Leonard Bernstein (1918-90), creator of the Broadway masterpiece, West Side Story , was the best loved and most successful conductor of his generation. He inspired fellow American musicians, being the first native American to direct a major American orchestra, and the first to conquer Europe. This biography covers all aspects of Bernstein's career, from his extraordinary early rise to fame as a conductor to his work as a world-famous composer, including his musicals and the score for On the Waterfront . It examines the paradoxes of a man who was brilliant, articulate, witty and charming but could also be vain, egocentric and demanding.