The Honor Roll...

[euphony131]

Diverging a little from B. --

the last 10-12 years has seen the passing of the Greats:

Leonard Bernstein
Von Karajan
Sir George Solti
Yehundi Menuhin
Vladimir Horowitz
Leontyne Price (is she still alive???)

(forgive me if I've left out any names..)

At this point, I'd argue that Sir Colin Davies, Issac Stern and cellist Rostropovich are truly the Last of the Old Guard, the last flickers of a once redhot flame ... Who will replace them? Where are the young Turks today with similiar levels of dynamism? It sometimes seems that as more and more of the Old Guard pass on that CM is more and more relegated to obscurity. Those mentioned above were true icons during their respective heydays -- where are the icons today? Now there are only recordings...

[stout]

I cannot speak for those who have gone before me, but I can speak for what I do know.
My goal, above all other things in life is to be like these honorable men. Men-who have dedicated their lives to classical music. I do not know what the distant future holds, but I will, throughout my life, become a composer, like Beethoven, or conductor, like Solti, (im not sure) but have no fear my friends, the music of Ludwig Van Beethoven will live on!

[Serge]

The loss of these great artists is to be deplored, but thankfully we have their recorded legacy to remember them by. There is a sense that there is a changing of the guard; once Brendel, Argerich, Masur, Maazel, Stern, et al retire or die, that generation will come to an end. This happens all the time. When all the greats from the fifties and sixties passed, that surely was forlornly regretted. Nothing can be done about that.

Today's generation of future stars is bright, though, to my eyes. We have people like Hilary Hahn and Leila Josefowicz, Murray Perahia and Arcadi Volodos, Simon Rattle and Claudio Abbado and David Zinman, Yo-Yo Ma (of course!), Hagen Quartet, Eroica Trio... There is no shortage of top-flight talent out there, so all that is required is that they are able to make a livelihood from it.

If the state of c.m. is somewhere in the cellar today, at least it isn't at the stage where no one young wants to take a stab at it. These people will be part of the answer to c.m.'s future.