October 30 - Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge (The Musical Birthday Series, 2nd Annual Cycle)

Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge (30 October 1864 – 4 November 1953) was an American patron of music, especially of chamber music.  She was responsibly for commissioning important works from most of the major composers of her time. She was also an accomplished amateur pianist. 

 [For last year's verses on Peter Warlock and Frans Brüggen click here.]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mrs. Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge (1)

I have read that her friends called her Liz,

But in the commissioning biz,

It’s considered more normal

For names to be formal,

When handing out money, that is.

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Mrs. Coolidge (2 & 3)

“My plea for modern music is not that we should like it, nor necessarily that we should even understand it, but that we should exhibit it as a significant human document." --  Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge

Liz Coolidge (Elizabeth Sprague)

Was not indecisive or vague.

She proffer commissions

To modern musicians

Whom listeners shunned liked the plague.

 

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Mrs. Coolidge said, “Over the years

I’ve sponsored a hundred premieres.

I’m worth quite enough

To encourage this stuff,

Though the music may leave you in tears.”

 

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Mrs. Coolidge (4) 

"She was famous in her later decades for attending premieres and turning off her hearing aid. 'I can pay for it, but I don’t have to listen to it.' was her typically forthright explanation." -- John Barker, The Pro Arte Quartet, 17

When the string quartet played a premiere, it

Was touched Mrs. Coolidge sat near it,

But she turned off her earpiece,

As they started the queer piece,

And simply pretended to hear it.

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Mrs. Coolidge (5)

“"Mrs. Coolidge, why is it that you do so much for the cause of modern music and you do nothing for modern art?' To which she quickly responded, 'Young man, I may be deaf but I'm not blind.'" John Barker, The Pro Arte Quartet, 17

When he asked her if she was inclined

To buy the new painting he’d signed,

She said she would not

Play a sou for the blot,

And explained she was deaf but not blind.