Ailantha
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact

The Night We Met Yo-Yo Ma

6/11/2020

2 Comments

 
                                YOU NEED SOMETHING GOOD TO READ.
"HAIL MARY," SEQUEL TO "EQUAL AND OPPOSITE REACTIONS," IS NOW AVAILABLE ON AMAZON.
                                      https://www.amzn.com/1684334888

"A hilarious, bizarre, sometimes ribald tale." -R. Bruce Logan, author of "As The Lotus Blooms"

"Liszkay continues to dazzle with fresh and funny characters from beginning to end." -Daniel B. Oliver, author of "The Long Road"
Picture

The Night We Met Yo-Yo Ma

Picture
      While writing the post last week about cellist Sara Swain, who took up Yo-Yo Ma's #Songs of Comfort challenge (See post from 6/4/2020, "A Couple Points of Light, Part 2: #Songs of Comfort by Sara Swain), I was reminded of the time my daughters Maria and Claire and I met Yo-Yo Ma.
      My four children studied strings from a young age, the girls cello, my son violin (his choice; since his two older sisters played the cello he picked up the notion that cellos were for girls).
        Here they are performing together at a party in the summer of 1993,

Picture
...and here at Nordstroms around Christmas time in 2001, the last time all four performed publicly together,
Picture
...though they still goofed off together when the opportunity arose,
Picture
...and they did play at each others' weddings.
Picture
Picture
     According to the date on the the photographs I took, it was January 19, 1994 that Maria, Claire and I met master cellist and United Nations Messenger of Peace, Yo-Yo Ma (here in a more recent picture than when we met him),
Picture
...and world-renowned pianist Peter Serkin (also in a more recent picture),
Picture
...after a concert the two musicians played together that evening at the Ohio Theater in Columbus.
      It was my daughters' cello teacher who'd impressed upon them that, as young cellists themselves, seeing Yo-Yo Ma perform would be an inspiration, and added the incentive that if we went to the concert she'd arrange for us to meet him afterwards. "He's really a regular Joe," said their teacher of the most celebrated cellist in the world.
       And so I got our tickets for the Yo-Yo Ma/Peter Serkin concert, which we awaited with anticipation. 
        As it turned out, the concert almost didn't happen. On the day of the concert there was a storm of snow and sleet, and by evening the streets were treacherous.  However the concert wasn't cancelled, and I decided to make the drive downtown to the Ohio Theater, oh so slowly and carefully.
        We arrived to a less than half-full theater, and shortly before the performance was scheduled to begin it was announced that the concert would be delayed, as the musicians' plane had been delayed due to the weather.
        So we waited, though I don't remember how long. I think the delay might have been an hour or so. But the musicians finally arrived on stage - dressed in their traveling clothes. Apparently their luggage had been lost along the way. At the beginning of the performance a smiling Yo-Yo Ma said, "Welcome, everyone, to the first of the Casual Concert Series."
      The girls' cello teacher later remarked that it's likely that a different pair of celebrities might have insisted that they must have their formal performance attire and held up the concert even longer while assistants scrabbled around Columbus trying to round up tuxedos. But, thankfully, Yo-Yo Ma and Peter Serkin didn't feel the need to belabor this detail.
      The concert was wonderful, and to us it felt all the more special and intimate to see the famous musicians playing in their everyday clothes. The encore was an exciting surprise as Yo-Yo Ma and his accompanist played a cello piece that Maria and Claire had played (and Theresa would eventually play), the Bach Allegro Moderato. 

Picture
    Yo-Yo Ma, however, added some of his own beautiful ornamentation to the piece, and Peter Serkin played a more scintillating piano accompaniment than I, my children's accompanist, ever did.  My daughters' teacher told us that Yo-Yo Ma was known for sometimes performing student-level pieces so that some of the cello students in the audience might recognize a piece they played.
     After the concert we met up with the girls' cello teacher at the arranged rendez-vous point near the front of the theater. The teacher then took us to a clandestine elevator that went to a level beneath the theater  where there were dressing and waiting rooms for the performers. Years later when my youngest daughter Theresa was a member of the Columbus Children's Choir she and the other choir members and I and the other choir parents would spend considerable time in that same waiting area.  

Picture
    But that night was my first time backstage. Or rather, beneath stage.
   We waited with the teacher among the other people there to see the performers. When Yo-Yo Ma and Peter Serkin entered the area Yo-Yo Ma was set upon by a group of young people, evidently ardently admiring fans, who surrounded him for photos and autographs.

Picture
     As the path to Peter Serkin was clearer, we approached him for a picture, with which he graciously obliged us.
Picture
     It seemed pretty clear that we wouldn't be able to get close to Yo-Yo Ma, who was still surrounded, so we just stood off at a small distance and watched him smile and joke with the crowd around him.
Picture
    However at one point he looked beyond the crowd over to us standing by ourselves. He called us over. "Would you like to take a photo?" he asked. We sure did. In fact we took a couple.
Picture
Picture
         Claire, who had brought her cello repertory book, then asked him if he would autograph it. He opened it to the first song - which happened to be one of the movements of the Seitz Concerto - and at the top of the page drew a little elephant head with a cartoon bubble coming from its trunk saying, "Good job!"
         Sadly, that book - Suzuki Cello Volume 4 - was lost in the shuffle somewhere, I think it was  during a music workshop the girls attended that summer, and had to be replaced with a new one, unsigned by Yo-Yo Ma.
         The following year the girls began studying with a new teacher, Bin,

Picture
Picture
...who, it turned out, had studied with Yo-Yo Ma at Tanglewood.
      Small world.

2 Comments
Sandy Mathias
6/12/2020 09:52:34 am

What a great story! Thanks, too, for the awesome photo of the CCC! SallyJane also has a great story if meeting YoYo Ma in MN!!

Reply
Patti Liszkay
6/12/2020 11:19:46 am

Thank you, Sandy, glad you enjoyed the post. And thank you for all your years as the wondrful director of the Columbus Children's Choir. Theresa has such happy memories of her time in the choir - and so do I. [PS - You say Sally Jane has a great Yo-Yo Ma story? Might she be interested in sharing it as a guest Ailantha blogger? You could ask her if she wants to write it out and send it to me. Always looking for a good Yo-Yo Ma story! ;) ].

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Picture
    "Equal And Opposite Reactions"
     by Patti Liszkay
    Buy it on Amazon:

    http://amzn.to/2xvcgRa
    Picture
    ​"Hail Mary"
    by Patti Liszkay
    Buy it on Amazon:

    https://www.amzn.com/1684334888
    Picture
    "Tropical Depression" 
    by Patti Liszkay
    ​Buy it on Amazon:   
    https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BTPN7NYY

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013

    RSS Feed

    I am a traveler just visiting this planet and reporting various and sundry observations,
    hopefully of interest to my fellow travelers.

    Categories

    All


























































































  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact