Not often does the New York concert audience feel history being made as well as recreated. Pianist Emanuel Ax, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and violinist Leonidas Kavakos celebrated a double anniversary at Carnegie Hall on March 6—the 250th year of Beethoven’s birth as well as the 100th birthday of the late violinist Isaac Stern—with performances of epoch-making musicianship. Ma is only a year short of the 50th anniversary of his 1971 Carnegie Hall debut at age 16; Ax debuted in New York in 1974, and the audience erupted in blissful applause when they stepped on stage. The younger Kavakos is a worthy addition to their ranks.
The great composers require memory. Popular music dwells in the moment, but classical music employs the past to create a sense of the future. An educated ear is required to hold in memory the musical events of a long movement in which the composer traverses an extended territory to reach the musical goal. Just as important is the receptivity of the audience to the musical past. Carnegie Hall was at capacity despite a health emergency that has left the Metropolitan Opera half empty during the past fortnight, filled with concertgoers who had heard these performers for decades, and before them the great Isaac Stern, whose organizational genius saved the great venue from a planned demolition in 1960. They came to hear old friends in intimate musical dialogue. Through this dialogue Beethoven could be felt as a living presence.
