After his death, his family and estate tried their best to protect his reputation as a family man. When it eventually became obvious that this effort was doomed, Lenny’s ‘secret’ was finally revealed as fact. Particularly revealing is The Bernstein Letters, a book of letters published a few years ago mostly between Bernstein and his wife. Early in their relationship, she writes to him, “You are homosexual and you may never change.” She added. “I happen to love you very much.”
Many of his close collaborators knew he was gay. According to Arthur Laurents, himself gay, who wrote the book for West Side Story, one of the great tragic love stories of musical theatre, Bernstein was
After their children had grown up, he moved from his luxurious New York apartment to live with a younger man in San Francisco for nine months. Then he learned of his wife’s cancer. For a while, he remained with his lover. Finally he flew back to New York and spent the rest of her brief life caring for her. She died aged 56. The gay man that was Bernstein grieved and was hugely upset. But he was from that point on free to live life as a gay man, albeit in the closet and unknown to most people. He was to live for another dozen years.“a gay man who got married. He wasn’t conflicted about it at all. He was just gay.”
Now another series of letters has just emerged, this time from a Japanese man he met in Tokyo and with whom he enjoyed a ten-year tender, passionate and ultimately heartbreaking affair. The young 26-year old Japanese salaryman who worked for a Tokyo Insurance company attended one of Bernstein’s Tokyo concerts with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. He went backstage to thank the conductor for such a wonderful concert.
Bernstein and the orchestra left Tokyo later the next day. When he left Hashimoto was devastated. He wrote to the maestro:“I noticed that he was gazing upon me,” Kunihiko Hashimoto, now 66, said. “It is hard to explain about his eyes. It was not to try to talk to me nor seduce me, just he was looking at me. It was irresistible.”
Bernstein spent all his time with Hashimoto on his many future visits to Japan. But the relationship went far beyond sexual intimacy. Soon Hashimoto was asked to become his Japanese manager. It was Hashimoto who suggested that he organize special Peace Concerts in Hiroshima in 1985 to mark the 40th anniversary of the atomic bomb on the city. On two occasions Bernstein arranged for him to join him in Europe so they could spend time together.“After you left Japan, my mind became vacant, because the one night and afternoon that we had were like a beautiful dream.”
One of Hashimoto’s letters refers to a discussion they had about the possibility of their living together.
In Bernstein’s own memoirs, Hashimoto’s name appears just once and he is referred to as a businessman. Their affair remained a total secret until a writer and researchers discovered 350 letters in the Library of Congress which detailed the relationship. Hashimoto’s letters cover about 11 years until the summer of 1990 only a few months prior to the conductor’s death aged 72. When the writer eventually tracked him down, Hashimoto was shocked. He had no idea their correspondence was available for public viewing.“I never forget that you asked me where we should live. Your question was where ‘we’ should live, wasn’t it? I would like to live with you . . . I was born to meet you and to be with you.”
Now he has agreed to the affair being the subject of a new book. Dearest Lenny: Letters from Japan and the Making of a World Maestro by Mari Yoshihara will be published on 2 September in the USA and 28 November in the UK by Oxford University Press.
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/ ... -hashimoto
