It's Never Too Late to Start by Thomas Wolf
In a previous blog post, I explored the question of how early a talented child might be encouraged to perform on the concert stage. In this one, I look at the question from the other end. How late can a musician pick up a new skill and perform well enough to be able to appear in a high-profile concert? Two of my uncles helped me answer the question.
The duo-piano team of Pierre Luboshutz and Genia Nemenoff. They enjoyed a close relationship with Serge Koussevitzky, the music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, whose inscribed photograph sat on one of their pianos.
By age sixty, my Great Uncle Pierre Luboshutz had enjoyed a long career as a pianist. Many of his years of performing had been in partnership with his wife, the pianist, Genia Nemenoff. Their joint career as the duo-piano team of Luboshutz & Nemenoff led to their performing hundreds of concerts throughout the world. Pierre was now at an age when many other instrumentalists ask themselves the question: might this be the time that I should try conducting?
One colleague with whom Pierre and his wife enjoyed a close relationship and who had gone out of his way to promote Pierre’s career was Serge Koussevitzky, the music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Pierre’s relationship with him dated back to their days together in Russia when Pierre had played recitals with Koussevitzky who at that time was best known as a virtuoso double bass player. Later, Pierre’s first trips to America were as Koussevitzky’s accompanist. Pierre recalled that at one point, Koussevitzky had suggested Pierre try conducting.
Pierre’s nephew (and my uncle) Boris Goldovsky had been Pierre’s piano student as a youngster and he too went on to a distinguished career. Boris had also developed a close professional relationship with Koussevitzky. Though Boris began his career as a pianist and gave piano recitals throughout his life, once in the United States, his career branched out into opera and it was Koussevitzky who hired him to head the opera department at Tanglewood in western Massachusetts, the summer home of the Boston Symphony. Koussevitzky also provided plenty of opportunities for Boris to conduct.
Boris Goldovsky (left) and his Uncle (and first piano teacher) Pierre Luboshutz discussing the possibility of performing together, possibly at Tanglewood.
But Pierre had something more pressing on his mind besides conducting as he looked at the decreasing number of years left in his performing life. After decades of pursuing separate careers, there was one professional aspiration that Pierre, Genia, and Boris had not been able to pull off and they believed Koussevitzky might help them do so. They had never done any serious performing together. One reason was that they all were extremely busy touring and playing concerts. But another had to do with repertoire. From the mid-1930s on, Pierre always appeared with his pianist wife as a duo-piano team and since there was little repertoire for three pianos that might include Boris (let alone halls that had three concert grands), the opportunity to perform together with Boris had not presented itself. This is where Koussevitzky came in.
An occasion presented itself in 1947. But it depended on Koussevitsky who had scheduled an all-Bach program at Tanglewood for July 13 and 15, 1947. He had invited Pierre and Genia to perform as soloists in the concerts with the Boston Symphony. And since Boris worked there and saw the maestro every day, he wondered aloud whether there was a possibility of including one of Bach’s concertos for three keyboards and orchestra on the program. Boris could play the third piano part with Pierre and Genia playing the other two. But for whatever reason, Koussevitzky did not bite. Instead, he selected a pair of Bach double keyboard concertos for Pierre and Genia to play and left Boris out. The family decided the three pianists had lost their only high-profile opportunity. If a good family friend was unwilling to program a rare work for three pianos on a program tailor-made for such a piece, who would?
Then, in the mid-1950s, another opportunity arose and this time, my three relatives decided they would take things into their own hands. They would go on an extended performing tour together and not be dependent on Koussevitzky or anyone else. I am not sure precisely when the idea of a three-piano Mozart tour originated or who first suggested it. Given the lead time required to book such a tour, the idea must have surfaced at least by 1954, two years before the bicentennial of Mozart’s birth. The concept was simple—create a compelling and unique presentation formed around Mozart’s piano music and honoring the composer. This could indeed bring together on the same stage the talents of Pierre, Genia, and Boris. And they could assemble their own touring orchestra.
Publicity photo for the 1956 three-piano Mozart tour featuring Pierre Luboshutz, Genia Nemenoff, and their nephew, Boris Goldovsky.
Mozart wrote twenty-seven concertos for piano and orchestra, many to show off his own pianistic abilities. These were quite popular and there was nothing unusual about performing them. Less famous was the concerto he wrote for two pianos and orchestra—but it was played frequently enough that it would not make for a special event. However, there was still another concerto that Mozart had written for three pianos and orchestra and this was almost never programmed. What if there was an evening devoted to Mozart piano concertos in all their forms—one of the single piano concertos, the concerto for two pianos, and the concerto for three pianos? Since no one was better known than Luboshutz & Nemenoff for performances of the two-piano concerto, they should be featured in that work with nephew Boris conducting the orchestra. The three-piano concerto could be played by all three pianists and because the third piano part, which Boris would play, was rather simple and the orchestration was also uncomplicated, Boris could conduct the orchestra from his piano stool. Boris would be the soloist in the single piano concerto—something he had done many times in his career.
There was only one problem: Who would conduct when Boris was playing the single piano concerto? The piano part was complicated enough that he did not want to risk both playing and conducting at the same time. Mozart himself had done it but Boris knew he was no Mozart. Hiring another conductor for the tour would be expensive, so Boris came up with a different solution. Why couldn’t Pierre conduct? Though Pierre had never conducted an orchestra before, Boris said he could teach him. “It is so simple,” said Boris. “Conducting a Mozart concerto is like falling off a log and I can spend the summer before the tour teaching you the score and the cues when we are together in Maine.”
Pierre and Genia were not so sure this was a good idea. Pierre was now over sixty, not a great age to pick up a new skill at a professional level. Boris was a musical risk-taker, but Pierre was not. Boris said, “All you need is a baton in your hand and you can be a conductor.” Pierre answered with a Yiddish saying that translates: “Yes, and when my grandmother has wheels, she will be a bicycle.” When Boris continued to press, Pierre again resisted, this time using an off-color Russian expression to indicate that it is not a good idea to try things that are physically impossible: “хуем стекло не порежешь” (“Hu-yom, stekla, nye, pohreszhesh”) meaning “with your penis you cannot cut glass!”
In the end, Boris prevailed and Pierre, who did not especially like hard work, took his new assignment very seriously. Finally, after all these years, he was going to become a conductor! He and Boris spent many hours during the early weeks of the summer of 1955 in Rockport studying the score of the Mozart concerto, listening to a recording, and mastering conducting technique. Pierre had to be ready for the rehearsals for the first “preview” concert, as they were billing it, and it was no joking matter—an appearance at Lewisohn Stadium in New York (capacity 8000) was scheduled for July 27th.
Back at Pierre’s place, he and Boris set up shop in the large studio music room. Boris placed a chair for each instrumental section, showing Pierre where he could expect players to be sitting with an actual orchestra in front of him. His instructions to Pierre were quite systematic. Pierre needed to establish the tempo and beat time in the correct meter, of course, being sure upbeats and downbeats were precise and perfectly placed. He also had to be able to cue entrances and give accurate cut-offs. He needed to indicate with his hand where he wanted a louder or softer sound. He had to lead when the music speeded up or slowed down. And Boris coached Pierre on the kinds of things he should listen for in rehearsal and comment upon—the precision of attacks, accurate intonation, articulation, tone color, and dynamics (both loud/soft but also intensity). Pierre must assert his authority and convey that he was in charge, Boris explained. “These orchestra musicians have seen it all and eat conductors alive who they do not respect.” This gave Pierre extra motivation.
Boris and Pierre spent plenty of time together. But at other times, Pierre practiced his conducting alone, often with a recording. On one occasion, he had been at it a particularly long time and Boris decided to go over to the studio to see what his uncle was up to. Standing quietly outside, Boris heard Pierre speaking very loudly. “Violins . . . at measure 21, second beat . . . it is sharp. Violas . . . next measure, the accent is late. Celli . . . at B, you are too loud and it should be more ponticello. Woodwinds, at C . . . you are not together with the piano with the eighth notes.” Pierre, who was talking to a bunch of chairs, was getting more and more worked up. Finally, he slammed his baton on his conductor’s stand and practically yelled: “Gentlemen, gentlemen. Must I explain and correct everything?”
Pierre practicing his conducting skills in publicity photo for 1956 Mozart tour with wife, Genia Nemenoff, and his nephew, Boris Goldovsky. In fact, he never conducted when both Boris and Genia were playing together…but he insisted that the photo be used anyway.
Boris could hardly keep from laughing. But he knew the battle was won. Pierre had become a conductor and, as it turned out, he was not only quite good at it but he was beloved by orchestra members. And, as he repeatedly reminded family members, he was the only one of them ever to receive an enthusiastic review in the New York Times that praised him both for his skill as a pianist and as a conductor. And Pierre milked the accolades as much as he could, insisting that publicity photos include him conducting with both Boris and Genia playing pianos though in fact, this never occurred in actual performances.
So encouraged was Pierre by the response of audiences, musicians and critics that, in a subsequent tour with Genia and Boris, Pierre took on the much more difficult task of conducting a Shostakovich piano concerto with Boris appearing as the piano soloist. Pierre even joked that, were it not for the fact that he would be leaving his piano partner and wife in the lurch, he might take up conducting full-time. He also learned an important lesson: If you are properly motivated, it’s never too late to start something new.