Leonard Bernstein: The Power of Music

The 2,400 square-foot exhibition, created by the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia, features original artifacts, immersive film, listening stations, and interactive technology that together emphasize the depth and complexity of Bernstein the man, the composer, the conductor, and the humanitarian. The exhibition explores how one of the greatest composers of the 20th century expressed the restlessness, anxiety, fear, and hope of a generation of Americans living through World War II and the Holocaust, Vietnam, and turbulent social change. It focuses on Bernstein’s “search for a solution to the 20th century crisis of faith,” which he considered the unifying and perhaps most significant theme to his body of work.