Page 75 - PDF Flip TR Program Demo

To prefer one piano over the other is Sophie’s Choice. When you love them all, all pianos become equal. At that stage, choosing one over the other reflects on us, not on them. To say that any beauty might have permission to pass sentence on a cow- ering, sensate beast which lives to serve her is to denigrate the skein of secrets, the history of private triumphs, the inner life of dreams, the childhood of monsters, the iceberg which towers beneath its tip in all of us, and in pianos alike. They do not fail us; we fail them.
A pianist once said to me, “Why worry about the concert? Give the piano its head. Let it do the talking. It’s been there before; it knows where to go.” On the other side is Don Quixote:
PARABLE
I read how Quixote in his random ride Came to a crossing once, and lest he lose The purity of chance, would not decide
Whither to fare, but wished his horse to choose. For glory lay wherever turned the fable.
His head was light with pride, his horse's shoes
Were heavy, and he headed for the stable. —Richard Wilbur
Pianos require a certain amount of intervention to direct their innate memories.
But much of a performance rests with the mo- ment itself. Lightning strikes randomly (assuming the electricity is there in the first place). A great concert happens as often in a practice session as onstage. Music flows in the moment. The novels which we write nightly are often better than the ones we read. Pianists play differently in every concert. What is a piano to do? They serve fickle masters.
Fortunately, pianos do not talk back, so we can blame everything on them, and they will treat us beautifully tomorrow, or as our moods deserve.
But we all know when there is something special in the air, when the sunset is filled with tropical drinks, when everything—the light, the night, the music, the mood—just clicks. There is more to those moments than any string, any key, or any finger. The great recorded operas of Pavarotti and Sutherland, the recordings of Magdalena Kožená, capture throughout just that sublime mo- ment, forever. Sometimes everyone can feel the shiver in the sky, but at other times you hope that someone in the audience heard what just hap- pened, and that it will change their life, as some musician at some time has changed ours.
2018 Summer Season 75