To J.F.K.

The old man painfully hobbled on two canes to the seat in the center of the podium at Philharmonic Hall last week and a capacity audience rose to its feet in unison to pay homage. At 72, Darius Milhaud is crippled by arthritis and rarely appears publicly any more. But this was a special occasion--the New York premiere of Milhaud's Murder of a Great Chief of State, in memory of John F. Kennedy.

Milhaud conducted sitting down, but with burly authority. The score opened with a fast descending scale on the strings joined by the brassy blare of trumpets. Four stark downbeats on the kettle drums were omens of doom. Cracking fortissimos rapidly fading to a whispered diminuendo, an accumulation of dissonant agonized tones, a carefree pastoral legato phrase, and a lamenting melody on a reedy oboe vividly characterized the fateful day in Dallas and the President's oblivious ride to his death.

Commissioned by the Oakland Symphony on Nov. 23, 1963, Milhaud wrote the 31-minute piece in 24 hours. It was premiered in Oakland on Dec. 3. "I was a great admirer of Kennedy or I would never have written it," says Milhaud: "It was a privilege to be offered an occasion to express my sorrow."

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