On August 18th, Temple librarian Anne Harlow gave a presentation entitled “Musicians: Ambassadors for Peace” at a pre-concert talk for the Saratoga Performing Arts Center in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. She is a member of the Reference and Instructional Services Department in Paley Library and also serves as the library’s subject specialist in music, dance, and theater. Anne’s presentation was coordinated with a rare concert appearance of Van Cliburn with the Philadelphia Orchestra. Cliburn became a national hero when he won the first International Tchaikovsky Competition in 1958, in the midst of the Cold War, only a few months after the successful launching of Sputnik.

Anne’s research into cross-cultural communications, particularly music, between the United States and the former Soviet Union during the Cold War, was inspired by her early love of Russian music. “Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Borodin, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Rimsky-Korsakov … I loved all of them since I was a little girl,” she says. “As a child, I spent endless hours listening to this music and wore out my records! But, in the midst of Duck and Cover drills, I could not understand how a nation that produced such beautiful music could not be our friends.” Traveling to Moscow, St. Petersburg, Warsaw, and Kiev to pursue her research interests, she discovered how deeply the Russians love music, and how important these musical exchange concerts were during this stressful and dangerous time of World History. She hopes that her research inspires further musical exchange beyond political, social, and cultural boundaries, and believes that such endeavors are important to promote peace.

— Carol Lang