Go Out, Keep Playing

Let’s get one thing out of the way: I’m a fan. In the last 30 years I’ve heard him play many times, many more than any other pianist or conductor: Bach, Liszt, Mahler, Schoenberg. My main motivation was curiosity. You could call it professional curiosity. But you could also call it professional bias. Why do music critics fall asleep so often in concerts? Because they hate boredom. When Daniel Barenboim performs, something is always happening, there’s always movement and life. He thinks quickly—often too quickly—three steps ahead. He has easily enough creative energy for two Barenboims. He’s always good for a surprise, whether nasty or nice. I’ve written many, many reviews of Barenboim concerts, in moods of despair and electrification. I’ve done innumerable interviews with him: brief chats on the fly, hour-long conversations cloaked in cigar smoke. More than once he’s greeted me, with mild derision: “Oh, it’s you again!”