Word: pianos
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Pianist Gunnar Johansen, 63, gets a phone call at the University of Wisconsin, where he has been artist-in-residence since 1939. Boris Sokoloff, manager of the Philadelphia Orchestra, is on the line. Conductor Eugene Ormandy and Pianist Peter Serkin have disagreed on the interpretation of Beethoven's Piano Concerto in D Major, which Serkin was to play with the Philadelphians in Manhattan's Philharmonic Hall the following evening. Could Johansen fill in? Johansen has never even heard the piece, a little-known transcription by Beethoven of his only violin concerto. He dashes next door to the music...
...real study of the score. He has had plenty of experience. Trained in Berlin by Egon Petri, he played concerts in Europe for four years before moving to the U.S. in 1929. He has made five previous New York appearances, notably a 1966 performance of Busoni's challenging Piano Concerto. But now the magnitude of what he has undertaken overwhelms him. At a hotel, he recites "a prayer to Ludwig for help," and drops off to sleep...
Tuesday, 9 a.m.: Johansen arrives at Philharmonic Hall to check the piano, decides that he needs a different one. He goes to the nearby Steinway building, chooses a piano, has it sent to the hall, then settles down for five solid hours of furious practicing. Then back to Philharmonic Hall for rehearsal, on the way gulping down a luncheon of carrot juice at a health-food store...
...first time. "Did you practice the cadenzas?" asks Ormandy. "What cadenzas?" replies Johansen. His score does not happen to include them. At this point, Ormandy says that he is having a heart attack. But the one-hour rehearsal goes on, with Ormandy concentrating on the passages where piano and orchestra play together. A messenger is dispatched to obtain a score of the cadenzas. Later Johansen practices backstage, then hurries to the hotel for his tails, which are due back from the valet. No tails. Back to Philharmonic Hall for more practice. Several of the Philadelphia musicians offer to lend Johansen...
...predictable after you listen to a lot of music. But the Who's music can't be followed so easily. They have taken the forms of rock and played it onto a new level. They are unique. Roger Daltrey sings and plays French horn occasionally. Nicky Hopkins plays piano, as sort of a guest performer on the recordings where they use piano, but he's not in the group...