Mozart, Mixter, and my unrepeatable Miracle

Medici.tv is featuring this week what one might call Covid concerts:  Daniel Barenboim playing to an empty hall, Pierre Boulez Saal (Berlin, Germany), where he directs Berlin State Opera and the Staatskapelle Berlin.  There are several episodes.  In the first, he plays the Beethoven Diabelli Variations, magnificently. Another presents Chopin.  In a third, the subject is Mozart, and he collaborates with son, Michael, violinist, on the Violin Sonata, No. 35, A, K. 526.  It was remarkable and unforgettable in many ways:  the starkness of the empty hall vis-à-vis the artist, nevertheless, creating his art, the father-son rapport, the music itself.  It also put me in remembrance of my first encounter with this particular work:

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In the same way I had filled Miss Taylor’s mimeographed second-grade class newspaper, generating at least 51% of the bylines each week, I covered classical music for the Ohio State Lantern, i.e., uncredentialed, and self-assigned.  (The junior high and high school years were, for me, a journalistic hiatus.)  The editors at our daily college newspaper, a daily, were kind enough to indulge my new-found enthusiasm for classical music.  I saw no one else was covering the beat, so I took it on.  For an entire year.  I received free records from Angel, Phillips and other labels.  One time I was even invited to a Cincinnati Symphony event. 

I was in heaven.

Classical was a rich lode to mine, and Columbus was a good place to be.  Ohio State’s Mershon Auditorium attracted the greatest artists in the world:  Isaac Stern, Joan Sutherland, Misha Dichter, Pierre Cochereau (organist of Notre Dame, played in that vast space to a tiny handful of us who made it out on a particularly stormy night, unforgettable) and Pinchas Zukerman.

Regarding Zukerman, the young Israeli, he stopped in January 17, 1973 with this program:

Mozart                      Six Variations, g, K 360

Mozart                      Violin Sonata, A, K 526

Franck                       Violin Sonata, A

Hindemith                 Violin Sonata, Eb, Op 11, No. 1

Kriesler                     Tempo di menuetto

Kriesler                     Allegretto style of Boccherini

Kriesler                     Scherzo

Kriesler                     Polichinelle

Kriesler                     Liebeslied

Kriesler                     Liebesfreud

Bartók                       Rumanian Dances

The K. 526 is such a brilliant, engaging piece, and Zukerman was top-notch, as always.  I wrote abut the event; my review was published.  I proudly carted a copy to my music history professor, Dr. Keith Mixter, who taught Music 143, spring 1970, and then 142, fall, 1970.

He hadn’t been my teacher for more than two years, I was in graduate school, about to say “Goodbye Columbus” forever in less than 60 days, so he had no obligation to me whatsoever, but still he remembered me, received me graciously, like we had just stepped out of class.  I wanted his insights into my writing; he was a professional and respected musicologist.  A full professor.  Me?  A mere novitiate to the world of classical.  Truth be told, something of a pretender, I had no particular credentials to write about classical music other than passion.

He glanced at my clipping.  Without much ado, he said, “Let’s go listen to it.”

We headed to the music library.  He pulled out the famous recording of the two Hungarian giants performing the K. 526 in the bright, optimistic key of A,  Szigeti and Szell, grabbed two headphone sets, gave one to me, and carefully put the needle down.

We spent the next 24 minutes in Mozart, no other communication between us.  Just listening.  Intently, totally focused on the genius of Mozart, the magic of the playing.  There was not yet such a thing a “multi-tasking” in 1973.  It was more like 1873 or 1773 than 2020 in that regard.

When it was over, he nodded at me, smiled, said a few words of goodbye, scooped up his papers and left.

Like a true Zen master, he said not a single word to me about Mozart, Szell, Szigeti, or my writing.  Whatever I was to conclude about these matters, was, apparently, left up to me.

I have never forgotten his kindness, and this strange private lesson, so to speak.  We corresponded a time or two after.  That June I had moved to Chicago to begin work, he taught, and sailed his boat on Lake Erie, and wrote me a few lines in response to my own.

Encouraged by his silent endorsement of my passion for the musical arts, and with a strong desire to plumb the depths for more and more and yet more meaning, I sailed out into deeper waters, too, this time with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, led by the world's greatest conductors, Solti, Giulini, and guests.  I attended Lyric Opera, and concerts by the entire cavalcade of Allied Arts keyboard superstars, Horowitz, Arrau, Brendel, Barenboim, and most of the rest.

When Munan was getting old he called his senior pupil, Shoju in to see him. 

“Shoju,” he said, “I am getting old. This book was handed to me by my teacher, to him from his teacher for seven generations. You will succeed me, and I am now passing the book to you.” 

Shoju declined to accept the book. “I have received your teaching without writing and am satisfied. I have no need for the book. Perhaps you should keep it.” 

“Even so,” said Munan, “you should take the book as a symbol of my teaching. This has been so for seven generations.” And he passed the book to Shoju. 

Shoju threw it into the fire. 

“What are you doing!” Shouted Munan. 

“What are you saying!” Shouted Shoju back.

There’s no crying in baseball, they say, and after a certain point in Zen, there’s no teaching either.

Unlike Munan, Dr. Keith Mixter had given me no book.  He had not even given me any words about my writing.  Instead, he gave me something better: a validation that transcended tutelage.  He was saying, in effect, 'trust your ears, trust your judgments, trust your writing.'  And the implication, of course: don't stop listening.

This was for me, an ichigo ichie, an unrepeatable miracle.

Like the Mozart K. 526 itself.   And I never did stop listening....

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John A. Sarkett is author of Obscure Composers (1, 2 and 3), Bach and Heaven:  The Promise of Afterlife in the Text of the Cantatas, Classical Music Saved My Life, and Death in classical music:  making friends with the unfriendly.