Dear MSO Retirees,
Hope you all survived January’s temperature extremes. Even in Kauai we had our share of cold weather and blustery winds, but this was nothing compared to Wisconsin’s -0 temperatures and heavy snows. The MSO even canceled several services, so you know it was cold! And now there is Punxsutawney Phil’s prediction of six more weeks of winter and groundhogs are never, ever wrong. Right?
Three people will be celebrating birthdays’ this month. February 6th is Phil Grossman’s day of birth, with Don Haack on the 15th, and Bailey Gartner on February 22nd. Best wishes to all three for a wonderful day. It has been a while since we’ve heard news from these friends and I hope they will take a moment to let us know what has been happening in their lives.
The cold weather must have kept you off the internet because I could find very little information about our colleagues, but here is what I can share…
Dennis Najoom’s daughter in a member of the Sapphire Woodwind Quintet which is based in the Chicago area. Anna also teaches clarinet at the Merit School of Music, Maine South High School, District 64 in Park Ridge, and in Wilmette and Kenilworth, Illinois.
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John Lounsbery and his quintet did a benefit concert for the Occidental Center for the Arts in January.
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Bill Barnewitz posted a 60th birthday celebration photo (December 23) and one taken a few years earlier. No explanation was given for the golden duck.
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One of the delights of living in Kauai is being able to get the New York Times Crossword puzzle many hours before the mainland. The Sunday arrives at 2PM on Saturday! On January 24th I thought our own Steve Basson “made it” to the NY Times daily puzzle. The clue was “Instrument that opens Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring.” Aha! I know this! So I pencil in B A S S O O…but there is no space for the final leter. Can it be that Will Shortz knows how beautifully Steve played it every time it was performed? Alas, it is the Thursday puzzle- the one with the unusual clues, and this week’s “unusualness” is double oo’s in one box. Damn. Shortz’s loss.
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I type this while sitting at the Wellington Hotel in New York. The MSO’s “home” when we played Carnegie Hall every year, then leaving it for the Central Park Hotel across the Avenue when we started going every two years and then once in a while. It still has its old world charm, but the bathrooms have been modernized and it is very, very clean.
The Carnegie Deli still exists as an empty store front. I read that in December they reopened it for a week so that a scene for “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” could be filmed there. There was a sign-up for folks who wanted to be customers and the prices at the deli were the same as those years when the show takes place- the late 1950’s. You know they didn’t have trouble getting volunteers for that event.
It always brings a bit of sadness when we walk be the old Patelson’s building. It was such a remarkable institution, whether you were seeking an interesting work to study or hoping to catch a famous artist in pursuit of the same. Two years ago the Patelson building was demolished and now there is a fifteen story hotel, the Carnegie Hotel, that occupies it space.
We are here for two days to hear Leon Fleisher’s 90th Birthday Celebration concert and a recital with Leonidas Kavakos and Yuja Wang at Carnegie Hall. Leon visits Marlboro each summer and Woody has become a “groupy,” helping him with music/transportation/whatever in return for picking Leon’s brain for all things music and piano. Other guests on the program included Jonathan Biss, Yefim Bronfman, and the Dover String Quartet. I was surprised to see that the first violinist of the quartet plays a beautiful 1857 Villaume violin on loan to him from Desiree Ruhstrat! Remember Desiree? She was our soloist on one of our tours when she was twelve years old with Lukas conducting. Desiree now teaches at Northwestern and is a member of the Lincoln String Trio. She wasn’t using this violin because it wasn’t a good match for the trio (her husband is the cellist) and when she learned that Joel Link, the Dover’s first violinist, was looking for a new instrument she offered it to him. The music business is such a small world- and I am feeling very old.
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Well, just as February is the shortest month, this is probably the shortest newsletter. I wish you and your loved ones a wonderful Valentine’s Day and hope that you will share your news with us for next month’s mailing.
Best wishes,
Andrea
OLOMA65 