Perlman gleams on a Sunday afternoon

Waiting for the Perlman

We had never seen the stage at the Schermerhorn Center so empty – just a grand piano with a lone music stand and a seat for a page turner. Before the concert, only a piano tuner graced the stage.

But on this afternoon, whatever sparseness faded as soon as the music swelled. What should we have expected from the world’s most-famous violinist?

When sitting behind a stage, it’s hard to expect much from the performers. Yet as Itzhak Perlman emerged on his scooter, he immediately waved at the crowd behind the stage before acknowledging the larger crowd in front of the stage. A little gesture like that makes a good performance glow brighter.

At 71, Perlman proved he was still at the top of his game (the scooter replaces the leg braces he wore due to contracting polio as a child). He was joined by pianist Rohan de Silva, who  has accompanied a laundry list of famed violinists.

In concert, Perlman plays one of three violins, all older than the United States – the Soil Stradivarius violin of 1714, Guarneri del Gesu 1743 'Sauret' and the Carlo Bergonzi 1740 'ex-Kreisler' (stolen from Wikipedia). I’m not sure which he played, but you can imagine the sounds Perlman produces on some of the world’s best-crafted violins.

For this matinee performance, Perlman looked more relaxed than most of the audience, wearing a blue dress shirt and black slacks. Now, sits behind the orchestra have advantages. We had clear lines of sight for Perlman’s finger and even better views of de Silva’s hands smoothly roaming the keys.

The program started with Beethoven’s Violin Sonata No. 1, an important piece in Beethoven’s break with tradition in pursuit of a more difficult musical course.

After an intermission, the duo sprang into Caesar Franck’s Violin Sonata, a piece ranked among the best sonatas ever composed. While mostly new, the sharp, high notes of the sonata’s final movement were surprisingly familiar, even if I could not place when I first heard it.

When Perlman rolled off, we knew he would return. The best part of his concerts is the unknown. Unlike a typical classical performance, Perlman has said he enjoys talking to the audience and picking shorter, random pieces from the stage. When Perlman and de Silva returned to rapturous applause, their page-turner brought a stack of sheet music, boding well for additional performances. I didn’t catch the name of the first piece they performed, and probably don’t need to say Perlman and de Silva sounded great.

One piece could not have been less random – The Theme to Schindler’s List by John Williams. Perlman famously played the violin solos on the Oscar-winning score. In popular culture, it is arguably the piece he is best known for. That said, its emotional power peaks live on the stage. Someday, I think back to that moment, the rare chance to see a classical musician play a famous piece he originally performed.

The pair also played Johannes Brahms’ Hungarian Dance No. 1, a piece in G minor that has a fragility when played on solo violin as the initial piano notes cascade like icy rain.  After another short break, Perlman and de Silva emerged for Franz Ries’ Perpetual Motion (Op. 34 No. 5), a virtuoso piece as insanely fast as its name implies. After the frenetic pace of Perpetual Motion, it was hard to imagine Perlman tackling anything else.

Indeed, when Perlman emerged one last time without one of his priceless violins, we knew the famous violins were locked up and the performance had ended. But the room still resonated with notes from the world’s most-famous violinist.