I worked like a dog in Providence on Wednesday and drove down to meet Carol and Steve and Shelly Brown,

Carol's colleague and publisher at JTS and his wife, who are staying with us for a couple of days, at Marble House for a sunset concert of Chopin by Agustin Anievas. He was Malkovich's fellow student at Julliard and is pushing 70. Wearing a black shirt buttoned at the collar with black pants and gray hair, he played the Fourteen Waltzes. What can I say? We were rooting for him in his comeback. For lyrical and sensitive playing with a high level of musicality, he was 10 out of 10. But when power and dexterity were called for together, he just couldn't cut it, and things got mushy, with too many wrong notes. For the record, he did the "Minute Waltz" in 60 seconds flat, with the reprise and coda, 1 minute, 35 seconds. After the break, the Twelve Etudes of Book II were much better, although he still couldn't muster the power for the "Revolutionary Etude."  The setting was perfect, the light though the windows changing from yellow to gold and then fading into darkness, the birds in the trees singing their last songs of the day, paying tribute to an aging pianist giving it his all, the oongepatchket gilted wretched excess of the Marble House interior, done by some flamboyant decorator gone mad. Anievas got a standing O.

     We returned to the condo, where Carol had prepared a dinner of cold roasted chicken, cold sesame noodles with chili sauce, salad with mandarine oranges and candied pecans, and for dessert good coffee and a wonderful nectarine-blueberry tart with peach melba Tofutti. The champagne was a Pacific Echo Brut.

     Tuesday morning, I biked to the Inn at Castle Hill, where a huge white tent was set up by the water. Carol and the Browns drove around Ocean Drive and we all met for Festa Italiana. It began with Tom Hrynkiw and Mirian Conti playing the overture to "La Gazza Ladra" by Rossini for 4 hands. Then Celeste Taverna, whom we heard 10 days before butchering Strauss, showed that she can destroy Italian arias, as well. I suddenly realized who she was--she is the girl who beat out Meadow Soprano for the honor of singing at their high school graduation. Then Jiri Barta, the gypsy cellist, played a Rossini piece. Then an exquisite Rossini Sinfonia for a wind quintet. Celeste Tavera returned to make us suffer through 4 Bellini songs--problems with pitch, intonation, diction...what's left?

     After intermission, things warmed up. Scott Hendricks, the hot new baritone from the New York City Opera sang several Tosti songs in Italian and English. I didn't know that Tosti was Sir Francesco Paolo Tosti, singing tutor to the royal family of England. Hendricks is tall, young, handsome, with a flawless baritone voice, clear, perfect intonation and diction...what else is there? In ten years, when his voice darkens, he may be legendary. To close the concert Mirian Conti played a series of pieces by Alfredo Casella, who at one time was conductor of the Boston Pops, pieces done in the style of Wagner, then Fauré, Brahms, Debussy, Richard Strauss, and Franck. It was uncanny, humorous, and brilliant. Especially the Strauss, a piece called Symphonia Molestica (pun on Domestica), a discordant bombastic piece of foppery. The pianist herself played superbly, without the flamboyance of a showoff. It wouldn't hurt to jump around a little bit, Mirian.

     We returned to the condo for lunch--cold sesame noodles, quiche, quesadillas with pesto and sundried tomato, avocado, goat cheese, grape tomatoes, all served with a lovely Mirassou Chardonnay that the Browns brought.

     At 5:30 PM, we went to Marble House for a continuation of the Saint-Saensiad. Celeste Tavera and Scott Hendricks sang songs. Finally, some singing came out of her mouth. Perhaps it was the French embouchure which helped her to focus her tone and maintain pitch. He was absolutely grand. Then Piers Lane, dressed in a foppish collarless dark suit with silver buckles in the front, with a grand pompadour of curly blond hair, played a feverish and fiendish set of Etudes in breathtaking fashion. He is a real showman, and he pulled out all the stops in a Lisztian frenzy. Standing O. After intermission, a transcription of the love duet and pagan worship of Dagon from Samson et Delilah set for  two pianos (Piers Lane and Alain Jacquon), cello (Julie Albers--who looks like Tom Cruise), and Tedi Papavrami, an Albanian violinist who studied at the Paris Conservatoire and has won several medals.  Excellent. And to close, Tedi Papavrami played the well-known Violin Concerto No. 3 to the orchestral transcription of Alain Jacquon. Papavrami is a tall thin knight of the woeful countenance, with sorrowful eyes that look like he has known suffering. John Belushi he is not. He is only 29, and he gave one of the greatest violin performances I've ever heard. A rich full tone, a maturity of expression beyond his years. All I can say is, "Watch out Itzhak...here comes Father Abraham!" In a few years, he will be one of the world's greatest violinists. He already is--it's just that no one knows about him.

     After the concert, the Browns took us to dinner at the White House Tavern, the oldest tavern in America, right near the oldest synagogue in America. Dinner at the White Horse costs as much as annual dues at Touro. And it was worth it (easy for me to say). We had superb ahi tuna, mushroom ragout, splendid Caesar salad, rack of lamb, and a Kendall-Jackson Chardonnay.

     What a lovely two days!

Addendum: 8/17/02: I received a letter from the firm of Parker · Stanbury LLP, Attorneys At Law in Los Angeles. The letter was addressed to Oi! I'm All Farklempt! Consulted by Celeste Tavera, the attorney informed me of the obligations imposed by "California Civil Code Sections 44-46 which prohibits false and unprivileged publications which expose 'any person to hatred, contempt, ridicule, or obloquy, or which causes him to be shunned or avoided, or which has a tendency to injure him [her] in his [her] occupation.'" The attorney referred to my criticism of Ms. Taverna's singing, above. In response, Farklempt humbly begs the humble pardon of the attorney and Ms. Tavera. Of course, ignorance of the law is no excuse, as we all know, but Farklempt was completely unaware that it was against the law in California to offer adverse criticism about bad singing. So, for those readers of The Farklempt Page in California, Farklempt wishes to retract his statements above, and to say that Ms. Tavera sang Italian arias like Renata Tebaldi reborn. The sentence about Meadow Soprano's competitor was just a topical joke, which Farklempt hopes that no one takes literally. Ms. Tavera is really not that person. For the rest of the country and world, my initial opinion still stands, including the positive statements about her French singing. As to calling The Farklempt Page a "false" publication, Farklempt, unlike some singers and their attorneys who shall remain nameless, accepts adverse criticism with grace and a good nature. As to "obloquy," Farklempt does not even know what that word means.