[upbeat violin concerto] [cheers and applause] Who's next?

[laughter] Can you imagine what happens if you play... [rapid buzzing playing] ...like this very, very fast and you have an echo between each note?

You can't hear anything.

You know, I once, I once played Paganini No.

5, you know... [rapid playing] ...very fast.

And I once heard the tape of it in a very echo-y hall in Sao Paulo.

[rapid nonsensical playing] -[laughter] -And I know I played every note.

[laughter] But, but see, the problem was that I played too many notes.

You know, there were so many.

There was a note here and a note there, plus these notes.

[frenetic upbeat piano and violin music] I've got a rather large hands, and everybody tells me, "Okay, you've got terrific hands.

"You should be a cellist.

"You should be a bass player.

You should be a pianist.

Anything but a violinist."

[rapid piano and violin playing continues] [rapid picking] [climaxes ceremoniously] [thrilled cheers, applause, and stomping] [birds chirping] [pensive classical music] [Itzhak] My violin-playing business began at the age of three and a half.

I heard some violinists on the radio, I think it was Heifetz, and I liked it.

And so I said, uh, "I'd like to play the violin."

[bittersweet violin music] [Christopher] Among the great performers, the story is not uncommon.

For a young child to hear a musical sound at a very early age, and to be so attracted and impressed by it as to spend the rest of his life pursuing the mysteries of that magical moment, in his mind, Itzhak Perlman has been playing the violin since the age of three and a half and enjoying it.

His command of the instrument is second to none, and his virtuosity a source of constant delight, particularly in the virtuoso showpieces that had been out of fashion for some years now.

He's here playing Sarasate's Zigeunerweisen with the Philharmonia Orchestra of London, conducted by Lawrence Foster.

[music continues] [melancholic fade out] [ceremonial emotive playing] [plucking strings] [rapid whimsical playing] [revert to ceremonious playing] [climaxes thunderously] [cheers and applause] [Christopher] Itzhak Perlman was born in Tel Aviv of Polish parents in 1945.

At three and a half, he resolved to play the violin and, a year later, contracted polio.

Nobody will ever know to what extent this either hindered or fostered the development of his talent.

But by the age of nine, he was already giving concerts and already confronted by the idea that it would be quite impossible for him to have a successful career in the strenuous and competitive world of professional music.

[Itzhak] I contracted polio when I was four and a half, and, uh, looking in retrospect, my parents were just marvelous about the whole thing because people's disabilities, especially when they're children, their outlook on life really depends on their parents completely.

There is a lot of tragedy among people who are disabled because the parents don't really know how to handle it.

A disability is an abnormality, just as somebody who is a wunderkind is abnormal.

And that's why I'm very happy that I was not a wunderkind, because there was one less abnormality in myself, you know, and there was enough abnormality, as you know... There was never a thought, as there is in so many of these cases, of sending you to one of those institutions, uh, sleeping over and, you know, getting rid of whatever there is in your household that is not usual.

Here we are.

Noah!

-Hey!

Hi there.

-Hi!

And so I, I lived in the house.

I had friends, I played hide and seek, I went to school like everybody else, and I was at the top of my class, which didn't hurt at all.

Uh, [chuckles lightly] I had a lot of fun.

I liked school very, very much.

And until I was 13, I, that was my childhood.

You can make a normal situation out of an abnormal situation very, very easily.

It has to do with how you are treated, what you're able to do, and, uh, in my case, this never really interfered with anything.

[charming, peppy violin playing] [Christopher] The talent developed in spite of the handicap, and he began to give concerts and to attract public attention.

But the feeling persisted that a full scale solo career would be quite impossible.

Then one day, when he was 13, Ed Sullivan heard him and invited him to appear on The Ed Sullivan Show on United States television.

The opportunity seemed heaven-sent and the whole family moved to New York in search of training and support for what was already unquestionably a rare talent.

[Itzhak] When I first came to the States, uh, first we lived in a downtown hotel for one day, then another downtown hotel for another day, and then this.

We lived there for a year, just me and my mother, and had a little kitchen.

We lived in one room, and that's when I had my, uh, my first, uh, tutoring to study English.

Oh, listen, let me, let me take you to Julliard, the old Juilliard.

I mean, we, this, this was my route.

This was the route every, you know, every day or four, three, four times a week.

I used to go to Juilliard.

And Juilliard was not at the, at the... at the, at the Lincoln Center.

Juilliard was all the way up to 120th Street.

And, uh, right now, it's a different music school.

Now it's the Manhattan Music School, but-- [Christopher] How did you get to Juilliard?

I took a taxi every day.

I took a taxi, uh, right at the corner of the liquor store, you know?

And when it used to snow, I slid into a taxi.

I used to fall right before the taxi and then slide right into the taxi.

Yeah, it was, uh, those days were... It was really something.

[Christopher] How often do you fall down?

Well, I'll tell you.

Falling down is becoming... I, I, I don't mind falling down.

What I don't like is almost falling down because that's the worst, you know, because that gets your adrenaline going like mad.

And, and I said, "Damn, I should've fallen down!"

I almost fell down, you know, "Fall down already!"

[Christopher] [chuckles] You know, either do something or don't do it.

This was it.

That's it.

That is the building.

Now, I would never go through here because there were too many steps, [chuckles] naturally.

So I would go through there where there was not as many steps and, I must say, not as many graffiti on the wall... not as much graffiti.

So this is it.

It's my old school.

I came to the United States when I was 13.

I entered the Juilliard School of Music, and it was an incredible thing because they had usually had all those incredible balls that they used to run at Waldorf Astoria hotels and things like that.

And it was an unusual way to play the violin because everybody would eat dinner and then they would finish with the, with the, with the dessert.

And then would say, "Okay, "let's hear young Perlman here play The Flight of the Bumblebee and the Bloch Nigun."

And this usually occurred around 12:00 at night after everybody was absolutely, you know, like, "Oh, God.

Well, who is that now?"

And so I would go on a makeshift stage, you know, listen to the forks, uh, still being collected by the waiters and do my Flight of the Bumblebee.

And you know something?

This is, this is, there's nothing more unpleasant or more difficult than to do that because you know that you're trying to get the attention of the audience.

And, you know, at 12:00 at night, you know, I was like 14 years old.

It's not exactly the greatest things.

And I did that for a few years.

And when I made my Carnegie Hall debut, it was a breeze because, my God, I said, "I'm actually having people in this hall listening to me.

"They haven't eaten anything.

Uh, they haven't had a cocktail.

"They haven't complained about the, the hard rolls "or the stuffed chicken.

They actually came here to listen to me play the violin."

And so, for me, that was a real luxury.

[Toby] Okay, ready?

[Christopher] The advantages of the early years were already beginning to tell.

Carnegie Hall was a breeze, and he sailed through Juilliard and won the Leventritt Award with the same apparent ease.

Making friends along the way with a fellow violinist, Toby Friedlander.

[Toby] We met at a summer music camp in Upper New York State, and it was a Sunday.

And Isaac was playing on one of the student concerts that Sunday night.

And he played, he played the [indistinct], he played the Tzigane, Ravel Tzigane, and I went backstage and asked him to marry me.

[chuckles] He was 17.

It was July 4th weekend and he was almost 18.

His birthday is the end of August.

And then, well, about a year or so after we met, he grew up and he became interested in girls and found a girlfriend, and it wasn't me.

[chuckling] It was somebody else.

It was terrible!

So I had to kind of live through that period of time.

And it was a very difficult, because, you see, I was hopelessly in love with him, but he recovered from his, you know, other girlfriend.

It took a year or so and, uh, our friendship resumed and it grew and it, you know, it blossomed.

And really marriage was the most natural thing.

It was not a... not an emotional trauma for us at all.

The real change in our lives came when our first child was born.

And then things changed slightly.

Um, not that it upset us, it's just that we weren't, we couldn't sleep till noon anymore.

[chuckles] Those days are gone forever.

-[Itzhak] [laughing] -[Woman 2] Do you need that-- [Itzhak] He builds sheep.

Ah!

Goo, goo.

[growling] He really hasn't got used to it, to my playing yet.

-Can I have the bow?

-This is shorter.

Well, of course it's shorter.

That's the one that I that I use when I don't need the long bows.

-[baby coos] -[laughs] God bless you.

[plays Rock-a-bye Baby] My God, he's sleeping.

[all laughing] [laughter] [opera singing and music playing] [classical group playing tenderly] The Trout is, is, is... a wonderful little piece of history.

It captured a real musical time that I don't know if it exists anymore.

[music swells emotively] It certainly had an awful lot of people in it who worked well together.

[music transitions to sweeter, whimsical tones] [music swells] [Itzhak] Of course, musically, uh, it was, it was, again, uh, it was like, uh, it was a very important part of memorabilia.

You know, when you, when you think about it, you know, and we're talking about Zubin and Daniel and, and Pinky and myself and, and Jacquie, of course, no longer with us.

[violins playing melancholy] And, of course, she ruined that piece for me because every time I hear somebody play that piece, I say to myself, "It's not Jacquie.

"It's not Jacquie.

I can't listen to that piece until," you know, when I hear a particular, uh... a particular phrase... [sings operatically] And I say, "Oh, God, that's not her."

That sounds good, but it's not Jacquie."

[dramatic, emotive playing] [music softens and swells] [rapid, peppy playing] [music crescendos] [music softens to legato] [music crescendos] [closes ceremoniously] [somber, dramatic playing] [laughter] [hysterical laughter] Do you know that there's a serious public waiting outside?

[laughter] Come on, let's start.

In the Trout, the chemistry was that, you know, we were in the middle of, um, a festival, a Southbank Festival that Daniel started.

And so it was all, you know, people were playing chamber music together and so on.

[indistinct chatter] [Itzhak] You know, the adrenaline of, of first of all, the performance, you know, at the Queen Elizabeth, uh, was quite incredible.

Then you look at it and you say, "Oh, my God, "we were really having a great time.

You know, it was really fantastic."

[orchestra playing tenderly] [music crescendos dramatically and abruptly stops] [jolly playing] [abrupt dramatic crescendo] [legato playing to mild crescendo] [soft staccato playing and swells gradually] [music rumbles] [powerful emotive crescendo] [music rumbles] [abrupt pianissimo] [abrupt powerful crescendo] [abrupt pianissimo] [music swells and rumbles] [climaxes triumphant] [cheers and applause] Mm, it's delicious.

[child laughing] -[Itzhak] Want a massage now?

-Yeah.

[Itzhak] I'm really basically a family man.

I love to spend time with my family, and I just cannot conceive of traveling and leaving them to grow all by themselves.

-One more time.

Over here.

Go.

-I can't... [Itzhak] As a parent, it's incredible to see your kids grow.

And so many of my colleagues sometimes I speak to, I spoke to one the other day, says, "My God," he said, "Before you know it, you miss it.

"The whole thing, you just missed the whole thing.

"You know, that your kids are all grown up and they're away in school."

And I'm determined not to do that.

And I haven't been doing it.

[child bellows and giggles] [Itzhak] All right, we have a little sack of potatoes here.

[snorts] Oh!

Hey.

Hey, what are you doing?

Hey, man.

What?

I never go to Europe by myself for more than two and a half, three weeks maximum.

Whenever I go on a longer tour, I always take the children and Toby with me.

Especially in the summers, if course, we all go together, but during the winter, whenever there is a tour that involves more than three weeks, I say, "No thank you, I'd rather not so that I can spend time in New York with them," which is really the most important thing in my life.

-[grunts] -[screams] [Itzhak] And whenever I go away for two weeks or something, I'm always very, very miserable.

I really am upset.

Ah, flying!

-[Child] [grunts] -[imitates plane engine] Ah!

[bellowing] [Itzhak] I hate traveling.

I always say that if I could, if I could have a steady job... [chuckles] in New York, playing the fiddle, I would do it.

So as a result, what I do, I really plan my life around my kids' vacations, around my vacations, around their schools and so on and so forth.

George, you've got everything?

-[indistinct chatter] -You've got everything?

[Toby] He's a very, um, normal man.

That means he doesn't pick up his dirty clothes and put them in the hamper.

That means that, a great deal of the time, he thinks dinner is going to appear by magic on the table.

The children will get home from their various activities because they will fly and no one has to pick them up.

And, of course, the biggest problem, we can stay up till 3:00 in the morning, every night because we don't have to get up.

Except that I have to get up at 6:30.

[chuckles] It's the bath time.

He forgets that the house does not run on magic.

The telephones never stop.

The doorbell never stops.

People are in and out all day long.

Everybody feels that they need Isaac and that they need him more than anybody else, students and managers and recording people, and everybody wants to talk to him all the time.

And in order to make it a peaceful, comfortable, healthy environment, one has to really think about all the problems and how best to solve them for everyone.

Well, good.

I'll take your shirt.

[Deejay] Welcome to St John's Smith Square, London, and to our Radio 3 lunchtime concert.

Our guest today is the violinist, Itzhak Perlman, who's going to play the Partita in E Major by Bach.

This is the last of the set of three sonatas and three partitas, which Bach completed in 1720 when he was employed at Curtin.

And now it's with great pleasure that we welcome Itzhak Perlman.

[applause] [vibrant, pleasant, up-tempo violin playing] [softens and swells] [transitions to weightier tones] [reverts to pleasant tones] [softens and swells] [slows and closes brightly] [Toby] He has to have some frustrations because he can't play basketball, he can't ice skate, he can't do lots of things.

Now, we around him don't feel that because he handles it in his, with his own grace and style.

But he must, inside in his soul, want to run across the basketball court.

You know, he's such a fan of basketball and so on.

I suppose eating helps with that.

♪ The noodles are frying ♪ ♪ For me and my gal ♪ [Toby] He dreams about food.

He calls me from Europe to tell me what he had for lunch.

Um, I think it's nuts, personally, I really do.

[Itzhak] I got into cooking because... I went on a diet, and I explain to you how this this happened.

You see, the problem with diets are they are really disgusting because you really don't have anything that you want to eat because it's all yucky.

It's blegh.

Ow!

And one day I said to myself, "Look, "if I can cook myself diet food "and I can use certain ingredients "that would be tasty and yet still not fattening, it would be terrific."

And that's why I started on the cooking.

It started with a very nice, uh, idea, and then it kind of went out of hand.

And then I said, "Well, if I can cook, uh, diet stuff, just imagine what I can do with real stuff."

[chuckles] So then I started into Chinese cooking and, uh, I really love it.

Mm, it's not bad.

As a matter of fact, in the country when I cook, I eat less.

[sharp sizzling] Most cooks have a sort of a, a natural, uh, inferiority complex.

You know, it doesn't taste as good when you cooked it as when somebody else cooked it.

All I do is just taste and make sure that it's okay.

And then I just sit and relax and watch everybody else eat.

[hums happily] [playful, peppy classical music] [staccato playing] [reverts to original tones] [adding on-beat stomping] [downward slide playing] [reverts to playful, peppy tones] [downward slide playing] [closes simplistically] [applause and stomping] [Itzhak] Oh yes, I love performing, it's great.

I like the audience.

I like to, to make the audience come to me.

I like to, uh, go to them.

It's a, it's really a, I feel, it's a give-and-take situation.

I think that, when you play, your personality has to be in the music, but you cannot put yourself ahead of the music.

The music has to be ahead of yourself.

But, of course, if you have a personality and you have some sort of a rapport with the audience, it has to show.

You really have to have the contact.

As a matter of fact, if you don't have that adrenaline working within you, I don't think that you can play so well because you might as well play in the bathroom or in a, in a kitchen or someplace.

That's as much excitement as you're going to get out of it.

[rapid violin music] -All right, Richard.

-[Richard] Yeah.

Can we do something?

[Richard] Yes.

Why don't you do [indistinct]?

A, a what?

-[Richard] A take.

Of this.

-Of this?

-Do you want to do a take?

-[Man] A take.

[Christopher] Kingsway Hall, London, to record Beethoven sonatas with Vladimir Ashkenazy.

Can you, can you give a little fiddle a little more, uh, something?

Bloom?

[Richard] It's difficult because of the lights and the people.

[Christopher] They've been recording the Beethoven sonatas for some years and are now about to complete the series with the G major Sonata, opus 96.

[plays legato] Okay.

[clears throat] [warm, intimate playing] [Itzhak] Our relationship has been, let's see, quite a few years.

Um, about almost 10 years, maybe more than that.

And, uh, when I look back, this is like a period in which we grew together and the way we played together also grew.

And I always find that, at least in my case, that there is something extra special that my playing gets when I play with him.

[music continues via recording] It should be more piano.

-It was good.

-[Itzhak] That's nice.

[Itzhak] Yeah, but that, that-- You should have told me that before.

-[Itzhak] What?

-Because I didn't do that-- [Itzhak] Spontaneity is what, what this is all about.

It's true.

Are we clear?

Actually, it's all right.

-Of course it is.

-Naturally.

But, see, I move it a little bit.

I move it a little.

[music swells] You're right.

I should move it.

We need more piano here as well.

And I can also play less... the F sharps.

[imitates key striking] I'll do less.

[music softens and swells gradually] [imitates swing rhythm] That part.

We're dubbing that on next week.

Really?

Would you dub that?

[Man 2] Yeah.

-[all chuckling] -He's crazy.

[imitates swing rhythm and bass riff] [Itzhak] We tried each other out to see if it was going to work or not work.

And, uh, we decided to give it a go.

"Let's start from something terrific."

So we decided to do the Beethoven sonatas, and we're still doing them.

You know, it took us, I think, about two and a half years to just do the Kreutzer Sonata, 0but that's because it was a growing process all the time.

[abrupt rapid, cheerful playing] [abruptly softens] [Itzhak] I always find that we always, we always have fights about music, which is a very healthy thing to have, sometimes really like half an hour.

We kind of fight very, very hard about just basics of music, which, uh, which is, I think as the end result of it is growth.

So I really appreciate that.

[legato emotive playing] [music swells dramatically] [music transitions to romantic, tender tones] If you compare those phrases, those answers, those echoes between the piano-- This was good, this was good.

Listen to it.

[climaxes cheerfully and triumphantly] -[cheers] -[Itzhak] Take it, take it.

-No, take this one.

-[Man 2] Right.

-That's definitely in.

No-- -[Man 2] [indistinct] No, right.

For example, here.

[taps] There's nothing.

Yeah.

Do you think you were playing that... -I was playing as... -[Man 2] Beautifully.

-As hard as I could.

-[Man 2] Yeah?

-No, as hard as I could.

-Well, maybe too hard.

Because that's I find, it's, there's a certain thinness.

I mean we can help a bit there.

-Somebody needs to complain.

-Complain, yeah.

Why is it always me?

Why is it never you?

It's always me, I've been playing hard.

I've been playing soft.

I've been playing thin.

I've been playing thick.

You've been recording thin.

Piano is too loud.

That's what it is.

No, no, the piano is beautiful.

Believe me.

It's gorgeous.

It has a gorgeous sound.

Gorgeous.

Terrific.

[violin music] I made it!

[chuckles] Excuse me.

[Christopher] London again, the Royal College of Music, at the end of a memorable and highly successful tour of Europe with Pinchas Zukerman.

It's such a pleasure to see you, sir.

-Mwah!

Mwah!

-[laughs] Ah, wonderful.

Please keep it up.

Very good, very good.

Lovely violin.

Thank you so much.

[playing casually] [plays honky-tonk] [Christopher] As performers, they're very different in style and temperament, but they greatly enjoy each other's playing and each other's company, and have developed a close relationship.

-So where's my copy then?

-I don't have it.

Well, that's nice.

That's-a-nice.

Let's see.

Where is it?

Oh, I got it.

-No.

No, that's not it.

-Yes, that's it.

That's it.

-You wanna bet?

-Oh.

Lost again!

That's 60 bucks you owe me.

[both laughing] [Christopher] In spite of their differences, they're often mistaken for one another because both were born in Israel, both studied at the Juilliard School in New York, both won the Leventritt Award, America's top musical prize, and both are already among the handful of violinists at the very top of their profession.

[plays legato] [plays comparatively faster] [Itzhak] No?

No.

No, [mumbles].

[plays upbeat tempo] You tap with that foot.

[indistinct chatter] [both playing honky-tonk] No, no, it's the foot has to be... [imitates stomping rhythm] [both laughing] Here we go.

-[indistinct] -All right.

[rapid, buzzing classical playing] [Itzhak] I had a tour with, with Pinky.

That, for me, was the most wonderful tour I've ever had.

[chuckles] My bow doesn't bounce much.

No, I got to do this.

I can't come in at there-- -Here on the page, yeah.

-[Itzhak] No, no, no.

[Itzhak] First of all, Pinky is a, is such a individual person.

He, I mean, let's not talk about musicianship or anything like this.

We take that for granted.

But to go on tour with Pinky is, uh, it's a riot.

It's a gas.

It's, it's, it's so much fun.

[rapid, mischievous playing] That's enough.

I can't play more.

Whew!

[Itzhak] I've known Pinky since childhood, since when Pinky was the ripe age of nine and I was the ripe age of, of 12, you know, and, uh, the thing is that, when we play together on the stage, again, it's something that happens between us, the rapport.

The musical improvisation that went on, on the stage was something for me that was a very private thing.

But yet, of course, it came across to the audience.

At least that's what I felt.

And it's also the kind of repertoire that we play, just two violins with nothing else.

And, and there was always a sense of expectancy.

And, uh, you know, we just had a lot of fun.

[mischievous playing continues] [crescendos and climaxes playfully] Very good.

[Man 3] Tell him to stop horsing around.

[Christopher] Tonight's concert is a last-minute addition to their tour.

They played in Hamburg yesterday and are due in the recording studios in the morning.

But they've agreed to give an extra concert at the Royal College for an audience of music students and London musicians, which is to be filmed for television.

[casual, mischievous playing] -Five more minutes?

-[Man 3] Sure!

Five minutes.

[Christopher] They've been making music together every day for two weeks and without losing the zest for it.

11 concerts in as many cities in 14 days, with a good deal of traveling in between.

And travel for Itzhak Perlman is doubly difficult.

[playful playing continues] -Again.

-Sure.

Ready.

Let's go.

♪ Take my violin, darling ♪ [enthusiastic applause] [audience laughs mildly] [melancholic legato playing] [transitions to pianissimo] [music swells gradually and emotively] [music crescendos and softens] [transitions to yearning, somber tones] [increases in tempo and intensity] [transitions to brighter tones] [music swells and increases in tempo] [music gradually softens and slows] [reverts to brighter tones and increases in tempo] [music swells dramatically] [music softens and slows] [reverts to yearning tones and increases in tempo] [music slows and fades out] [applause and cheers] [Christopher] Aspen, in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, home of the Aspen Music School and Summer Festival, and for some years past, the summer retreat of the entire Pearlman family.

[sentimental, hopeful classical music] [Itzhak] Well, I've heard about this place many years, but, you know, hearing about a place and experiencing a place are two different things.

And, uh... Uh, Dorothy DeLay was my teacher.

She started to come to this place, I think, about 7 or 8 years ago.

She said to me, "You've got to come, even if it's like for three days, four days."

So one summer I decided, "Okay, take the family, come have a little four-day-vacation."

[music continues] We stayed for about a week and at the end of the week, it was the most horrible, difficult departure of my life from any place.

I got what they call the Rocky Mountain Fever.

It was something that just grabbed you, wouldn't let you go, and it's an experience that caused me to completely change my entire, uh, schedule in the summer, my entire life in the summer.

[music continues] [dog barking] [indistinct] Yeah, nothing so that we can have... [imitates two note strikes] right?

[indistinct chatter] -Yes, yes.

Arco on the last one.

-[indistinct] Last, the last... arco.

Now, I want everybody to come in really fortissimo at, uh... 120?

-That's right, one-- -124.

124.

And then you start doing your stuff with the hairpins.

But before you just come in really fast, especially basses.

[imitates rumbling bass-playing] Can we try that?

[sentimental, hopeful violin playing] [abrupt, rapid, vibrant playing] I'm sorry, it's quite good, but I still didn't hear the very first in the bass.

[imitates rumbling bass] The 113.

113, please.

[sentimental, hopeful playing] I'd like to play the second one, yes, second one pianissimo, okay?

Let's start from that one.

[music continues emotively] [abrupt, rapid, vibrant playing] [transitions to dramatic rumble] [closes with hard fade-out] [fervent cheers and applause] [Man 4] [indistinct] The big lob.

Where is it?

Oh.

This summer has become, all of a sudden, something, uh, very special, very precious.

I try to satisfy myself, uh, musically as well as, uh, visually.

I just take everything in.

I soak everything, and all I can tell you is that when my family, my children and Toby, go back to New York, the only thing we do is, uh, we look forward.

It sustains us for the next year.

[Toby] Do I have to do another one?

-[Itzhak] No, no, it was good.

-Because I can-- [Itzhak] It was good.

But basically I just come here to do things musically that I don't do throughout the year, you know, during the season.

[upbeat cheerful violin music] Now, take your time.

There you go, like a-- Yeah, yeah, but see, you see where your bow is?

Bow is around here.

It's around, you know, it's in... It's in, uh, down under, you know?

[cheerful playing] Right around here.

Eh-eh!

Yeah, but you see, now, when last time I told you to hold the fiddle up, you said, "Thank you very much."

[cheerful playing] [all laugh and applaud] Okay?

Right there.

I don't want to go-- I don't want to be there.

I don't want to be, you know, you know, like that with a, you know... [all laugh ecstatically] But, you know, you see, the thing is that don't dig yourself a hole, you know, don't go... [imitates abrasive scratching] like that.

Right from there, one more time.

[rhythmically hums] [cheerful playing] See.

Right.

Now sing again.

And no, no.

Take a little time.

It's the second tone.

[plays legato] You know... [plays slightly staccato] You then go... [plays sharper, higher notes] Then go... But, you know, prepare it because this is, you know, this is a completely, uh, you know, completely for virtuoso purposes, you know?

So you can take time, take time, do it, all right?

Same, same spot.

Take your time.

[cheerful playing] Bam!

Now take your time.

[plays legato] Now you go.

[plays high notes and slides downward sharply] All right.

All right, that's very cute, very nice.

But I want to hear it.

I want to hear it.

You know, you start, uh... [scales upward] You know, this is like a competition.

Who can play more notes with less bow?

You know why?

Why?

You know?

[hums rhythmically and plays sharply] [rapidly scales downward] You know, I mean, do something, you know, use a little bit more bow, you know, because it's very small, you know?

Wait for it.

Yeah.

[mimics Itzhak's rapid scale down] Mm, all right.

[audience laughs] No, what will happen if you just, uh, I don't know, let's experiment, what happens if you don't do the ricochet?

What if you just do spiccato?

[plays spiccato scale-down] I don't know, something.

[imitates Itzhak's spiccato playing] -That's pretty good.

-[audience laughs] And, and it gives you more of a chance.

You know, you could you could do a whole sweep, you know, if you're facing-- There you go.

[plays spiccato scale-down] [audience laughs] To do a whole sweep of the thing, you know?

But, you know, what my point is... I love to teach.

I, I think that teaching helps me a lot.

The most important thing about playing concerts is to be able to listen while you're playing.

Sometimes you listen while you're playing and you say to yourself, "Why?"

I say to myself, "Why is it not going quite well?"

And then all of a sudden, I say to myself, "Listen to what you preach," you know?

"All day yesterday you were talking about "a certain thing in the bow.

Do it yourself," you know?

"Don't just say to somebody else."

And I do it and it really helps me.

It, uh, that's number one.

Number two, it's, it's very nice to help people, help young people.

And I think that I, I do a good job.

I think that the important thing about teaching, besides knowing what you're talking about on a technical terms, is to give support to the students, to, to, to really tell them, you know, to give compliments when compliments are needed and to be able to make criticisms in such a way that they will not be a destructive.

All right, try from here.

[dramatic violin playing] [imitates dramatic, thumping note-strikes] Ah, ah, ah, more, more, more!

[imitates dramatic, thumping note-strikes] Now you go!

You know, don't rush, don't rush.

There's time, plenty of time.

[dramatic violin playing] [mimics Itzhak's spiccato playing] [all laugh, applaud] [music swells with buzzing, sharper tones] [crescendos dramatically] [closes dramatically] Very good.

[all laughing and applauding] Okay.

We'll start by you telling me how you do the staccato bit.

[all laughing] Now is that, you stiffen the arm?

-Is that what you do?

-Yeah.

[Itzhak] Uh-huh, and then what you do?

-[mild laughter] -Hope for the best.

Hope for the best, yeah.

No, you know... There's a, there's a story.

I never forget this.

Uh, uh, Josef Gingold told me once that he, he did a concerto, and it was supposed to be a lot of staccato there and, uh, and he didn't have a good staccato, and, uh, so Ysaye, Eugène Ysaye was at the concert, and Ysaye was a huge, tall fellow and, uh, quite frightening to, to a violinist who's starting, and, or any colleague of his, because he was such a giant.

And he came backstage and he says, "What's with the staccato?

Where was the staccato?

No staccato."

So he says, "Well," he says, "I'm sorry, Mr.

Ysaye, but I don't have a staccato."

He says, "I'll give you a staccato.

Don't worry."

He says, "Just put the violin under the chin."

So he put, he says, "Now put the bow on the string."

He go, "Go!"

And... [all laughing] He said he got, he got so nervous, he says he hasn't it since.

[all laughing] [cheerful, peppy playing] [crescendos ceremoniously] [reverts to cheerful playing] [transitions to ceremonious tones] [dramatic rumble] [crescendos dramatically] [reverts to cheerful tone] [plays cheerful scales up and down] [transitions to sweeter, legato playing] [crescendos ceremoniously] [crescendos and rumbles] [reverts to cheerful tones] [crescendos ceremoniously] [crescendos triumphantly] [transitions to bright sentimental tones] [music swells gradually] [music crescendos and rumbles] [emotive solo playing] [orchestra playing cheerfully and emotively] [bright rapid playing] [music crescendos] [music swells ceremoniously] [music softens and slows] [climaxes dramatic and triumphant] [applause] [cheers] [rapid, buzzing, cheerful classical music] [climaxes ceremonious]