The meaning of the film gets drowned in the overwhelmingly good performances of the artists, and there are any number of them: they are all there, Artur Rubinstein, Jasha Heifetz, Gregor Piatigorsky, Leopold Stokowski, Bruno Walter, Artur Rodzinski, Fritz Reiner, Ezio Pinza, Lily Pons and even Tchaikovsky (vaguely discerned from some distance, impersonated, of course,) and although Marsha Hunt makes a good and touching performance as the mother who loses first her husband and then her son in the same way - getting lost making their own ways - the superficial acting of that story must drag the film down from the top levels of the performances. The key scene to the whole thing is however Jasha Heifetz' communication with Marsha, when he eloquently comforts her for all her grief better than anyone could have done.The personality of Jasha Heifetz is somehow the key to the whole problem, which is the alienation of the artist from an ordinary human life, which is what both the father and the son can't bear and rebel against. Jasha Heifetz was often considered inhuman in his seemingly callous attitude, and even in his acting here he gives a rather stiff and almost robot-like impression, but his words couldn't be warmer, and they could but come from the heart, which still beats down there under all the layers of superhuman professionalism and completely reconciles Marsha (Nora) with her fate. Edgar G. Ulmer made some very odd films in extremely different directions, there is one film about tuberculosis and another horror film with Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi, which could be their best - and here he films music, and as a music film of music and about music it will certainly endure for all ages and continue to impress all lovers of real music.

Long before Carnegie Hall came to the big screen, modern swing music arrived there with Benny Goodman and his clarinet with that famous concert in the late Thirties. So the idea behind the film was already quite dated.But the rather hokey plot of this film only serves as a frame for numbers by more classical artists than ever gathered on one movie at the same time. If you love classical music and the great artists who are no longer with us from the past than this is your movie and no review good or bad will have anything to do with whether you see it or not.Such as it is the story revolves around Marsha Hunt whose mother was a charwoman at Carnegie Hall and she started there as well and worked her way up to part of the management. She married and had a son who grew up to be William Prince who listening to the greatest classical artists around got a real musical education. But all Prince wants to do is play piano with Vaughn Monroe.Without giving too much away, let's say that the education was not in vain after all.With people like Walter Damrosch and Leopold Stakowski conducting symphonies and such artists as Lily Pons, Rise Stevens, Jan Peerce and my favorite Ezio Pinza on the screen, if you're a classical music fan this movie is a must for you. The story is easy to take as well and there's a nice performance by Frank McHugh as Carnegie Hall's eternal doorman.

This is a movie about a young man and his mother. She sacrifices everything so that he can study to be a classical pianist. He falls in love with big band music and decides to pursue that. His mother is heart-broken. In other words, one long, slow cliché that has been done better elsewhere.If that's all there were to this movie, I would say "forget it." But in between these scenes of melodrama there are live performances by some of the greatest classical musicians of the 1930s and 40s, indeed some of the greatest classical musicians of all times. Their performances, often truly great ones, are not wedged in in bits and pieces. Rather, we get to watch Arthur Rubinstein perform the entire Chopin Military Polonaise - and then de Falla's Ritual Fire Dance. We get to watch Jascha Heifitz perform the entire last movement of the Beethoven Violin Concerto - and with what fire! We get to wonder as Leopold Stokowski completely distorts the tempo markings for an entire movement of a Tchaikovsky symphony, producing a series of remarkable moments that, for this listener, never came together as a whole - but still, what daring to pull Tchaikovsky apart like that. Stokowsky and Rubenstein both remind us of an era when classical musicians were also stage performers. Rubenstein bangs away at the keyboard with fantastic arm gestures. Stokowski is very clearly conscious of the angle from which he is being filmed. These are spectacular musicians devoted to the music, yes, but these are also colossal, theatrical egos.We get to see Ezio Pinza stand there in a costume that would be grounds for a law suit, yet sing Don Giovanni's Brindisi like no one else - and the opening of Il lascerato spirto, from Verdi's Simon Bocanegra, the only musical fragment in the movie.I saw this - most of it - on TCM. It is evidently available on DVD. I hope the DVD recognizes the dual nature of the movie and has the tracks arranged so that one can skip over the melodrama and just enjoy the remarkable musical performances.

Enjoyed this film from the very beginning to the end with great artists performing in Carnegie Hall and a great story revolving around a woman named Nora Ryan, (Marsha Hunt) and her son named Tony Salerno, Jr., (William Prince) who wants her son to become a great concert pianist. Nora works in Carnegie Hall as a cleaning lady polishing brass rails and works hard to support her son who she loves very much. Tony grows up in Carnegie Hall and gets to meet all the famous conductors, singers and famous musicians. However, Tony wants to cut the apron strings of his mother and branches off to the modern dance bands and meets up with a very attractive gal which sort of breaks his mother's heart. If you like Classical Music and enjoy the great talents of super star talents from the past, this is the film for you. By the way, Marsha Hunt is approaching the age of 90 years and contributed a great deal of her acting ability to the Hollywood Silver Screen. Great film, don't miss it. Enjoy.