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How an artist makes a difference
Yo-Yo Ma at the Kimmel (2nd review)
Dan Rottenberg
What force could nearly fill Verizon Hall (plus some 50 people onstage) to hear a cellist, even a great cellist, especially on a night when the Phillies were fighting for survival in the National League championship series?
I can't speak for the 2,500 others who attended Yo-Yo Ma's concert (with his longtime pianist Kathryn Stott) Sunday night— a turnout that included, just on the basis of my cursory eyeball survey, doctors, architects, accountants, psychiatrists and Drexel University's athletic director. But here's my story:
Sunday morning my wife and I rose at the crack of dawn and drove two hours to Brooklyn, where we spent most of the day looking after our grandchildren while their parents attended a funeral. By the time we hit the road back to Philadelphia, at about 4:15, we were exhilarated but pretty well pooped. Then, on the Turnpike, we ran into terrible Sunday traffic congestion.
By the time we got home it was 6:45. That gave us 45 minutes to change, wolf down a bite of dinner and hustle three blocks to the Kimmel. We were exhausted, but we assured each other that, after all, we could nap during the concert.
Yo-Yo Ma's very first note changed all that. It was not the music— in this case a snippet from Ennio Morricone's film score for The Mission— that transfixed us, but the exquisite sound from Ma's instrument. Suddenly our fatigue evaporated and our Sunday, however long it may have seemed at that point, was beginning afresh.
"We love playing in this hall, and we hope it sounds OK for you," Ma told the audience after a while, in his customary self-deprecating manner. Given Verizon Hall's forthcoming acoustical overhaul, it seemed an oddly naÓ¯ve comment. But Sunday night, nobody was complaining— about the acoustics, Sunday night traffic, scheduling conflicts with the Phillies. Great artists, and great art, can take you from the mundane to the sublime, just like that.♦
To read another review by Peter Burwasser, click here.
To read responses, click here and here.
I can't speak for the 2,500 others who attended Yo-Yo Ma's concert (with his longtime pianist Kathryn Stott) Sunday night— a turnout that included, just on the basis of my cursory eyeball survey, doctors, architects, accountants, psychiatrists and Drexel University's athletic director. But here's my story:
Sunday morning my wife and I rose at the crack of dawn and drove two hours to Brooklyn, where we spent most of the day looking after our grandchildren while their parents attended a funeral. By the time we hit the road back to Philadelphia, at about 4:15, we were exhilarated but pretty well pooped. Then, on the Turnpike, we ran into terrible Sunday traffic congestion.
By the time we got home it was 6:45. That gave us 45 minutes to change, wolf down a bite of dinner and hustle three blocks to the Kimmel. We were exhausted, but we assured each other that, after all, we could nap during the concert.
Yo-Yo Ma's very first note changed all that. It was not the music— in this case a snippet from Ennio Morricone's film score for The Mission— that transfixed us, but the exquisite sound from Ma's instrument. Suddenly our fatigue evaporated and our Sunday, however long it may have seemed at that point, was beginning afresh.
"We love playing in this hall, and we hope it sounds OK for you," Ma told the audience after a while, in his customary self-deprecating manner. Given Verizon Hall's forthcoming acoustical overhaul, it seemed an oddly naÓ¯ve comment. But Sunday night, nobody was complaining— about the acoustics, Sunday night traffic, scheduling conflicts with the Phillies. Great artists, and great art, can take you from the mundane to the sublime, just like that.♦
To read another review by Peter Burwasser, click here.
To read responses, click here and here.
What, When, Where
Yo-Yo Ma, cello. With Kathryn Stott, piano. Works by Morricone, Gershwin, Mariano, Brahms, Fitkin and Rachmaninoff. October 17, 2010 at Verizon Hall, Kimmel Center, Broad and Spruce Sts. (215) 893-1999 or www.kimmelcenter.org.
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