Editing Aaron Copland (section)

== Life ==

=== Early years ===
[[File:Aaron Copland School of Music (541691170).jpg|thumb|Aaron Copland School of Music, Queens College (part of the [[City University of New York]])]]
Aaron Copland was born in [[Brooklyn]], New York, on November 14, 1900.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=15}} He was the youngest of five children in a [[Conservative Jewish]] immigrant family of [[Lithuanian Jews|Lithuanian]] origin.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=19}} While emigrating from Russia to the United States, Copland's father, Harris Morris Copland, lived and worked in Scotland for two to three years to pay for his boat fare to the United States. It was there that Copland's father may have [[Anglicized]] his surname "Kaplan" to "Copland", though Copland himself believed for many years that the change had been caused by an [[Ellis Island]] immigration official when his father entered the country.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=15}}<ref name=Cone>{{harvnb|Cone|Copland|1968}}</ref> Copland was unaware until late in his life that the family name had been Kaplan, his parents having never told him.<ref name=Cone /> Throughout his childhood, Copland and his family lived above his parents' Brooklyn shop, H. M. Copland's, at 628 Washington Avenue (which Aaron later called "a kind of neighborhood [[Macy's]]"),{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=16}}<ref>{{cite book |last=Paton |first=David W. |title=1905 State of New York Census. Ninth Election District, Block "D", Eleventh Assembly District, Borough of Brooklyn, County of Kings |page=36 |date=July 1, 1905}}</ref> on the corner of Dean Street and Washington Avenue,{{sfn|Ross|2007|p=266}} and most of the children helped out in the store. His father was a staunch Democrat. The family members were active in [[Congregation Baith Israel Anshei Emes]], where Aaron celebrated his [[bar mitzvah]].{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=26}} Not especially athletic, the sensitive young man became an avid reader and often read [[Horatio Alger]] stories on his front steps.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=15}}

Copland's father had no musical interest. His mother, Sarah Mittenthal Copland, sang, played the piano, and arranged music lessons for her children.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=19}} Copland had four older siblings: two brothers, Ralph and Leon, and two sisters, Laurine and Josephine.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Aaron Copland / Timeline // Copland House ...where America's musical past and future meet|url=http://www.coplandhouse.org/aaron-copland/timeline/|access-date=February 13, 2022|website=coplandhouse.org}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Aaron Copland – Composer Biography, Facts and Music Compositions|url=https://www.famouscomposers.net/aaron-copland|access-date=February 13, 2022|website=Famous Composers}}</ref> Of his siblings, his oldest brother Ralph was the most advanced musically; he was proficient on the violin. Laurine had the strongest connection with Aaron; she gave him his first piano lessons, promoted his musical education, and supported him in his musical career.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=19}} A student at the Metropolitan Opera School and frequent opera-goer, Laurine also brought home [[libretti]] for Aaron to study.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=17}} Copland attended [[Boys High School (Brooklyn)|Boys High School]] and in the summer went to various camps. Most of his early exposure to music was at Jewish weddings and ceremonies, and occasional family musicales.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=26}}

Copland began writing songs at the age of eight and a half.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=22}} His earliest notated music, about seven bars he wrote when age 11, was for an opera scenario he created and called ''Zenatello''.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=22}}{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=32}} From 1913 to 1917 he took piano lessons with Leopold Wolfsohn, who taught him the standard classical fare.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=22}} Copland's first public music performance was at a [[Wanamaker's]] recital.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=18}}{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=23}} By age 15, after attending a concert by Polish composer-pianist [[Ignacy Jan Paderewski]], Copland decided to become a composer.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=33}} At 16, he heard his first symphony, at the [[Brooklyn Academy of Music]].<ref name="nyclgbtsites.org">{{Cite web|title=Aaron Copland Residence at the Hotel Empire|url=https://www.nyclgbtsites.org/site/aaron-copland-residence/|access-date=July 12, 2021|website=NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project}}</ref> After attempts to further his music study from a [[correspondence course]], Copland took formal lessons in [[harmony]], [[music theory|theory]], and [[Musical composition|composition]] from [[Rubin Goldmark]], a noted teacher and composer of American music (who had given [[George Gershwin]] three lessons). Goldmark, with whom Copland studied between 1917 and 1921, gave the young Copland a solid foundation, especially in the Germanic tradition.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=34}} As Copland later said: "This was a stroke of luck for me. I was spared the floundering that so many musicians have suffered through incompetent teaching."{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=23}} But Copland also said that Goldmark had "little sympathy for the advanced musical idioms of the day" and his "approved" composers ended with [[Richard Strauss]].{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=35}}

Copland's graduation piece from his studies with Goldmark was a three-movement piano sonata in a [[Romantic music|Romantic]] style.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=36}} But he had also composed more original and daring pieces that he did not share with his teacher.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=37}} In addition to regularly attending the [[Metropolitan Opera]] and the [[New York Symphony]], where he heard the standard classical repertory, Copland continued his musical development through an expanding circle of musical friends. After graduating from high school, he played in dance bands.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=39}} Continuing his musical education, he received further piano lessons from Victor Wittgenstein, who found him "quiet, shy, well-mannered, and gracious in accepting criticism."{{sfn|Smith|1953|pp=25, 31}} Copland's fascination with the [[October Revolution|Russian Revolution]] and its promise for freeing the lower classes drew a rebuke from his father and uncles.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=30}} In spite of that, in his early adult life, Copland developed friendships with people who had socialist and communist leanings.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=237}}

=== Study in Paris ===
[[File:Nadia Boulanger 1925.jpg|thumb|Nadia Boulanger in 1925]]
Copland's passion for the latest European music, plus glowing letters from his friend Aaron Schaffer, inspired him to go to Paris for further study.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=33}} An article in ''[[Musical America]]'' about a summer school program for American musicians at the [[Fontainebleau School of Music]], offered by the French government, encouraged Copland further.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=35}} His father wanted him to go to college, but his mother's vote in the family conference allowed him to give Paris a try. On arriving in France, he studied at Fontainebleau with pianist and pedagog [[Isidor Philipp]] and composer [[Paul Vidal]]. When Copland found Vidal too much like Goldmark, he switched at the suggestion of a fellow student to [[Nadia Boulanger]], then aged 34.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|pp=47–48, 50}} He had initial reservations: "No one to my knowledge had ever before thought of studying with a woman."{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=41}} She interviewed him, and recalled later: "One could tell his talent immediately."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=41}}

Boulanger had as many as 40 students at once and employed a formal regimen that Copland had to follow. Copland found her incisive mind much to his liking and her ability to critique a composition impeccable. Boulanger "could always find the weak spot in a place you suspected was weak... She also could tell you ''why'' it was weak [italics Copland]."{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=63}} He wrote in a letter to his brother Ralph, "This intellectual Amazon is not only professor at the [[Conservatoire de Paris|Conservatoire]], is not only familiar with all music from Bach to Stravinsky, but is prepared for anything worse in the way of dissonance. But make no mistake&nbsp;... A more charming womanly woman never lived."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=47}} Copland later wrote: "it was wonderful for me to find a teacher with such openness of mind, while at the same time she held firm ideas of right and wrong in musical matters. The confidence she had in my talents and her belief in me were at the very least flattering and more—they were crucial to my development at this time of my career."{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=64}} Though he had planned on only one year abroad, he studied with her for three years, finding that her eclectic approach inspired his own broad musical taste.

Along with his studies with Boulanger, Copland took classes in French language and history at the [[University of Paris|Sorbonne]], attended plays, and frequented [[Shakespeare and Company (1919–1941)|Shakespeare and Company]], the English-language bookstore that was a gathering place for expatriate American writers.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=54–55}} Among this group in the heady cultural atmosphere of Paris in the 1920s were [[Paul Bowles]], [[Ernest Hemingway]], [[Sinclair Lewis]], [[Henry Miller]], [[Gertrude Stein]], and [[Ezra Pound]], as well as artists like [[Pablo Picasso]], [[Marc Chagall]], and [[Amedeo Modigliani]].{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=51}} Also influential on the new music were the French intellectuals [[Marcel Proust]], [[Paul Valéry]], [[Jean-Paul Sartre]], and [[André Gide]]; Copland said the latter was his favorite and most read.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=53–54}} Travels to Italy, Austria, and Germany rounded out Copland's musical education. During his stay in Paris, he began writing musical critiques, the first on [[Gabriel Fauré]], which helped spread his fame and stature in the music community.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=62}}

=== 1925 to 1935 ===
Copland returned to America optimistic and enthusiastic about the future, determined to make his way as a full-time composer.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=55}} He rented a studio apartment on New York City's [[Upper West Side]] in the [[The Empire Hotel (New York City)|Empire Hotel]], close to [[Carnegie Hall]] and other musical venues and publishers. He remained in that area for the next 30 years, later moving to [[Westchester County, New York]]. Copland lived frugally and survived financially with help from two $2,500 [[Guggenheim Fellowship]]s in 1925 and 1926 (each of the two {{Inflation|US|2500|1925|fmt=eq}}).{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=89}} Lecture-recitals, awards, appointments, and small commissions, plus some teaching, writing, and personal loans, kept him afloat in the subsequent years through World War II.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=90}}

[[File:Kousewitzky.gif|thumb|left|upright|[[Serge Koussevitzky]] was a mentor and supporter of Copland.]]
Also important, especially during the Depression, were wealthy patrons who underwrote performances, helped pay for publication of works, and promoted musical events and composers.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=90}} Among them was [[Serge Koussevitzky]], the music director of the [[Boston Symphony Orchestra]], who was known as a champion of "new music". Koussevitsky proved to be very influential in Copland's life, perhaps the second most important figure in Copland's career after Boulanger.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=121–22}} Beginning with the [[Symphony for Organ and Orchestra (Copland)|Symphony for Organ and Orchestra]] (1924), Koussevitzky performed more of Copland's music than that of any the composer's contemporaries, at a time when other conductors were programming only a few of Copland's works.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=123}}

Soon after his return to the United States, Copland was exposed to the artistic circle of photographer [[Alfred Stieglitz]]. While Copland did not care for Stieglitz's domineering attitude, he admired his work and took to heart Stieglitz's conviction that American artists should reflect "the ideas of American Democracy."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=101}} This ideal influenced not just Copland, but also a generation of artists and photographers, including [[Paul Strand]], [[Edward Weston]], [[Ansel Adams]], [[Georgia O'Keeffe]], and [[Walker Evans]].{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=101}} Evans's photographs inspired portions of Copland's opera ''[[The Tender Land]]''.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=103}}

In his quest to take up the slogan of the Stieglitz group, "Affirm America", Copland found only the music of [[Carl Ruggles]] and [[Charles Ives]] upon which to draw.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=101, 110}} Without what Copland called a "usable past" in American classical composers, he looked to jazz and popular music, something he had started to do while in Europe.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=113}} In the 1920s, Gershwin, [[Bessie Smith]], and [[Louis Armstrong]] were in the forefront of American popular music and jazz.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=115–16}} By the end of the decade, Copland felt his music was going in a more abstract, less jazz-oriented direction.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|pp=134–35}} But as large swing bands such as those of [[Benny Goodman]] and [[Glenn Miller]] became popular in the 1930s, Copland took a renewed interest in the genre.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=116}}

[[File:Stieglitz 1907c autochrome self-portrait.jpg|thumb|Copland admired the work and philosophy of [[Alfred Stieglitz]]]]
Inspired by the example of [[Les Six]] in France, Copland sought out contemporaries such as [[Roger Sessions]], [[Roy Harris]], [[Virgil Thomson]], and [[Walter Piston]], and quickly established himself as a spokesperson for composers of his generation.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=159}} He also helped found the Copland-Sessions Concerts to showcase these composers' chamber works to new audiences.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=166–67}} Copland's relationship with these men, who became known as "commando unit," was one of both support and rivalry, and he played a key role in keeping them together until after World War II.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=176}} He also was generous with his time with nearly every American young composer he met during his life, later earning the title "Dean of American Music."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=178, 215}}

With the knowledge he had gained from his studies in Paris, Copland came into demand as a lecturer and writer on contemporary European classical music.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=58}} From 1927 to 1930 and from 1935 to 1938, he taught classes at [[The New School|The New School for Social Research]] in New York City.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=58}} Eventually, his New School lectures appeared in the form of two books—''What to Listen for in Music'' (1937, revised 1957) and ''Our New Music'' (1940, revised 1968 and retitled ''The New Music: 1900–1960'').{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=58}} During this period, Copland also wrote regularly for ''[[The New York Times]]'', ''[[The Musical Quarterly]]'', and other journals. These articles appeared in 1969 as the book ''Copland on Music''.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=58}} During his time at The New School, Copland was active as a presenter and curator, using The New School to present a wide range of composers and artists.

Copland's compositions in the early 1920s reflected the modernist attitude that prevailed among intellectuals, that the arts need be accessible to only a cadre of the enlightened, and that the masses would come to appreciate their efforts over time. But mounting troubles with the ''Symphonic Ode'' (1929) and ''[[Short Symphony]]'' (1933) caused Copland to rethink this approach. It was financially unprofitable, particularly during the Depression. Avant-garde music had lost what cultural historian [[Morris Dickstein]] calls "its buoyant experimental edge" and the national attitude toward it had changed.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=91}} As biographer [[Howard Pollack]] writes:{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=158}}
<blockquote>
Copland observed two trends among composers in the 1930s: first, a continuing attempt to "simplify their musical language" and, second, a desire to "make contact" with as wide an audience as possible. Since 1927, he had been in the process of simplifying, or at least paring down, his musical language, though in such a manner as to sometimes have the effect, paradoxically, of estranging audiences and performers. By 1933 ... he began to find ways to make his starkly personal language accessible to a surprisingly large number of people.
</blockquote>

In many ways, this shift mirrored the German idea of {{lang|de|[[Gebrauchsmusik]]}} ("music for use"), as composers sought to create music that could serve a utilitarian as well as artistic purpose. This approach encompassed two trends: first, music that students could easily learn, and second, music which would have wider appeal, such as [[incidental music]] for plays, movies, radio, etc.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=162}} To this end, Copland provided musical advice and inspiration to [[Group Theatre (New York)|The Group Theatre]], a company that also attracted [[Stella Adler]], [[Elia Kazan]], and [[Lee Strasberg]].{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=258}} Philosophically an outgrowth of Stieglitz and his ideals, the Group focused on socially relevant plays by American authors.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=257}} Through it and later his work in film, Copland met several major American playwrights, including [[Thornton Wilder]], [[William Inge]], [[Arthur Miller]], and [[Edward Albee]], and considered projects with all of them.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=267}}

=== 1935 to 1950 ===
{{listen|type=music|image=none|help=no
| filename     = Aaron Copland Appalachian Spring Opening original version for 13 instruments.ogg
| title        = Opening: ''Appalachian Spring'', original version for 13 instruments
| description  = Sample of the opening movement in Copland's ballet}}

Around 1935 Copland began to compose musical pieces for young audiences, in accordance with the first goal of American Gebrauchsmusik.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=303}} These works included piano pieces (''The Young Pioneers'') and an opera (''[[The Second Hurricane]]'').{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=303–05}} During the Depression years, Copland traveled extensively to Europe, Africa, and Mexico. He formed an important friendship with Mexican composer [[Carlos Chávez]] and returned often to Mexico for working vacations conducting engagements.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=178, 226}} During his initial visit to Mexico, Copland began composing the first of his signature works, ''[[El Salón México]]'', completed in 1936. In it and in ''The Second Hurricane'' Copland began "experimenting", as he phrased it, with a simpler, more accessible style.{{sfn|Copland|Perlis|1984|p=245}} This and other incidental commissions fulfilled the second goal of American Gebrauchsmusik, creating music of wide appeal.

[[File:Carlos Chavez.jpg|thumb|Carlos Chávez in 1937]]
Concurrent with ''The Second Hurricane'', Copland composed (for radio broadcast) "Prairie Journal" on a commission from the [[Columbia Broadcast System]].{{Sfn|Pollack|1999|p=310}} This was one of his first pieces to convey the landscape of the American West.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=312}} This emphasis on the frontier carried over to his ballet ''[[Billy the Kid (ballet)|Billy the Kid]]'' (1938), which along with ''El Salón México'' became his first widespread public success.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=187}}{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=323}} Copland's ballet music established him as an authentic composer of American music much as Stravinsky's ballet scores connected the composer with Russian music and came at an opportune time.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=184}} He helped fill a vacuum for American choreographers to fill their dance repertory{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=185}} and tapped into an artistic groundswell, from the motion pictures of [[Busby Berkeley]] and [[Fred Astaire]] to the ballets of [[George Balanchine]] and [[Martha Graham]], to both democratize and Americanize dance as an art form.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=94}} In 1938, Copland helped form the [[American Composers Alliance]] to promote and publish American contemporary classical music. He was president of the organization from 1939 to 1945.<ref name="nyclgbtsites.org"/> In 1939, Copland completed his first two Hollywood film scores, for ''[[Of Mice and Men (1939 film)|Of Mice and Men]]'' and ''[[Our Town (1940 film)|Our Town]]'', and composed the radio score "John Henry", based on [[John Henry (folklore)|the folk ballad]].{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=169}}

While these works and others like them that followed were accepted by the listening public at large, detractors accused Copland of pandering to the masses.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|pp=308, 336}} Music critic [[Paul Rosenfeld]], for one, warned in 1939 that Copland was "standing in the fork in the high road, the two branches of which lead respectively to popular and artistic success".{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=338}} Even some of Copland's friends, such as composer [[Arthur Berger (composer)|Arthur Berger]], were confused about Copland's simpler style.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=336}} One, composer [[David Diamond (composer)|David Diamond]], went so far as to lecture Copland: "By having sold out to the mongrel commercialists half-way already, the danger is going to be wider for you, and I beg you dear Aaron, don't sell out [entirely] yet."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=190}} Copland's response was that his writing as he did and in as many genres was his response to how the Depression had affected society, as well as to new media and the audiences made available by these new media.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|pp=308–09}} As he put it, "The composer who is frightened of losing his artistic integrity through contact with a mass audience is no longer aware of the meaning of the word art."{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=338}}

[[File:Aaron Copland, Fanfare for the Common Man.jpg|thumb|left|Initial trumpet notes from ''Fanfare for the Common Man'', Tanglewood]]
The 1940s were arguably Copland's most productive years, and some of his works from this period cemented his fame. His ballet scores for ''[[Rodeo (Copland)|Rodeo]]'' (1942) and ''[[Appalachian Spring]]'' (1944) were huge successes. ''[[Lincoln Portrait]]'' and ''[[Fanfare for the Common Man]]'' became patriotic standards. Also important was the [[Symphony No. 3 (Copland)|Third Symphony]]. Composed from 1944 to 1946, it became Copland's best-known symphony.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=410, 418}} The [[Clarinet Concerto (Copland)|Clarinet Concerto]] (1948), scored for solo clarinet, strings, harp, and piano, was a commission piece for band-leader and clarinetist Benny Goodman and a complement to Copland's earlier jazz-influenced work, the [[Piano Concerto (Copland)|Piano Concerto]] (1926).{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=424}} His ''Four Piano Blues'' is an introspective composition with a jazz influence.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=427}} Copland finished the 1940s with two film scores, one for [[William Wyler]]'s ''[[The Heiress]]'' and one for the [[The Red Pony (1949 film)|film adaptation]] of [[John Steinbeck]]'s novel ''[[The Red Pony]]''.{{sfn|Smith|1953|p=202}}

In 1949, Copland returned to Europe, where he found French composer Pierre Boulez dominating the group of postwar avant-garde composers there.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=460}} He also met with proponents of twelve-tone technique, based on the works of Arnold Schoenberg, and found himself interested in adapting serial methods to his own musical voice.

=== 1950s and 1960s ===
In 1950, Copland received a [[U.S.-Italy Fulbright Commission]] scholarship to study in Rome, which he did the following year. Around this time, he also composed his Piano Quartet, adopting Schoenberg's twelve-tone method, and ''[[Old American Songs]]'' (1950), the first set of which was premiered by Peter Pears and [[Benjamin Britten]], the second by [[William Warfield]].{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=467}} During the 1951–52 academic year, Copland gave a series of lectures under the [[Charles Eliot Norton Lectures|Charles Eliot Norton Professorship]] at [[Harvard University]]. These lectures were published as the book ''Music and Imagination''.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=170}}

Because of his leftist views, which had included his support of the [[Communist Party USA]] ticket during the [[1936 United States presidential election|1936 presidential election]] and his strong support of [[Progressive Party (United States, 1948)|Progressive Party]] candidate [[Henry A. Wallace]] in the 1948 presidential election, Copland was investigated by the [[FBI]] during the [[McCarthyism|Red scare]] of the 1950s. He was included on an FBI list of 151 artists thought to have Communist associations and found himself [[Hollywood blacklist|blacklisted]], with ''A Lincoln Portrait'' withdrawn from the 1953 inaugural concert for President [[Dwight Eisenhower]].{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=452}} Called later that year to a private hearing at the [[United States Capitol]] in Washington, D.C., Copland was questioned by [[Joseph McCarthy]] and [[Roy Cohn]] about his lecturing abroad and his affiliations with various organizations and events.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=455–77}} McCarthy and Cohn ignored Copland's works, which made a virtue of American values.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=452, 456}} Outraged by the accusations, many members of the musical community held up Copland's music as a banner of his patriotism. The investigations ceased in 1955 and were closed in 1975.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=458}}

The McCarthy probes did not seriously affect Copland's career and international artistic reputation, however taxing as they might have been on his time, energy, and emotional state.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=458}} Nevertheless, beginning in 1950, Copland—who had been appalled at Stalin's persecution of [[Dmitri Shostakovich]] and other artists—began resigning from participation in leftist groups.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=285}} Copland, Pollack writes, "stayed particularly concerned about the role of the artist in society".{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=286}} He decried the lack of artistic freedom in the Soviet Union, and in his 1954 Norton lecture he asserted that loss of freedom under Soviet Communism deprived artists of "the immemorial right of the artist to be wrong." He began to vote Democratic, first for Stevenson and then for Kennedy.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=285}}

Potentially more damaging for Copland was a sea change in artistic tastes, away from the Populist mores that infused his work of the 1930s and 40s.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=91}} Beginning in the 1940s, intellectuals assailed [[Popular Front]] culture, to which Copland's music was linked, and labeled it, in Dickstein's words, "hopelessly middlebrow, a dumbing down of art into toothless entertainment."{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=91}} They often linked their disdain for Populist art with technology, new media and mass audiences—in other words, the areas of radio, television and motion pictures, for which Copland either had or soon would write music, as well as his popular ballets.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=91}} While these attacks actually began at the end of the 1930s with the writings of [[Clement Greenberg]] and [[Dwight Macdonald]] for ''[[Partisan Review]]'', they were based in anti-Stalinist politics and accelerated in the decades following World War II.{{sfn|Oja|Tick|2005|p=91}}

Despite any difficulties that his suspected Communist sympathies might have posed, Copland traveled extensively during the 1950s and early 1960s to observe the avant-garde styles of Europe, hear compositions by Soviet composers not well known in the West, and experience the new school of Polish music.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=462–64}} In Japan, he was taken with the work of [[Tōru Takemitsu]] and began a correspondence with him that lasted over the next decade.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=464–65}} Copland revised his text "The New Music" with comments on the styles that he encountered.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|pp=465–66}} He found much of what he heard dull and impersonal.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=466}} [[Electronic music]] seemed to have "a depressing sameness of sound," while [[aleatoric music]] was for those "who enjoy teetering on the edge of chaos."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=465}} As he summarized, "I've spent most of my life trying to get the right note in the right place. Just throwing it open to chance seems to go against my natural instincts."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=465}}

[[File:Aaron Copland 1962.JPG|thumb|left|Copland in 1962 from a television special]]
In 1952, Copland received a commission from the [[League of Composers]], funded by a grant from [[Richard Rodgers]] and [[Oscar Hammerstein II|Oscar Hammerstein]], to write an opera for television.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=470}} While Copland was aware of the potential pitfalls of that genre, which included weak libretti and demanding production values, he had also been thinking about writing an opera since the 1940s.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=470}} Among the subjects he had considered were [[Theodore Dreiser]]'s ''[[An American Tragedy]]'' and [[Frank Norris]]'s ''[[McTeague]]''{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=470}} He finally settled on [[James Agee]]'s ''[[Let Us Now Praise Famous Men]]'', which seemed appropriate for the more intimate setting of television and could also be used in the "college trade," with more schools mounting operas than they had before World War II.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=470}} The resulting opera, ''[[The Tender Land]]'', was written in two acts but later expanded to three. As Copland feared, when the opera premiered in 1954 critics found the libretto to be weak.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=478}} In spite of its flaws, the opera became one of the few American operas to enter the standard repertory.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=478}}

In 1957, 1958, and 1976, Copland was the music director of the [[Ojai Music Festival]], a classical and contemporary music festival in [[Ojai, California]].<ref>[http://www.ojaifestival.org/music-directors-2/ Music Directors] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130701064355/http://www.ojaifestival.org/music-directors-2/ |date=July 1, 2013 }}, [[Ojai Music Festival]].</ref> For the occasion of the [[The Metropolitan Museum of Art Centennial|Metropolitan Museum of Art Centennial]], Copland composed ''Ceremonial Fanfare for Brass Ensemble'' to accompany the exhibition "Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries." [[Leonard Bernstein]], Piston, [[William Schuman]], and Thomson also composed pieces for the museum's Centennial exhibitions.<ref>[http://libmma.org/digital_files/archives/Trescher_Centennial_records_b18234550.pdf Finding aid for the George Trescher records related to The Metropolitan Museum of Art Centennial, 1949, 1960–1971 (bulk 1967–1970)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190412110104/http://libmma.org/digital_files/archives/Trescher_Centennial_records_b18234550.pdf |date=April 12, 2019 }}. [[Metropolitan Museum of Art]]. Retrieved August 6, 2014.</ref>

=== Later years ===
From the 1960s onward, Copland turned increasingly to conducting. Though not enamored of the prospect, he found himself without new ideas for composition, saying, "It was exactly as if someone had simply turned off a faucet."{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=516}} He became a frequent guest conductor in the United States and the United Kingdom and made a series of recordings of his music, primarily for [[Columbia Records]]. In 1960, [[RCA Victor]] released Copland's recordings with the Boston Symphony Orchestra of the orchestral suites from ''Appalachian Spring'' and ''The Tender Land''; these recordings were later reissued on CD, as were most of Copland's Columbia recordings (by Sony).{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=516}}
[[File:Aaron Copland House, Cortlandt Manor, NY.jpg|upright=1.3|thumb|[[Aaron Copland House|Rock Hill]], Copland's home in [[Cortlandt Manor, New York]], now a [[National Historic Landmark]]|alt=A green wooden house with stone chimney and foundation walls, seen through trees on a sunny winter day.]]
From 1960 until his death, Copland resided at [[Cortlandt Manor, New York]]. Known as [[Aaron Copland House|Rock Hill]], his home was added to the [[National Register of Historic Places]] in 2003 and further designated a [[National Historic Landmark]] in 2008.<ref name="nris">{{NRISref|version=2009a}}</ref> Copland's health deteriorated through the 1980s, and he died of [[Alzheimer's disease]] and [[respiratory failure]] on December 2, 1990, in [[North Tarrytown, New York]] (now Sleepy Hollow).

Following his death, his ashes were scattered over the Tanglewood Music Center near Lenox, Massachusetts.<ref>Wilson, Scott. ''Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons'', 3rd ed.: 2 (Kindle Location 9788). McFarland & Company. Kindle Edition.</ref> Much of his large estate was bequeathed to the creation of the Aaron Copland Fund for Composers, which bestows over $600,000 per year to performing groups.{{sfn|Pollack|1999|p=548}}