A Closeup Without Reflection

THERE ARE TWO kinds of biographies: inspiring accounts that create a vivid awareness of a life, noteworthy or dull; or uninspired accounts of genuinely fascinating lives. Most of the bestselling biographies that flood the market fall into the latter categories--loving accounts of tremendously visible figures. People obviously want to know what it was like to be close to a Fred Astaire, or a Marilyn Monroe, or an Arthur Fiedler. But after the reader's curiosity has coaxed the book's price from his wallet, he is likely to come away with the conviction that--yes--what they taught him in Expos makes sense. Unclear organization, general statements, inconsistency and verbosity cripple accounts of even the most interesting lives. In short, a biography has to be well-written.

Dickson's is not.

This "irreverent memoir" of Arthur Fiedler and the Pops, written by his assistant conductor for 40 years, is frustrating to read because Dickson simply cannot write well enough to bring Fiedler's evidently singular personality and career to life. Music buffs, if they concentrate hard, can probably glean from Dickson's anecdotes some sense of the excitement it must have been to work closely with Fiedler over the years, and feel the star-watcher's thrill at the Pops parade of brilliant guest performers; those who suffered through piano lessons and drillwork can catch the allusion and laugh at jazz pianist Oscar Peterson's assertion that his keyboard prowess can' from playing "lots and lots of Czerny when I was a kid." But what excitement and color come through does so painfully, in spite of Dickson's uncertain, cliche-ridden style and not because of it.

The author's love and admiration for Fiedler, which should have been the book's main strength, become a liability as Dickson eschews probing Fiedler's complex personality, and instead mingles anecdotes of the maestro's famed gruffness, inflexibility and stinginess with attempts to attribute to him every good quality imaginable. Fiedler, it seems, was a difficult man to love. Rarely showing any personal warmth, he treated his three children distantly, frequently annoyed guests by refusing to pay taxi fares, and once asked Black guest artist Roberta Flack is she "did floors." Yet, lifelong didactic and male chauvinist, he managed to command universal love and respect.

THIS DICHOTOMY could form the book's badly-needed central theme but Dickson unfortunately bumbles. Some of his anecdotes are telling and funny: Fiedler's annual conversation with the New England Provision Company before his end-of-season bash always went: "Hello Sam? Fiedler, here. It's time for that goddam party again." But others do not appear to deserve their build-up, in spite of Dickson's chatty "he told me" style. Neither the maestro nor the family and colleagues Dickson interviewed were strong on bon mots. Certain points simply beg for detail. Dickson lauds Fiedler's genuis for selecting balanced programs, yet endlessly reiterates a generality--in this case, he writes a full page and a half without naming a single piece.

Preoccupied with the idiosyncratic, conversational--and often trite--surfaces of Fielder's life. Dickson fails to explore or even notice those contradictions which could have been springboards for a sensitive look at the musician's character. At different points. Dickson describes Fiedler as either a cold father or a beaming one. He usually adhered to a renowned stinginess yet would fly discreetly to New York to give a benefit concert out of his own pocket. Likewise, near the book's end Dickson glosses over another probing question, raised in an observation by a Boston Symphony Orchestra friend:

There was at one time a real serious musician (in him) and that's the part of him that everyone lost sight of, including himself. And I don't think he was ever completely at peace with himself because of that.

The observation is provocative and could be illuminating, but it jangles oddly at the end of 167 pages of trivia and adulation for Fiedler's popularity, talent and dedication; the quote just sits there.

Thus the "irreverent memoir" winds up telling little about Fiedler. It reveals more about Dickson, as an assistant's grateful tribute to the experience of working with his maestro. Dickson's compendium of reminiscences and moments, a handful of which do seem interesting enough to be memorable, can, given sufficient effort and imagination from the reader, furnish the tools to create the picture of what it was like to know Fiedler and the Pops--but the image remains blurred and ineffective for those without the urge to do-it-yourself.