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Dan Coren
How many famous cellists, past and present, can you name off the top of your head?
When I asked myself that question, I came up with this list of nine-- a sort of Supreme Court of cellists (my apologies for any egregious omissions):
• Pablo Casals
• Emanuel Feuermann
• Gregor Piatigorsky
• Mstislav Rostropovich
• Janos Starker
• Lynn Harrell
• Pierre Fournier
• Jacqueline DuPré
• Yoyo Ma
Despite the paucity of the repertory for cello soloist, these are all musical legends. Any cellist who plays a Bach cello suite or one of the five Beethoven sonatas in public will inevitably be compared against them.
Why did I find myself making this list at 3 a.m.? I had just received a notice in the mail of the Philadelphia recital debut of the young Astral Artists cellist, Susan Babini.
Babini has been active on the Philadelphia scene for a few years now; I vividly remember her beautiful execution of one of the cello parts in a performance of the Schubert C major String Quintet at (if memory serves) the Delaware Chamber Music Festival two or three summers ago.
If anyone from my list were to have played her particular October 1 program at, say, Carnegie Recital Hall, the concert would have sold out months in advance. You don’t get to hear very many concerts featuring both the Beethoven Third Cello Sonata and work by a living composer, Elliott Carter, who is now past 100.
Carter’s music isn’t for the faint at heart. He won the Pulitzer Prize for his thorny Second String Quartet in 1960 and has been going full bore in his uncompromisingly dissonant style ever since. His Figment for Solo Cello, with which Babini will open the concert, was written just a few years ago.
For me, though, it’s the opportunity to hear the Beethoven Op. 69– a chamber work right up there, in my books, with Beethoven’s “Archduke” Trio– that made me adjust my schedule to hear this concert.
The Beethoven cello and violin sonatas are essentially piano sonatas with an extra bonus instrument. So when Rostropovich recorded the Beethoven cello sonatas, he did so with Sviatislav Richter; Yoyo Ma partnered with Emanuel Ax; Casals teamed up with Rudolf Serkin. In short, if you’re good enough to play the cello part of Op. 69, you’ll have to find a pianist who can handle some of Beethoven’s most challenging keyboard music. Astral’s publicity understandably puts its own artist (Babini) in the foreground; the card I received in the mail didn’t even mention pianist Anna Polonsky. I know nothing about her, but Sunday’s concert will be just as much hers as it will be Susan Babini’s.
When I asked myself that question, I came up with this list of nine-- a sort of Supreme Court of cellists (my apologies for any egregious omissions):
• Pablo Casals
• Emanuel Feuermann
• Gregor Piatigorsky
• Mstislav Rostropovich
• Janos Starker
• Lynn Harrell
• Pierre Fournier
• Jacqueline DuPré
• Yoyo Ma
Despite the paucity of the repertory for cello soloist, these are all musical legends. Any cellist who plays a Bach cello suite or one of the five Beethoven sonatas in public will inevitably be compared against them.
Why did I find myself making this list at 3 a.m.? I had just received a notice in the mail of the Philadelphia recital debut of the young Astral Artists cellist, Susan Babini.
Babini has been active on the Philadelphia scene for a few years now; I vividly remember her beautiful execution of one of the cello parts in a performance of the Schubert C major String Quintet at (if memory serves) the Delaware Chamber Music Festival two or three summers ago.
If anyone from my list were to have played her particular October 1 program at, say, Carnegie Recital Hall, the concert would have sold out months in advance. You don’t get to hear very many concerts featuring both the Beethoven Third Cello Sonata and work by a living composer, Elliott Carter, who is now past 100.
Carter’s music isn’t for the faint at heart. He won the Pulitzer Prize for his thorny Second String Quartet in 1960 and has been going full bore in his uncompromisingly dissonant style ever since. His Figment for Solo Cello, with which Babini will open the concert, was written just a few years ago.
For me, though, it’s the opportunity to hear the Beethoven Op. 69– a chamber work right up there, in my books, with Beethoven’s “Archduke” Trio– that made me adjust my schedule to hear this concert.
The Beethoven cello and violin sonatas are essentially piano sonatas with an extra bonus instrument. So when Rostropovich recorded the Beethoven cello sonatas, he did so with Sviatislav Richter; Yoyo Ma partnered with Emanuel Ax; Casals teamed up with Rudolf Serkin. In short, if you’re good enough to play the cello part of Op. 69, you’ll have to find a pianist who can handle some of Beethoven’s most challenging keyboard music. Astral’s publicity understandably puts its own artist (Babini) in the foreground; the card I received in the mail didn’t even mention pianist Anna Polonsky. I know nothing about her, but Sunday’s concert will be just as much hers as it will be Susan Babini’s.
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