Word: yo-yo
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...critics' thumb suckers on the subject. Yo-Yo Ma, for his part, is trying to liven things up. Besides his numerous collaborations, he has been commissioning new works, experimenting with electronic instruments, exploring the links between the European tradition and other world music, and involving himself in music education on every level from Sesame Street to Tanglewood. "The whole idea of what music is and what culture and education are has changed so much," says Emanuel Ax, the pianist who is a longtime friend and performance partner of Ma's. "Yo-Yo...
...rich tone and a masterly feel for interpretation that allows his performances to breathe with an almost jazzlike spontaneity. "Yo-Yo has an ease of playing that is given to very few. It is a kind of mastery that gives one the greatest possible freedom," says violinist Isaac Stern, a onetime mentor of Ma's. "He is probably the most perfect instrumentalist I have ever seen," says Ax. "I spend hours and hours practicing every day. Yo-Yo can afford to sleep late and have lunch, and he still plays much more perfectly than...
Aside from sheer intellectual curiosity there is a practical reason for Ma's restlessness. "A pianist," says Ax, "could go on playing for 100 years and not begin to play the complete standard repertoire. For a cellist, if you are a talent like Yo-Yo, by the time you are 25 you have mastered all the cello concertos that are known." Through numerous commissions, Ma has done his best to expand the repertoire. Still, he's swimming his laps in a comparatively small pool...
...impetus for the new recordings and the series of films, collectively titled Yo-Yo Ma: Inspired by Bach, came in the early '90s, when Ma got to musing about the extramusical implications of Bach's work. With the exception of the collaboration with Egoyan on the fourth suite--a fractured but more or less conventional narrative with an enigmatic power similar to the Bach--each film is split in two, documenting the collaborative process as well as its result. The pairing with choreographer Morris (for the third suite) is particularly inspired. Others are more frustrating, with Ma either...
Whatever the merits of the six films that make up Yo-Yo Ma: Inspired by Bach, the two-CD sound-track album (Sony Classical), on which Ma plays the Bach cello suites without benefit of ice dancers, landscape artists or snappy one-liners from choreographer Mark Morris, is a major musical achievement. Ma's second take on the Bach suites is also a distinct improvement on the version he recorded at the age of 26 (which is still available on Sony). His playing has grown deeper and more forceful in recent years, and these warmly romantic performances faithfully...