Olin Downes

[2] It was in those two cities that he made his career as a music critic – first with The Boston Post (1906–1924) and then with The New York Times (1924–1955), where he succeeded Richard Aldrich.

The first, Sibelius (1945), was published in Finnish only: a collection of Downes's articles on the subject translated by Paul Sjöblom.

[5] In addition to his campaigning for Sibelius, Downes, according to Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians, did much to advance the cause of other 20th-century composers, including Richard Strauss, Prokofiev, and Shostakovich in the U.S.[2] Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians says of Downes that his reviews "strongly influenced contemporary popular musical opinion in the USA" although "the taste defined in them has dated".

[1] He disparaged many composers later held in general esteem, ranging from the romantic to the atonal, including Elgar, Webern and Berg.

Of Elgar's music he wrote, "it reflects the complacency and stodginess of the era of the antimacassar and pork-pie bonnets; it is affected by the poor taste and the swollen orchestral manner of the post-romantics".