Zukerman takes his audience on a magical trip

ISTANBUL – Turkish Daily News
18 Aug 05

Music is the art of what cannot be expressed in words. It can go
beyond the things that words cannot express and the mind cannot
perceive. The area of music is the area of ambiguity, what cannot be
held with hands and dreams. That people can speak this language is
one of the greatest riches that God could have given us, and God gave
this richness generously to Pinchas Zukerman and his chamber orchestra.

An example of the support Zukerman has given to young artists is Joan
Milkson, a violinist in Canada who is of Greek origin but from the
Greeks who left Turkey in the 1922-1923 period to go to Greece. Later
on the family went on to Canada. After many years, today Milkson is the
first violinist of the Ottawa National Symphony Orchestra. Zuckerman
helped her and others because this is the kind of thing he likes to
do. She is also president of the Young String Performance Foundation
and in charge of the Tassos Prassopoulos Music Foundation, which
takes care of the children of talented musicians. The former Greek
Ambassador to Canada Leonidas Chrysanthopoulos remembers how Milkson
described Zukerman when he and his partner, the TDN’s Gul Demir, gave
a farewell dinner for Turkish Ambassador Erhan Ogut and his wife,
AyÅ~_e, who were leaving. Unfortunately Zukerman and his wife were
out of Ottawa at the time and couldn’t attend the dinner.

Milkson mentioned how Zukerman extends his hand to help young people.

She herself played with him. Another such person he supported was a
young southern Albanian girl named Areti, who went on to the Julliard
School of Music as a scholarship student.

Zukerman had never been in Turkey before, and so his first visit to
Istanbul for a recent concert was a totally new experience for him. He
brought with him his chamber players – violinist Jessica Linnebach,
violist Jethro Marks, violist Asham Pillai and cellist Amanda Forsyth,
who is Zuckerman’s beautiful wife.

In fact there were some people who never thought he would come to
Turkey. But there he was, with his chamber orchestra. Two magnificent
women, Israeli Consul General Amira Arnon and Cultural Attaché Batja
Keinan, were responsible for bringing this great artist here. He
came with the idea of promoting peace, and he paid the expenses of
the trip himself.

Zukerman and his chamber orchestra gave a concert devoted to Mozart
and Dvorak in Aya Irini, an ancient Byzantine church just within the
outer walls of Topkapı Palace.

Zukerman and his chamber orchestra took the audience on an imaginary
trip. It was fascinating because often you see poker-faced musicians
playing exciting and cheerful music. Not these! They smiled with each
other and acknowledged special passages in the music that must have
reminded them of other experiences. There was magnificent harmony
and empathy among them all.

What makes Zukerman so strong on stage? Is it his charisma or is it
that he’s a superior artist? Yes, these exist but his real power is
caused by his confidence. He can be unconditionally persuasive before
an audience through the sincerity of his confidence and power. Also,
he says his violin is part of his body. He touches the strings with
his five senses. It is as if his violin has become his sixth sense.

The audience was hypnotized when they were on stage. We were glued
to our seats and listened to the works of Mozart and Dvorak until
the end as if we had been charmed.

Author Ragip Zarakolu was in the audience that night, and his
reaction to Zukerman and his friends playing for “Friendship” was
that friendship was “the thing which Turkish society needs most at
the moment.”

Among the members of the audience were Greek Orthodox Patriarch
Bartolomeos, Armenian Patriarch Mesrob II, diplomats including
the German ambassador from Ankara and the German consul general
in Istanbul, Ä°shak Alaton, Nuri Colakoglu, Barbaros Cag and his
lovely wife Sema Cag, Nazan Olcer, Ebru and Haluk Sanver and other
distinguished guests.

If there was anything jarring, it was that members of the audience
would applaud at the wrong times. This really brought Ahmet Vefik
PaÅ~_a to mind. The three-time grand vizier towards the end of the
19th century was governor of Bursa. He translated Molière and other
works and set up a theater in Bursa, where he used to get up and try
to educate the audience on when to applaud and so forth. Perhaps we
need him today.

We could also point out there is a need for air-conditioning in Aya
Irini, but that’s probably not going to happen; the old building would
not be able to withstand the resulting vibrations. But we watched
people putting up fans around the stage in order for Zukerman and his
chamber orchestra to be cool enough. It was interesting to see how
Zukerman had the fans replaced so that they would be more comfortable.

At the end Zukerman made a nice gesture. He was presented with a
beautiful bouquet of flowers and after thanking the presenter he
turned and threw it to Israeli Consul General Amira Arnon, who was
one of those responsible for his coming to Istanbul. And she in turn
presented it to Batja Keinan.

Arnon was supposed to give a dinner for Zukerman and his chamber
orchestra in her home, but she was in the middle of packing out to
leave, so Haluk and Ebru Sanver responded to the SOS with one of
their superb Ottoman-style family dinners that everyone enjoyed,
ending up poolside with coffee and chat.

Do you think there’s some way to persuade Zukerman to participate
in the 2006 Istanbul Music Festival? Surely he will want to come to
Istanbul again now that he has made its acquaintance. But if he doesn’t
have time right now, what would happen if some of us hijacked him,
his beautiful wife and the excellent other members of his chamber
orchestra for next year?

–Boundary_(ID_r+YuEJD0e+LcVbueAY7GEg)–