Thread by @dean_frey

Remembering Ned Rorem on his birthday 🎂
📷 Man Ray, Paris, 1953
"He has the gift for letting poetry sing, and he knows the human voice — the warmth and the timbres, and how to bring them out in exactly the right place."
- Joshua Barone

Ned Rorem by Horst P. Horst
"There are certain things I can't get the point of. Bagels, for instance. Why do people like them? I can't get the point of Berlioz. I can dislike a composer, while admitting what others see in him or her. But not Berlioz."

The Paris Diary of Ned Rorem was published in 1966. His boyfriend at the time, Joe Adamiak, was a graphic artist, & did the layout for the book. And took the cover photo as well, which Rorem calls "pretty good".
amzn.to/2Tvwu5L

Ned Rorem in an incredibly cultured-looking group in the home of the Vicomtesse de Noailles, 1951. "She was a rather gifted writer & a very gifted painter, but like many of the rich undisciplined with pen and paintbrush. She was powerful & famous too, and launched me, sort of."

Here's another picture of Ned Rorem from Paris in 1953. Can't find a photo credit, even on the Ned Rorem website - nedrorem.net. I wonder if it might also be by Man Ray. A great shot, in any case.

Highly recommended: Ned Rorem, The Art of the Diary No. 1, @parisreview
"I am a composer who also writes, not a writer who also composes."
📷 Jack Mitchell, 1992

Another classic photo of Ned Rorem by Jack Mitchell, with his close friend Gloria Vanderbilt, 1992

And, for #caturday, this shot of birthday boy Ned Rorem by Jack Mitchell, from 1983