Encores and Destiny

Well, the double-hitter is over, and I’m finding myself feeling both grateful for having had the opportunity as well as remembering the value of being overprepared - overtrained, as the sports psychologists say...

This has been a great week, filled with wonderful surprises from both the musicians in the orchestra as well as from Rich and Debbie Simons. There was also an opportunity to reconnect with Dominique Simons, a violist with whom I lived and played chamber music for one summer while we both studied at the University of South Carolina. Going home will be a good thing, as I do feel satisfied in many ways.

At the end of the concert - what can I say? It’s still wonderful and heartwarming to receive flowers from children (as I did) as well as have an audience call you back to the stage. While I was not prepared to play an encore we asked the audience if they wanted to hear something else. They said yes - and I played Bach.

YES - the G Minor Adagio, on no warning - AGAIN....not since 1997 has something gone that smoothly, and not since June 2006 have I actually felt that vibartory link between a performer and an audience. Speaking of "myself", I have to say that it went quite well, and this was probably the best performance of the G Minor Adagio that I have ever given.

Speaking of "the moment", however (taking "little me" out of the picture and observing), there was magic made in Croton-on-Hudson on the night of April 5, 2008, when an audience sat with open ears, eagerness, and open hearts to receive...

The first time that I felt that link between an audience and a performer was in 1994 when, while making my graduate school decisions, I went to Houston for a violin lesson (and, of course, had one of those happy life accidents - a chance meeting - that changed the course of my life) and had an opportunity to hear Christian Tetzlaff with the Houston Symphony. He played the Dvorak Concerto - and the audience brought him back FOUR times! On his fourth trip back to the stage he played the Andante from the A Minor Sonata and one could definitely feel the intense connection between that man and a room filled with grateful concertgoers....