margaret Mason, was one of the most respected teachers of music theory in the Conservatory. Her refusal to teach an elementary course that consisted of the basics of music theory implies that O'Hara at the time was already at an advanced level. O'Hara planned on continuing his education at the Conservatory, where he would prepare for a career in music reviewing and music teaching that would support his dream to become a composer.
However this plan had to be put on hold due to the presence of World War II. O'Hara enlisted into the Navy later that year. But that didn't hinder O'Hara's love for music. His homesickness was brought about through the base library's record collection, which is where O'Hara would listen to familiar pieces that were similar to his music library at home. He commented on his approval of the record collection by stating:
"The records here are pretty good. You don't hear much Hindemith though. None at all in fact. Dad'd like it. (Gooch)
O'Hara's social life while in the Navy was confined to the musicians he met on base. He met two violinists who played at his request the Brahms Violin Concerto and a violinist instructor named Johnson. He also kindled a friendship with Tom Benedek, who graduated form the University of Chicago and shared O'Hara's passion for piano music. O'Hara must have been very apparent with his love for music, because Benedek recalls:
"He was always talking about classical music and classical pianists. As I remember, our conversations were pretty much focused, at least by him, on the piano rather than on symphony orchestras in general. At that time he was fantasizing about becoming a concert pianist. He was obviously more intelligent than most of the people I encountered." (Gooch)
While searching for an art museum while in port in San Francisco, O'Hara found the composer and pianist Charles Cooper in the Servicemen's Art Center. Because Cooper and his wife were friendly with many composers such as William Schuman, he and O'Hara had much to discuss regarding music composition. This led to a musical collaboration in Cooper's living room that allowed O'Hara to show off his talent as a young pianist. After this encounter, O'Hara wrote home to his parents saying that he finally found some place away from home where he felt like he belonged.
As O'Hara traveled to the South Pacific on he U.S.S. Lurline, the trip was long and lonely. But he managed to keep himself busy by reading and composing music every free minute that he had while on board. During this time, O'Hara composed two pieces: "Little Dances for Piano" and "Rere Regardant". "Little Dances for Piano" was made up of a waltz, march, sarabande, and polka all in one, while "Rere Regardant" was written for a string quartet and based on four passages from Joyce's Ulysses, which O'Hara read while travelling earlier.
Ironically, O'Hara also admits to trying his hand at poetry, but he later told the poet Bill Berkson that his efforts were such failures that threw them overboard in disgust.
After returning from the Navy, O'Hara attended Harvard University, where he majored in music. On campus, his attention was usually caught by announcements of musical performances, specifically ones given by the music club on campus. As his education continued, O'Hara became more interested in other art forms, such as poetry and painting.
Meanwhile, O'Hara's dream to become a composer and concert pianist was fading. As his desire to become a poet grew, he became more and more dissatisfied with the difficulties with becoming a professional musician. The academic component of music always perplexed him, which is why he shied away from prestigious music schools such as Julliard.
"I've studied and loved some things while passing over the simple bases leading toward them. In too many places I have information but no knowledge. (Gooch)
Through this realization, O'Hara swore off all of the music courses at Harvard. Soon after, a rumor spread around campus that O'Hara learned his limitations as a pianist when he had the opportunity to play for Rachmaninoff at the New England Conservatory and that the pianist and composer said that his hands were too small to ever be a successful pianist. O'Hara drew on this story in another one of his "On Rachmaninoff's Birthday" poems:
Good fortune, you would have been my teacher and I your only pupil Only my eyes would be blue as I played and you rapped my knuckles, dearest father of all the Russias. (O'Hara)
Although this rumor was false, the conclusion that O'Hara was physically unsuited for a career in music dissuaded him from a career in music and pushed him to change his major in order to become a poet.
Even though O'Hara wasn't studying music, some of the poems he wrote while in college were based on musical models such as "Blues Song", "Nachstuck", "Quintet for Quasimodo", and "Song". These poems relied on musical conventions like the alternation of fast and slow tempo for their effect.
Similarly to the Renaissance poets he was studying, O'Hara though of songs as poems. He even kept a separate notebook that he used to copy down some of the lyrics to his favorite songs to use in poetry.
Years later after O'Hara became a famous poet, O'Hara was sometimes inspired to sit down at the keyboard again. He surprised many of his friends and colleagues with his talent, even prompting Robert Fizdale, one of the members of the duo piano team "Gold and Fizdale", to comment:
"One of the most amazing things was one day I heard some Rachmaninoff or Liszt piece being dashed off at the piano and I though Arthur must be playing. I went in and it was Frank playing this very difficult piano rhapsody, his hands flying over the keys. He really played particularly well. I didn't know he played at all so I was astonished." (Gooch)
The only production that features O'Hara's talent is in the background of the documentary "The Automotive Story" in 1954. While watching this documentary, it's obvious that O'Hara has a proclivity and passion for the piano. An audio recording of the documentary that showcases O'Hara's talent is provided below:
Although Frank O'Hara may not be universally known for talent and passion for music, his experience with music certainly provided a gateway for O'Hara to produce poetry that follows many of the same feelings and styles as a music composition would.
