I saw Lorin Maazel conduct many times but I met him only once, when he was in Edinburgh with the concert pianist Israela Margalit, who had recently become his second wife. They were staying at the Caledonian Hotel near the Usher Hall. She was in Scotland to play, if I remember rightly, a Rachmaninov or Saint-Saens concerto with Sir Alexander Gibson and the Scottish National Orchestra, and he was there to listen to her.
Sensing a story, I made an appointment to have afternoon tea with them in the hotel’s relaxing lounge. Though I was happy to interview her - she’d never been in Edinburgh before - I was even happier to do so in the presence of Maazel who, to be truthful, was the person I really wanted to meet.
Maazel’s death in America the other day at the age of 84 brought it all back to me. The interview had started with Margalit, alone, joining me at the tea-table. We chatted about the standard things - her career and what she would be playing - and conversation was flowing. But where was Maazel? I glanced around the room. Not a sign. I was beginning to fear that he had guessed my objective when suddenly I spotted him bounding down the staircase, then sauntering across to join us. I brought him into the conversation and he immediately made his position clear. Though perfectly friendly, he said he was not there to be interviewed, or even to take part in a joint interview with his wife. He did not want it known that he was in Edinburgh. He did not want anything he said to be quoted in The Scotsman.
My plan was not only scuppered but I realised that he was perhaps not quite the musical show-off I thought he was. His stick technique may have been famously flashy, his platform manner brimming with self-esteem, but he had rightly guessed that his presence would detract from my interview with his new wife. Having made his point, he sat back and beamed, saying next to nothing that could not have gleaned from any publicity sheet. But the edge, I regretted, had been removed from the interview.
Knowing that as a journalist I could have made the whole thing work, I felt disappointed when it didn’t. After our exchange of pleasantries, he and his wife went back upstairs to prepare for the concert. Attending it as a critic, I thought the performance unimpressive. Maazel, I was told, was in the audience, though I failed to spot him. An opportunity to interview him, alas, never came again.The next time I heard Maazel conduct, he had a different wife and Israela Margalit had started a different career as a writer and playwright.But did he already know, that afternoon in Edinburgh, that her days as a concert pianist were numbered?
14 July 2014
Sensing a story, I made an appointment to have afternoon tea with them in the hotel’s relaxing lounge. Though I was happy to interview her - she’d never been in Edinburgh before - I was even happier to do so in the presence of Maazel who, to be truthful, was the person I really wanted to meet.
Maazel’s death in America the other day at the age of 84 brought it all back to me. The interview had started with Margalit, alone, joining me at the tea-table. We chatted about the standard things - her career and what she would be playing - and conversation was flowing. But where was Maazel? I glanced around the room. Not a sign. I was beginning to fear that he had guessed my objective when suddenly I spotted him bounding down the staircase, then sauntering across to join us. I brought him into the conversation and he immediately made his position clear. Though perfectly friendly, he said he was not there to be interviewed, or even to take part in a joint interview with his wife. He did not want it known that he was in Edinburgh. He did not want anything he said to be quoted in The Scotsman.
My plan was not only scuppered but I realised that he was perhaps not quite the musical show-off I thought he was. His stick technique may have been famously flashy, his platform manner brimming with self-esteem, but he had rightly guessed that his presence would detract from my interview with his new wife. Having made his point, he sat back and beamed, saying next to nothing that could not have gleaned from any publicity sheet. But the edge, I regretted, had been removed from the interview.
Knowing that as a journalist I could have made the whole thing work, I felt disappointed when it didn’t. After our exchange of pleasantries, he and his wife went back upstairs to prepare for the concert. Attending it as a critic, I thought the performance unimpressive. Maazel, I was told, was in the audience, though I failed to spot him. An opportunity to interview him, alas, never came again.The next time I heard Maazel conduct, he had a different wife and Israela Margalit had started a different career as a writer and playwright.But did he already know, that afternoon in Edinburgh, that her days as a concert pianist were numbered?
14 July 2014
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