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Category Archives: Our Artists

Lasting Impressions: Jerusalem String Quartet

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JerusalemStringLeila’s great story about the Jerusalem String Quartet’s first visit to Vancouver inspired to ask you for your stories.

Since their memorable debut, they have returned to Vancouver several times, most notably for a week in 2006 when they performed the complete string quartets of Dmitri Shostakovich, and more recently with clarinetist Martin Fröst in the 2008/09 season. The Quartet returns to the Chan Centre (with a new member!) on Sunday, October 2.

We would like to know what is your lasting memory of the Jerusalem String Quartet? Perhaps it comes from one of the VRS presentations, or from a performance in another city, or perhaps you are especially found of one of their recordings.

Tell us about your lasting memory of the Jerusalem String Quartet.

Getting to Know: Boris Giltburg

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“The best about being the musician is that you get to experience that magical atmosphere…. created between the music, you and the audience…” Boris Giltburg

  • Who: 26-year-old Russian residing in Israel
  • First teacher: mother
  • Debut: age seven
  • Hobbies: languages and computer programming
  • Biggest inspiration: “classical music in its entirety – I learn and experience a lot by listening to the huge amount of works that exist in musical literature…”
  • Listening to: “I’m a heavy classical music fan – late Shostakovich Quartets, that type of thing. I like also opera and baroque music and of course jazz, which I unfortunately cannot play.”
  • Boris’s Facebook ‘likes’: Rainer Maria Rilke, Artur Rubenstein, Sviatoslav Richter, Grigory Sokolov (some of whom he counts among his inspirations).
  • Boris Giltburg makes his Vancouver debut at the Vancouver Playhouse on Sunday, September 25.

Call the Vancouver Recital Society box office this week to reserve your tickets and you will receive a special 15% discount: 604-602-0363.

(sources: tokafi.com, Facebook, philharmonia.uk.co)

A dedication to die over!

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When Javier Perianes dedicated his first encore to me (Chopin Nocturne in c sharp minor, Op. 20) at the Vancouver Playhouse I was rendered speechless for at least 20 minutes. What an extraordinarily wonderful thing to have happened.

There’s actually a story behind Perianes and that Nocturne.  This goes back about three years.  I had been dealing with a London Management to book a date for the young Finnish pianist, Juho Pohjonen (on the recommendation of Andras Schiff).  The particular manager with whom I was making the arrangements sent me an email telling me that he had just added another pianist to his roster and he thought that I would really like his playing.  He asked “shall I send you a CD?”….to which I replied “no, not yet, as my season is already fully booked”.  “Wait a couple of months” I said.  He then sent me an email by return which said “oops, I already put it in the mail”.

Of course, I didn’t have the willpower not to open it when it arrived and I put it on.  The Nocturne was the first piece on the CD, and it caused a major stir in the office.  Next thing, before even listening to the rest of the CD, I was frantically trying to fit him in the series for the following year.  I can’t remember displacing anyone, so maybe we just added another concert.  Oh, and because all the literature on the CD was in Spanish I went over to CBC where Gloria Macarenko translated for me.

So now Javier has appeared twice, and hopefully before long, we’ll have him back.

See what you have to do to get a return engagement with the VRS?

Murray Perahia has some wild fans!

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A few weeks ago, I was sitting at YVR waiting for a flight to Seattle – Frankfurt – Johannesburg – Cape Town for a reunion with my friends from the College of Music in Cape Town.  My husband recently won an iPod Touch which I quickly appropriated, so now I have finally joined the iPod world, and I’m loving it.  In any case, there I was at the airport listening to Mozart, having downloaded Murray Perahia’s complete recording of the concerti, and I was reminded of an incident on a trip to South Africa about 18 years ago involving Murray Perahia.  Books and CDs cost an absolute fortune in South Africa, so I usually travel with CDs to give friends.  I, and my then-teenage daughter, Sara, were driving from Cape Town to Hermanus (a coastal town about 80 miles from Cape Town) to spend a week with some friends.

The route winds over a very beautiful mountain pass with a lookout at the top.  We parked the car and locked the doors…but forgot to close the rear window.  There are signs all over the place warning of baboons and to keep car windows closed and food out of sight, but we hadn’t noticed that we had left the window open.  So there we were, a few yards away from the car with our cameras in hand, when, all of a sudden a baboon entered the car through the open rear window.  I watched in horror as it rummaged through my handbag which I had left in the back seat.  Out came my wallet.  He tasted it and threw it out of the window.  Next, the passport, which couldn’t have tasted very nice either because it soon followed the wallet (thanks heavens!).  I stood shrieking, much to my daughter’s embarrassment and drew a crowd of onlookers.  Next, the baboon, getting fed up with the fact that he couldn’t find anything edible, seized a Murray Perahia CD, climbed out of the window and ran around the parking lot with it in his hands.  I followed, shouting “oh what a publicity shot!”   The baboon disappeared into the bushes and I’m sure that generations of baboons in the area of Sir Lowry’s pass have grown up listening to Mozart.  My friends in Hermanus never got their gift.

And whilst on the subject of Murray Perahia, it is he who introduced me to YouTube on his last visit to Vancouver. He wanted me to see Dudley Moore doing an imitation of Peter Pears singing Benjamin Britten songs (if you haven’t seen it you really should check it out…you’ll find it under Benjamin Britten).  I have to confess that after that introduction, I spent hours glued to my computer exploring the great musicians of the past and present on YouTube.  And now I’ve even found another weakness of mine, Tony Hancock!

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