
Famous Father Girl
A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $24.29
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Jamie Bernstein
-
By:
-
Jamie Bernstein
About this listen
The oldest daughter of revered composer/conductor Leonard Bernstein offers a rare look at her father on the centennial of his birth in a deeply intimate and broadly evocative memoir.
The composer of On the Town and West Side Story, chief conductor of the New York Philharmonic, television star, humanitarian, friend of the powerful and influential, and the life of every party, Leonard Bernstein was an enormous celebrity during one of the headiest periods of American cultural life, as well as the most protean musician in 20th-century America.
But to his eldest daughter, Jamie, he was above all the man in the scratchy brown bathrobe who smelled of cigarettes; the jokester and compulsive teacher who enthused about Beethoven and the Beatles; the insomniac whose 4 a.m. composing breaks involved spooning baby food out of the jar. He taught his daughter to love the world in all its beauty and complexity. In public and private, Lenny was larger than life.
In Famous Father Girl, Bernstein mines the emotional depths of her childhood and invites us into her family’s private world. A fantastic set of characters populates the Bernsteins’ lives, including: the Kennedys, Mike Nichols, John Lennon, Richard Avedon, Stephen Sondheim, Jerome Robbins, and Betty (Lauren) Bacall.
An intoxicating tale, Famous Father Girl is an intimate meditation on a complex and sometimes troubled man, the family he raised, and the music he composed that became the soundtrack to their entwined lives. Deeply moving and often hilarious, Bernstein’s beautifully written memoir is a great American story about one of the greatest Americans of the modern age.
©2018 Jamie Bernstein (P)2018 HarperCollins PublishersListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Leonard Bernstein Letters
- By: Nigel Simone - editor
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 23 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leonard Bernstein was a charismatic and versatile musician - a brilliant conductor who attained international super-star status, and a gifted composer of Broadway musicals ( West Side Story), symphonies ( Age of Anxiety), choral works ( Chichester Psalms), film scores ( On the Waterfront), and much more. Bernstein was also an enthusiastic letter writer, and this audiobook is the first to present a wide-ranging selection of his correspondence.
-
-
Great read
- By paula peron on 05-22-24
-
My Name Is Barbra
- By: Barbra Streisand
- Narrated by: Barbra Streisand
- Length: 48 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Barbra Streisand is by any account a living legend, a woman who in a career spanning six decades has excelled in every area of entertainment. She is among the handful of EGOT winners (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony) and has one of the greatest and most recognizable voices in the history of popular music. She has been nominated for a Grammy 46 times, and with Yentl she became the first woman to write, produce, direct, and star in a major motion picture. In My Name Is Barbra, she tells her own story about her life and extraordinary career.
-
-
BARBRA IS LIKE BUTTAH!
- By JoeGato57 on 11-08-23
By: Barbra Streisand
-
Enough
- By: Cassidy Hutchinson
- Narrated by: Cassidy Hutchinson
- Length: 11 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ever since a childhood visit to Washington, DC, Cassidy Hutchinson aspired to serve her country in government. Raised in a working-class family with a military background, she was the first in her immediate family to graduate from college. Despite having no ties to Washington, Hutchinson landed a vital position at the center of the Trump White House.
-
-
Painful
- By Melissa C. on 09-28-23
-
Astor
- The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune
- By: Anderson Cooper, Katherine Howe
- Narrated by: Anderson Cooper
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From 1783, when German immigrant John Jacob Astor first arrived in the United States, until 2009, when Brooke Astor’s son, Anthony Marshall, was convicted of defrauding his elderly mother, the Astor name occupied a unique place in American society. The family fortune, first made by a beaver trapping business that grew into an empire, was then amplified by holdings in Manhattan real estate. Over the ensuing generations, Astors ruled Gilded Age New York society and inserted themselves into political and cultural life, but also suffered the most famous loss on the Titanic.
-
-
A family first made, then destroyed by wealth.
- By Barbara W. on 09-23-23
By: Anderson Cooper, and others
-
Tom Lake
- A Novel
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Meryl Streep
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
-
-
So incredibly boring
- By Rhonda Morrison on 08-05-23
By: Ann Patchett
-
Every Man for Himself and God Against All
- A Memoir
- By: Werner Herzog, Michael Hofmann - translator
- Narrated by: Werner Herzog
- Length: 13 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Werner Herzog was born in September 1942 in Munich, Germany, at a turning point in the Second World War. Soon Germany would be defeated and a new world would have to be made out the rubble and horrors of the war. Fleeing the Allied bombing raids, Herzog’s mother took him and his older brother to a remote, rustic part of Bavaria where he would spend much of his childhood hungry, without running water, in deep poverty. It was there, as the new postwar order was emerging, that one of the most visionary filmmakers of the next seven decades was formed.
-
-
Absolutely incredible, memoir of the year
- By Susie Bright on 10-16-23
By: Werner Herzog, and others
-
The Leonard Bernstein Letters
- By: Nigel Simone - editor
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 23 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leonard Bernstein was a charismatic and versatile musician - a brilliant conductor who attained international super-star status, and a gifted composer of Broadway musicals ( West Side Story), symphonies ( Age of Anxiety), choral works ( Chichester Psalms), film scores ( On the Waterfront), and much more. Bernstein was also an enthusiastic letter writer, and this audiobook is the first to present a wide-ranging selection of his correspondence.
-
-
Great read
- By paula peron on 05-22-24
-
My Name Is Barbra
- By: Barbra Streisand
- Narrated by: Barbra Streisand
- Length: 48 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Barbra Streisand is by any account a living legend, a woman who in a career spanning six decades has excelled in every area of entertainment. She is among the handful of EGOT winners (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony) and has one of the greatest and most recognizable voices in the history of popular music. She has been nominated for a Grammy 46 times, and with Yentl she became the first woman to write, produce, direct, and star in a major motion picture. In My Name Is Barbra, she tells her own story about her life and extraordinary career.
-
-
BARBRA IS LIKE BUTTAH!
- By JoeGato57 on 11-08-23
By: Barbra Streisand
-
Enough
- By: Cassidy Hutchinson
- Narrated by: Cassidy Hutchinson
- Length: 11 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ever since a childhood visit to Washington, DC, Cassidy Hutchinson aspired to serve her country in government. Raised in a working-class family with a military background, she was the first in her immediate family to graduate from college. Despite having no ties to Washington, Hutchinson landed a vital position at the center of the Trump White House.
-
-
Painful
- By Melissa C. on 09-28-23
-
Astor
- The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune
- By: Anderson Cooper, Katherine Howe
- Narrated by: Anderson Cooper
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
From 1783, when German immigrant John Jacob Astor first arrived in the United States, until 2009, when Brooke Astor’s son, Anthony Marshall, was convicted of defrauding his elderly mother, the Astor name occupied a unique place in American society. The family fortune, first made by a beaver trapping business that grew into an empire, was then amplified by holdings in Manhattan real estate. Over the ensuing generations, Astors ruled Gilded Age New York society and inserted themselves into political and cultural life, but also suffered the most famous loss on the Titanic.
-
-
A family first made, then destroyed by wealth.
- By Barbara W. on 09-23-23
By: Anderson Cooper, and others
-
Tom Lake
- A Novel
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Meryl Streep
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the spring of 2020, Lara’s three daughters return to the family's orchard in Northern Michigan. While picking cherries, they beg their mother to tell them the story of Peter Duke, a famous actor with whom she shared both a stage and a romance years before at a theater company called Tom Lake. As Lara recalls the past, her daughters examine their own lives and relationship with their mother, and are forced to reconsider the world and everything they thought they knew.
-
-
So incredibly boring
- By Rhonda Morrison on 08-05-23
By: Ann Patchett
-
Every Man for Himself and God Against All
- A Memoir
- By: Werner Herzog, Michael Hofmann - translator
- Narrated by: Werner Herzog
- Length: 13 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Werner Herzog was born in September 1942 in Munich, Germany, at a turning point in the Second World War. Soon Germany would be defeated and a new world would have to be made out the rubble and horrors of the war. Fleeing the Allied bombing raids, Herzog’s mother took him and his older brother to a remote, rustic part of Bavaria where he would spend much of his childhood hungry, without running water, in deep poverty. It was there, as the new postwar order was emerging, that one of the most visionary filmmakers of the next seven decades was formed.
-
-
Absolutely incredible, memoir of the year
- By Susie Bright on 10-16-23
By: Werner Herzog, and others
-
West Side Story
- By: Lisa Schulman, Irving Schulman
- Narrated by: Christian Barillas
- Length: 4 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The classic novelization of one of Broadway’s most enduring and beloved musicals, updated with a beautiful new cover. Maria is young and innocent and has never known love - until Tony. And Tony, searching for life beyond the savagery of the streets, has discovered love for the first time with her, too. But Maria’s brother is the leader of the Sharks and Tony had once led the rival Jets. Now, both gangs are claiming the same turf and with tensions rising to the point of explosion, it seems there is no way to stop a rumble.
-
-
good
- By Daniel Ruelas on 03-16-22
By: Lisa Schulman, and others
-
Everything Nothing Someone
- A Memoir
- By: Alice Carrière
- Narrated by: Alice Carrière
- Length: 10 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Alice Carrière tells the story of her unconventional upbringing in Greenwich Village as the daughter of a remote mother, the renowned artist Jennifer Bartlett, and a charismatic father, European actor Mathieu Carrière. From an early age, Alice is forced to navigate her mother’s recovered memories of ritualized sexual abuse, which she turns into art, and her father’s confusing attentions—her childhood is spent in an adult’s world, with little-to-no boundaries or supervision.
-
-
This book is awful.
- By af_90 on 12-17-23
By: Alice Carrière
-
Every Good Boy Does Fine
- A Love Story, in Music Lessons
- By: Jeremy Denk
- Narrated by: Jeremy Denk
- Length: 13 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Every Good Boy Does Fine, renowned pianist Jeremy Denk traces an implausible journey. His life is already a little tough as a precocious, temperamental six-year-old piano prodigy in New Jersey, and then a family meltdown forces a move to New Mexico.
-
-
Read by Denk, with music to illustrate examples
- By VT on 04-02-22
By: Jeremy Denk
-
Liner Notes
- On Parents & Children, Exes & Excess, Death & Decay, & a Few of My Other Favorite Things
- By: Loudon Wainwright III
- Narrated by: Loudon Wainwright III
- Length: 10 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A memoir by the influential Grammy Award-winning singer and actor - son of journalist Loudon Wainwright, former husband of Kate McGarrigle and Suzzy Roche, and father of Rufus Wainwright, Martha Wainwright, Lucy Wainwright Roche, and Lexie Kelly Wainwright - a captivating meditation on relationships and creativity from the patriarch of one of America's great musical families. With a career spanning more than four decades, Loudon Wainwright III has established himself as one of the most enduring singer-songwriters who emerged from the late '60s.
-
-
Best ever book for listening
- By Jeff Bernhardt on 10-29-17
-
Leading Lady
- A Memoir of a Most Unusual Boy
- By: Charles Busch
- Narrated by: Charles Busch
- Length: 9 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Tony Award-nominated writer of The Tale of the Allergist's Wife and the long-running hit Off-Broadway play Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, and a Sundance Festival award winner Charles Busch has created a unique place in the entertainment world as a playwright, LGBT icon, drag actor, director, and cabaret performer, with his extraordinary gift for both connecting with and channeling the leading ladies of show business.
-
-
A transporting memoir of a great talent.
- By dognique on 12-16-24
By: Charles Busch
-
Home
- A Memoir of My Early Years
- By: Julie Andrews
- Narrated by: Julie Andrews
- Length: 12 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Since her first appearance on screen in Mary Poppins, Julie Andrews has played a series of memorable roles that have endeared her to generations. But she has never told the story of her life before fame. Until now.
-
-
The Road to Fame, Dame Julie style
- By Christopher on 04-08-08
By: Julie Andrews
-
Vanderbilt
- The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty
- By: Anderson Cooper, Katherine Howe
- Narrated by: Anderson Cooper
- Length: 8 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
New York Times best-selling author and journalist Anderson Cooper teams with New York Times best-selling historian and novelist Katherine Howe to chronicle the rise and fall of a legendary American dynasty - his mother’s family, the Vanderbilts.
-
-
Interesting Approach to a Well Known History
- By HistoryNerd on 09-24-21
By: Anderson Cooper, and others
-
Empress of the Nile
- The Daredevil Archaeologist Who Saved Egypt's Ancient Temples from Destruction
- By: Lynne Olson
- Narrated by: Lisa Flanagan
- Length: 13 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the 1960s, the world’s attention was focused on a nail-biting race against time: the international campaign to save a dozen ancient Egyptian temples from drowning in the floodwaters of the gigantic new Aswan High Dam. But the coverage of this unprecedented rescue effort completely overlooked the daring French archaeologist who made it all happen. Without the intervention of Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, the temples—including the Temple of Dendur, now at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art—would currently be at the bottom of a vast reservoir.
-
-
Interesting but annoying
- By evan k pinto on 03-27-24
By: Lynne Olson
-
Dinners with Ruth
- A Memoir of Friendship
- By: Nina Totenberg
- Narrated by: Nina Totenberg
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Four years before Nina Totenberg was hired at NPR, where she cemented her legacy as a prizewinning reporter, and nearly twenty-two years before Ruth Bader Ginsburg was appointed to the Supreme Court, Nina called Ruth. A reporter for The National Observer, Nina was curious about Ruth’s legal brief, asking the Supreme Court to do something revolutionary: declare a law that discriminated “on the basis of sex” to be unconstitutional. That call launched a remarkable, nearly fifty-year friendship.
-
-
Not quite what I expected
- By Debra Malone on 09-23-22
By: Nina Totenberg
-
Mr. B
- George Balanchine's 20th Century
- By: Jennifer Homans
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 29 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Arguably the greatest choreographer who ever lived, George Balanchine was one of the cultural titans of the twentieth century—the New York Times called him "the Shakespeare of dancing." His radical approach to choreography—and life—reinvented the art of ballet and made him a legend. Written with enormous style and artistry, and based on more than one hundred interviews and research in archives across Russia, Europe, and the Americas, Mr. B carries us through Balanchine's tumultuous and high-pitched life story and into the making of his extraordinary dances.
-
-
Interesting.
- By An Old Crow on 10-15-23
By: Jennifer Homans
-
Also a Poet
- A Memoir
- By: Ada Calhoun
- Narrated by: Ada Calhoun, Lili Taylor, Josephine Brill
- Length: 6 hrs and 33 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When Ada Calhoun stumbled upon old cassette tapes of interviews her father, celebrated art critic Peter Schjeldahl, had conducted for his never-completed biography of poet Frank O’Hara, she set out to finish the book her father had started 40 years earlier. As a lifelong O’Hara fan who grew up amid his bohemian cohort in the East Village, Calhoun thought the project would be easy, even fun, but the deeper she dove, the more she had to face not just O’Hara’s past, but also her father’s and her own.
-
-
Pretty Interesting
- By Michele A. Cacano-Green on 08-02-22
By: Ada Calhoun
-
Boys in the Trees
- A Memoir
- By: Carly Simon
- Narrated by: Carly Simon
- Length: 13 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Simon's memoir reveals her remarkable life, beginning with her storied childhood as the third daughter of Richard L. Simon, the co-founder of publishing giant Simon & Schuster; her musical debut as half of The Simon Sisters, performing folk songs with her sister, Lucy, in Greenwich Village; to a meteoric solo career that would result in 13 top 40 hits, including the number-one song "You're So Vain".
-
-
Gorgeous and Sad
- By Adele in CBus on 11-30-15
By: Carly Simon
What listeners say about Famous Father Girl
Highly rated for:
Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Sarah S Heath
- 11-02-18
A Brave and Dazzling Tribute to Bernstein
It’s not easy being the child of an iconic conductor, beloved by people the world over. Jamie brings us so close to her famous father in such an intimate way that we feel like family. She also lets us into his life as a driven, passionate composer, who lived and died for music. Her authenticity and spunky narration left this listener spellbound and quite teary, by the end!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Milton
- 09-06-18
Wonderful in Every Way!
I just finished this wonderfully narrated memoir. My only disappointment is that it was not longer. I’ll plan on attending one of Jamie’s programs with the New World Symphony in Miami Beach. Thank you for a memorable audio book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amy Miller Cohen
- 12-26-23
The details
After watching Maestro I was eager to learn more about the Bernstein family…..listening to Jamie’s book filled in the details …..it was a wonderful experience to have
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amazon Customer
- 06-28-18
Engrossing, engaging and full of life!
I love the book. Jamie's life found its full meaning far sooner than she tells in this amazing memoir. Well done.
Dwayne Johnson-Cochran
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Tabula
- 03-11-24
The talent and intensity of Leonard Bernstein and the seeming stability of his kids—in spite of his indulgent nature.
I especially liked the forthright insider view of the family and their satellite role around “Father Sun.”
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Nonna2
- 01-17-24
Famous father’s daughtert
Her delivery made it very interesting and details of her dad’s life were facts I didn’t know.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Anonymous User
- 11-27-21
Redefining Lenny
I have been a musician for all my life, but at age 20, I discovered Lenny's Harvard lectures and it was one of the most redefining experiences of my life. Almost like having to reevaluate your life as a musician and thinker. From there I was hooked, and Lenny became the hero of my life. Having said that, to me… this book redefined me once again, almost in the same way that the Norton Lectures had done years ago. You may think that this is a book about Leonard Bernstein and his life… and of course, in a way it is, but it is so much more. The more you listen, the more you realize this is a book about what it means to be human, and to search for your calling in an effective, true to yourself way. THANK YOU Jamie Bernstein for sharing so many anecdotes and insight about not just Lenny the maestro… but Lenny the human. What a ride. And thank you for letting us know you in such a special way and through you, keeping Lenny more alive than ever.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Dara Starr Tucker
- 09-12-22
Enrapturing
From beginning to end, this was downright fascinating. What a wonderful perspective to hear about Bernstein‘s life from. Jamie is a wonderful observer and writer. I’ve never read any biographical works about him before but I feel like I’ve listened to the definitive work on him. It was personal, insightful, honest, compassionate and thoughtful. Wish I could listen to it all over again. Highly recommended.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- T. Olsen
- 01-07-24
Exuberant
I enjoyed learning more about Leonard Bernstein from someone who knew him best. I love that Jamie did the narration. I don’t think I’ve ever heard such a lively narration and although I sometimes wished she would tone it down a bit, I couldn’t quit listening. I was touched by her enthusiasm and genuine expressions of love for her complicated father and his music.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Ron L. Caldwell
- 07-16-18
A bit too much gee-whizzing
I'm a child of the 60s and Leonard Bernstein was a god to me. West Side Story and Candide changed my life. In the ensuing decades other of his compositions have spoken to me. I was in the audience for rehearsals of Houston Grand Opera's productions of Trouble in Tahiti and A Quiet Place. All that is leading up to saying that I have the greatest respect for the maestro's immense talent.
Jamie Bernstein is a clear-eyed observer and reporter of her and LB's life and relationship. I'm grateful for that. The only criticism that I would offer is that there's a bit too much of the forced cutesy-ness in her childhood stories. The family's in-jokes are not all that funny to an outsider.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
5 people found this helpful