Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Distinguished concert pianist.
On the island
Eight records
Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1: Fugue No. 24 in B minor
it's the kind of music which can be studied and studied and never runs out of architectural wonders.
I think he would remind one of how very little a human being really needs to get along with, basically.
Quintet for Piano and Strings (last page)
it's really the last page of it, which is the most meditative and heavenly kind of spreading sound.
Piano Trio in B-flat major, Op. 97 'Archduke' (opening)
Jascha Heifetz, Emanuel Feuermann, Arthur Rubinstein
the very opening, which starts on such a note of serenity that I feel however irritated I might become by my own company on the desert island, I think it would restore me for a while anyway.
people who had been so ill and so disturbed that they really had broken off diplomatic relations with the world and never spoke to anyone at all, many of these people had become well enough to want to speak to others and to take part in other gatherings that were more social in nature.
Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 68 (last movement)
Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Otto Klemperer
the wonderful part where the French horn, followed by the flute, come in, singing this heavenly, noble, majestic tune, which would also, I feel, reconcile one to one's lot on a desert island.
it's all about extremely civilised people pretending to be uncivilised shepherds and shepherdesses. My main reason for choosing it is because it has a very happy personal association and I feel that I should allow myself at least one bit of music that would remind me of the happier days of my life.
Sonata for Solo Violin, Sz. 117 (Chaconne, opening)
this sonata is a very long piece… we would play perhaps only just the opening of the chacona, which is as noble, I think, an opening as Bach's chacon opening for the violin.
In conversation
Presenter asks
1:15How do you react to the thought of being marooned on a desert island?
I don't like it at all. I much prefer people to almost anything else that one can have on earth, and the most horrifying prospect is not that I might run out of music on this desert island, but that there aren't going to be any people with whom to enjoy it.
Presenter asks
1:32Do you play the gramophone a lot?
No, I never play the gramophone at all, if I can help it. Unless I'm listening to new records, but I don't like playing records over that I've already heard, because they irritate me, and I like a live performance so much better than a canned or a pickled performance, however perfect.
Presenter asks
6:00It's practically unique for a family to have three children with such great musical talent—you, Yehudi, and Yaltah. Do you think it can be accounted for by heredity?
No, I don't think it should be accounted for by heredity. Um my brother is one of these creatures that springs up once or a few times in a lifetime. But I think the rest of us are just the kind of people who, subjected to the same sort of influences, would have probably produced the same sort of um a fluency in the making of music.
The keepsakes
The book
Not recorded.
The luxury
A Chinese alphabet and grammar book, along with Chinese language records
I'm so frightened that a mind without food for thought might eventually disintegrate altogether or rust, and then wouldn't be worth meeting up with other people again. So I think perhaps I should take away a Chinese alphabet and try and learn it, a Chinese um grammar, a collection of of um letters.
Presenter asks
9:23How do you match temperamentally [with your brother Yehudi]? Do you think you're very different in temperament?
Well, we love each other very much, and I think we understand each other very much, with only this difference, that he's very, very much nicer than I am. He's rather a pure kind of person.
Presenter asks
16:47How practical a person are you, and how do you think you'd be able to look after yourself on a desert island?
Well, it takes all the modern conveniences of the modern kitchen to enable me to get along in the very heart of civilization, and I think that in a desert island I should be absolutely sunk.
“I don't like it at all. I much prefer people to almost anything else that one can have on earth, and the most horrifying prospect is not that I might run out of music on this desert island, but that there aren't going to be any people with whom to enjoy it.”
“No, I never play the gramophone at all, if I can help it. Unless I'm listening to new records, but I don't like playing records over that I've already heard, because they irritate me, and I like a live performance so much better than a canned or a pickled performance, however perfect.”
“No, I don't think it should be accounted for by heredity. Um my brother is one of these creatures that springs up once or a few times in a lifetime. But I think the rest of us are just the kind of people who, subjected to the same sort of influences, would have probably produced the same sort of um a fluency in the making of music.”
“Well, we love each other very much, and I think we understand each other very much, with only this difference, that he's very, very much nicer than I am. He's rather a pure kind of person.”
“It isn't so much a matter of playing to people in hospitals as a matter of encouraging them to make their own music because the healing properties of music I think reside not so much in the entertainment qualities of music as in the fact of having a common language wherein one can express oneself without the inhibiting qualities that make people sometimes worry about what words they're going to choose and what things they're going to talk about to one another.”