Music: Prime Pianist

Seven years ago a sleek, pale-faced young Russian Jew rushed up the back steps of Manhattan’s Carnegie Hall, tore off his coat and hat, took a photograph of Liszt from his pocket, glanced at it prayerfully, then fairly galloped out on the stage for his U. S. debut. For critics it was a double-barreled evening because Sir Thomas Beecham, famed son of a famed pillman, was also making his U. S. debut. Sir Thomas was as athletic a conductor as New Yorkers had ever seen. But young Vladimir Horowitz, with all his stage fright, was a match for the lusty Briton. Horowitz played the Tchaikovsky Concerto with his hands racing all over the keyboard, tossing off trills and smashing out chords as if he were a Rubinstein. Horowitz was 24 then and an instant sensation. But sane critics were chary with their praise for playing that had more flash than meaning to it.

This month, as he completes his eighth U. S. tour, even the most cautious critics are agreed that Vladimir Horowitz is, as Paderewski lately said, the greatest of the younger pianists. For the sleek young Russian has survived his superficial successes and grown to think more of music and less of showing off his amazing technique. He proved his maturity to New Yorkers last month when he played with Arturo Toscanini and gave real contemplation to Brahms’s First Concerto. He proved himself again in Chicago last week where audiences cheered him wildly. For the Chicago concerts motherly Signora Toscanini broke precedent and left the Maestro working in Manhattan to hear her new son-in-law play in the Midwest.

In Russia old Simeon Horowitz reads eagerly of his son’s development. Wistfully he reviews the old days when his job as an electrical engineer kept the family comfortable, enabled him to take the stand that no son of his should ever be exploited as a prodigy. Vladimir’s schooling was to last until he was 24—until the Revolution interfered. The family lost its home, its money, even the piano from which the young musician could rarely be pried. An uncle who was a music critic arranged for his first public appearance in 1922. Year after, Vladimir played 70 concerts in Russia, 23 in Leningrad alone where he was paid in flour & butter as often as in rubles.

In 1924 Horowitz stormed Berlin, then made a tour of Europe. After his debut in Manhattan in 1928, U. S. reporters tried hard to dramatize him but the pianist who could sparkle so on the concert platform proved to be an excessively shy person offstage. Money in his pocket led him to many a naive taste but none worth headlines. He took to wearing pink and red shirts, fussed about his tailoring. In London he bought a Rolls-Royce, which still impresses him greatly. Until lately he has taken little pains with his English.

Marriage into Toscanini’s family seems to have helped Horowitz to a more profound approach to music. But the way was hard. When he first met the great conductor he was so awed that he hunched in a corner all evening and was scolded by his friends for sulking. He married the Maestro’s daughter Wanda in 1933. Next year Pianist Horowitz will remain in Europe for a tour that is already solidly booked.