Moscow Nights

by Nigel Cliff

  12: “HE PLAYED THE PIANO AND THE WORLD WAS HIS”

  197“He Played the Piano and the World Was His”: New York Post, May 16, 1958.

  197missed his connection to New York: Ibid. Van had been due to connect with SAS Flight 921 from Copenhagen, arriving New York 5:55, May 16. See Davis to secretary of state, telegram, May 13, 1958, Box 2182, RG 59, NACP.

  197telephone interview: TASS, “Van Cliburn in New York,” SK, May 17, 1958.

  198“Oh . . . you’re the one: VC, 148.

  199photographers came running: Video Recording 200-UN-31–40, “Universal Newsreel” 31, no. 40, May 19, 1958; MCA/Universal Pictures Collection, 1929–1967; NACP.

  199shouting questions: For the press conference, see Milton Bracker, “Jubilant Cliburn Arrives Here After Piano Triumph in Soviet,” NYT, May 17, 1958; “Hero’s Return,” Time; Robert E. Baskin, “Interlude at Idlewild: A Happy Cliburn Returns as Concert, Parade Await,” DMN, May 17, 1958.

  200twenty-five hundred items: Daily Courier (Connellsville, PA), June 24, 1958.

  200“gold and white satin evening bag”: VCL, 123.

  200Elizabeth Winston: Ibid., 148.

  200Life photographer: Van’s second Life spread ran in the June 2, 1958, issue.

  201“He hasn’t had one bite to eat”: Bracker, “Jubilant Cliburn Arrives Here.”

  201back at Idlewild: Milton Bracker, “Cliburn Greets Soviet Conductor,” NYT, May 18, 1958.

  201“SOLD OUT”: “Hero’s Return.”

  202“Are you Harvey Kilgore”: “Kilgore Friend of Van’s Shares New York Reception,” KNH, May 25, 1958, quoted in VC, 152.

  202Abram Chasins . . . dropped by: Chasins describes the scene in VCL, 140–41.

  202notorious kleptomaniac: John Giordano, interview with the author, August 16, 2014.

  202Liberty Music Store: Betty Milburn, “Fall Fabrics Drape Loosely over ‘Suggested’ Figures,” Tucson Daily Citizen, July 18, 1958.

  202Time sign: VCL, 142.

  203manner of dress: Martin Bookspan described the scene in an interview with Peter Rosen: Reel 37, Van Cliburn—Concert Pianist elements, VCA.

  2032,760 seats: “Hero’s Return.” Before Van played, Kirill Kondrashin conducted the Symphony of the Air in Prokofiev’s Symphony no. 1 in D Major.

  203Smiling Mike: See “Pair of Soviet Charmers on U.S. Scene,” Life, March 31, 1958, 46–53.

  203fastened it with a rubber band: Gilbert Millstein, “Great Moments at Carnegie Hall,” NYT Magazine, May 22, 1960.

  203old Benny: Bernard Mulryan was the artists’ attendant for over thirty years, both at Carnegie Hall and Lewisohn Stadium.

  204“She really is bursting”: Milton Bracker, “Cliburn Cheered in Packed House,” NYT, May 20, 1958.

  204“I’m so happy to be home again”: “Biggest in Carnegie Hall History: Cliburn Wows ’Em at Home; Given Thunderous Ovation,” KNH, May 20, 1958.

  204“What do you play”: VCL, 144.

  204“Van Cliburn at Home”: Ogonyok 24 (1958), 29.

  204“Jeepers . . . mudder-in-law”: VCL, 145.

  204“We can all breathe easily now”: Louis Biancolli, World-Telegram, May 20, 1958. He added that Van had “exceeded all expectations.” In the NYT, Ross Parmenter more soberly declared that Van had “lived up to expectations.”

  205“Over and over again”: Howard Taubman, “A Winner on His Merits,” NYT, April 20, 1958.

  205letter to Time: From Henri Temianka of Los Angeles; published June 2, 1958.

  206powerhouse of the world: The theme is developed in Amy Chua and Jed Rubenfeld, The Triple Package: How Three Unlikely Traits Explain the Rise and Fall of Cultural Groups in America (New York: Penguin Press, 2014).

  206Van Cliburn Day: Detailed arrangements for the parade were recorded in minutes of meetings of the Department of Commerce and Public Events held on May 5 and 13, 1958, headed “Van Cliburn—Planning Meeting,” Folder 16, Box 2, JAP. The parade was slated for May 14 but was moved back because of Van’s Soviet commitments.

  206with Harvey and Rildia Bee: Rildia Bee to Bill Schuman, Hotel Pierre, June 6, 1958, Box 2, Folder 16, JAP.

  207“He’s cuter than Tony Perkins”: “Hero’s Return.”

  207“You showed them Russians”: VCL, 131.

  207“How does it feel”: Milton Bracker, “Van Cliburn Gets a Hero’s Parade,” NYT, May 21, 1958.

  207his mind still a blank: VCG.

  208“It was a wonderful thing”: AP, Times Record (Troy, NY), May 21, 1958.

  208halibut flakes “Antoine”: Philip Hamburger, “Tribute,” The New Yorker, May 31, 1958.

  208“this young, this very old diplomat”: VCL, 136.

  208Reported The New Yorker: Hamburger, “Tribute.”

  209“He’s the Eggheads’ Elvis Presley”: VC, 159.

  209“Horowitz, Liberace and Presley”: “All-American Virtuoso.”

  209“It’s a dream”: VCL, 132.

  210undignified for a musician: Leopold Mannes of the Mannes College of Music, in “3 Bands to March in Cliburn Parade,” NYT, May 15, 1958.

  210“PARADE FOR PIANIST LAGS”: New York Herald Tribune, May 14, 1958.

  210“I could have gone to Moscow”: Norman Shetler, interview with the author.

  210“green-eyed poem”: VCL, 172.

  210“arranged” Van’s victory: Ibid., 200.

  210report marked TOP SECRET: “Van Cliburn,” FBI summary, February 19, 1968 (FOIA). The information first appears in a report of December 21, 1963, but was presumably received shortly after the competition.

  210“Van Cliburn is here”: VCL, 149.

  210“God bless you, son”: Ibid.

  211first private Soviet citizen to meet the American president: Gregor Tassie, Kirill Kondrashin: His Life in Music (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow, 2009), 158. Through his State Department interpreter, Alexander Akalovsky, Kondrashin also passed on the Soviet people’s compliments on the birth of a great American musician.

  211“that kind of ordeal over there”: Felix Belair Jr., “Eisenhower Greets Van Cliburn; Flies in Helicopter to Gettysburg,” NYT, May 24, 1958.

  211twelve minutes: From 11:05 to 11:17. See Eisenhower’s Presidential Appointment Book for Friday, May 23, 1958, http://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/research/online_documents/presidential_appointment_books/1958/May_1958.pdf. The Afghan ambassador also got twelve minutes.

  211“Yes, I think so”: Sound Recording 306-EN-G-T-5781, “Van Cliburn Washington Press Conference,” May 23, 1958, RG 306, NACP.

  212“play it very cautiously”: A. H. Belmont to L. V. Boardman, memorandum, “Van Clibern [sic] Internal Security,” May 9, 1958, FBI (FOIA).

  212“number two papa”: Winzola McLendon, “Van Toasted in Vodka and Champagne,” WP, May 25, 1958.

  213“entire employment record”: Wiley T. Buchanan Jr., “Presentation of Credentials to President Eisenhower by the Soviet Ambassador,” Washington, DC, February 11, 1958, reprinted as document 37 in FRUS X:1, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1958–60v10p1/d37.

  213another lengthy meeting: John Foster Dulles, “Memorandum of Conversation,” Washington, DC, March 3, 1958, reprinted as document 38 in FRUS X:1, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1958–60v10p1/d38.

  213“According to Coyne”: A. H. Belmont to L. V. Boardman, memorandum, “Van Cliburn, Kirill Kondrashin—Internal Security,” May 26, 1958, FBI (FOIA).

  13: “HE’S BETTER THAN ELVIS BY FAR!”

  214“You’ve got to let this poor boy have some sleep”: VCL, 153.

  214“What is that you’re holding”: VC, 161–62.

  215three thousand dollars: VCL, 146.

  215“back to my apartment”: Abram Chasins, “Will Success Spoil Van Cliburn?” NYT, June 22, 1958. Chasins also recounts the following day’s activities.

  215“A great event”: “Van Cliburn’s 1958 Broadcast Debut from Carnegie Hall (May 26, 1958),” audio recording, WQXR, http://www.wqxr.org/#!/story/272469-piano-legend-van-cliburn-dies-78/.
Included is Abram Chasins’s intermission interview with Van.

  215“I do hope you will forgive me”: Ibid.

  215“Y’all go along”: Chasins recounts the events of the early morning in VCL, 154–55.

  216Person to Person: The live show was broadcast on Friday, May 30, 1958.

  216planted the sapling: “Cliburn in Salute to Rachmaninoff,” NYT, June 1, 1958.

  217“MILLION-DOLLAR CONTRACT”: Rogers, “Midnight Conversation.”

  217What’s My Line?: Episode 416, May 25, 1958.

  217Russian bear: VCL, 155; “Soviet Conductor Leaves,” NYT, June 2, 1958.

  217“I wish you the greatest success”: “London Audience of 7,000 Hails Cliburn in Concert Conducted by Kondrashin” (AP), NYT, June 16, 19 58.

  218saturating the fair: MMP, April 16, 1958, Folder 5, Box 2, WSP.

  218with the Philadelphia Orchestra: Walter H. Waggoner, “U.S. Hopes to Sign Cliburn for Fair,” NYT, April 23, 1958; Howard Taubman, “Cliburn at Fair,” NYT, July 6, 1958.

  218“I listened to Cliburn”: Arthur Friedheim, Life and Liszt: The Recollections of a Concert Pianist, ed. Theodore L. Bullock (New York: Taplinger, 1961), 24. Bullock was the open-eyed listener; Rildia Bee, he concluded, had clearly been Friedheim’s most receptive pupil and had become the greatest teacher of them all.

  218Paris: “Cliburn a ‘Virtuoso’ to Paris,” NYT, June 28, 1958.

  218arrived in the Windy City: VCL, 160; VC, 170.

  218eighteen thousand, for Carmen: Ross Parmenter, “The World of Music,” NYT, June 22, 1958; John Briggs, “The World of Music,” NYT, August 31, 1958.

  219predicted he would become a big star: Arlene Dahl interviewed by Peter Rosen, Reel 15, Van Cliburn—Concert Pianist elements, VCA.

  219audience of 22,500: Ross Parmenter, “22,500 Hear Cliburn at Stadium,” NYT, August 5, 1958. The concert was on August 4.

  219nearly ended in tragedy: SAC, New York to Director, FBI, memorandum, August 6, 1958, “Van Cliburn Information Concerning,” FBI file 105–70035–6; John Edgar Hoover to E. Tomlin Bailey, director, Office of Security, Department of State, memorandum, August 15, 1958, “Van Cliburn Information Concerning,” FBI (FOIA). The target of Cliburn Sr.’s ire is redacted but may be inferred from the context.

  220“Ku Klux Klan member”: The conjecture is refuted by strong testimony that the Cliburns were free of color prejudice.

  220Sergei Dorensky: Interview with Lyuba Vinogradova.

  220Van Cliburn’s school: Olmstead, Juilliard, 167; “2d Day in City Busy for Soviet Visitors,” NYT, July 9, 1958.

  220“I felt very sorry”: Sound Recording 306-EN-G-T-7952A-B, “Van Cliburn Press Conference Held at Steinway Hall,” [September 25, 1958], RG 306, NACP. See also “Khrushchev Says Music Aids Amity” (AP), NYT, May 31, 1958. The visitor was Robert Dowling, chairman of the American National Theater and Academy, which organized the expert panels for the arts exchange program.

  220still hoping: “Soviet Extends Bid to Pianist Cliburn,” NYT, August 2, 1958; “Russians Again Say Cliburn Accepted,” NYT, August 3, 1958.

  221“not up to them”: “Cliburn to Join Russian Concert,” NYT, August 10, 1958.

  221“A young American”: Howard Taubman, “Musical ‘Summit’ in Belgian Accord,” NYT, August 18, 1958.

  222scanning the jukebox: Gus Schuettler, “Piano Prodigy Van Cliburn Arrives in Heidelberg,” Stars and Stripes, August 1958.

  222spring 1959: “Cliburn to Tour Soviet in ’59” (AP), NYT, November 6, 1958.

  223one he called that September: Sound Recording 306-EN-G-T-7952A-B, “Van Cliburn Press Conference Held at Steinway Hall,” [September 25, 1958]; RG 306, NACP. Van donated the full $1,250 he had been able to take out of the USSR.

  223Metropolitan Opera: Ross Parmenter, “‘Met’ Sets a Record as Its 74th Season Opens,” NYT, October 28, 1958.

  223New Yorker . . . dying of cancer: Patricia Dane Rogers, “Van Cliburn’s Piano Provided a Glorious Coda to a Dying Father’s Life in the 1950s,” WP, February 28, 2013.

  223old “friends”: VCL, 173.

  224“At Victor these days”: “Cliburn Album Sells Like Hot Single,” Billboard, August 18, 1958.

  224“bottom of our hearts”: VCL, 161. The concert was on September 29, 1958.

  224“To watch Elvis”: John W. Stevens, “Cliburn Sets Off a Teen-Age Jam,” NYT, October 27, 1958.

  224Boston: “Boston to Hear Cliburn Twice” (UPI), NYT, September 23, 1958.

  225November morning: “Cliburn Hailed in Texas” (AP), NYT, November 24, 1958.

  225Texas’s proudest brag: VCL, 151, 180.

  225first for an honoree younger than ninety: The earlier living honoree was John Nance Garner, who was feted on his ninetieth birthday.

  225“PROUD HOME OF VAN CLIBURN”: “Van Cliburn Comes Home,” The Rotarian, June 1959, 47.

  225“He’s better than Elvis by far”: “Noisy Ovation at Matinee: Youngsters Go Wild over Van, Forget ‘Rock,’” KNH, December 3, 1958.

  225play in India: Mary Meador, “Van Cliburn Paid Honor at Shreveport,” KNH, December 17, 1958.

  226“rushed up”: VCL, 173–74.

  226an admirer: Winthrop Sargent in The New Yorker, October 25, 1958.

  226“flesh and blood juke box”: VCL, 212, quoting Paul Henry Lang in New York Herald Tribune, October 18, 1958.

  226service professional: James M. Keller, “Van Cliburn at Bat,” Piano and Keyboard, September/October 1993; Stuart Isacoff, “Then &Now,” Piano Today, Summer 2001; “Deep in the Art of Texas,” video recording; Van Cliburn for the Worthington Hotel, dir. Rick Croft and William Betaille, 1992, youtube.com/watch?v=RzezkMdy1gY.

  227“Tucson minister friend”: “What’s with Cliburn’s Teeth?” Tucson Daily Citizen, January 7, 1959.

  227dining at the Cliff House: Elaine Raines, “Happy Birthday, Van Cliburn,” Arizona Daily Star, July 11, 2008.

  227“arrested at Phoenix”: “Van Cliburn,” FBI summary, December 21, 1963 (FOIA).

  227North Indian House Road: “Acclaimed Pianist Van Cliburn Had a House in Tucson,” Arizona Daily Star, February 27, 2013.

  228drowned in the backyard pool: “Mrs. Newton White,” Tucson Daily Citizen, December 23, 1959; Lawrence (KS) Journal-World, February 6, 1960.

  228rented it out: Mary Campbell, “Not This Time,” Tucson Daily Citizen, September 5, 1964.

  228Newton White died: S. C. Warman, “Rev. Newton H. White Dies; Organized 2 Churches Here,” Tucson Daily Citizen, June 4, 1963.

  228handsome donation: Van donated twelve hundred dollars, to be used to defray a student’s fees. Peter Mennin to Van Cliburn, October 18, 1963, Folder 10, Box 22, JAP.

  14: IN THE HEAT OF THE KITCHEN

  229“Learn from Liu Shikun”: Liu Shikun, interview with the author.

  229Khrushchev arrived for a summit: The events are entertainingly recounted in Mike Dash, “Khrushchev in Water Wings: On Mao, Humiliation, and the Sino-Soviet Split,” May 4, 2012, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/khrushchev-in-water-wings-on-mao-humiliation-and-the-sino-soviet-split-80852370/?no-ist.

  229“making him the historical pivot”: Frank Dikötter, Mao’s Great Famine (London: Bloomsbury, 2011), 4.

  230yet to deliver: Khrushchev annulled the nuclear pact with China in June 1959.

  230“transcontinental missile”: Vladislav Zubok, “The Mao-Khrushchev Conversations, 31 July–3 August 1958 and 2 October 1959,” CWIHP Bulletin 12/13 (Fall/Winter 2001): 256; https://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/CWIHPBulletin12–13_p2_0.pdf.

  231“pleasant period of thaw”: “Moscow’s New Campaign,” NYT, June 26, 1958.

  231“blatant errors . . . gifted composers”: “On Rectifying Errors in the Evaluation of the Operas ‘The Great Friendship,’ ‘Bogdan Khmelnitzky,’ and ‘From All One’s Heart,’” Central Committee decree, Pravda, June 8, 1958. See Schwarz, Music and Musical Life, 263–66.

  231printed with CIA funds: After years of rumors, the CIA’s involvement
was confirmed when it declassified the relevant documents in 2014. See http://www.foia.cia.gov/collection/doctor-zhivago.

  231called off: B. Makarov, “Report from the All-Union ‘International Book’ Association to D. A. Polikarpov on the Advisability of Stopping Attempts Aimed at Preventing the Publication of B. L. Pasternak’s Novel ‘Doctor Zhivago’ in France,” February 5, 1958, CCCP&C, 24–25.

  231“low-grade reactionary hackwork”: David Zaslavsky, “Reactionary Propaganda Uproar over a Literary Weed,” Pravda, October 26, 1958.

  231Begging Khrushchev: Ivinskaya, Captive of Time, 240–41.

  232“mangy sheep”: Solomon Volkov, The Magical Chorus: A History of Russian Culture from Tolstoy to Solzhenitsyn (New York: Knopf, 2008), 196.

  232Vladimir Ashkenazy: Interview with the author.

  232assistant professor: Alexander Egorov, assistant to venerable professor Konstantin Igumnov.

  232more gay piano teachers: Also implicated were piano professor Vladimir Belov and Ashkenazy’s teacher Boris Zemylansky, who, like Naum Shtarkman, was an assistant to Lev Oborin.

  233refused to play in Moscow: Heinrich Neuhaus told Paul Moor the story: “Slava, the Russian,” Piano and Keyboard 189 (November/December 1997). Moor ascribed Richter’s cyclical depression, which kept him away from the piano for long stretches, to the impossibility of living a fulfilled personal life under Soviet law. See also Moor, “Sviatoslav Becomes Svyetchik,” High Fidelity 12, no. 10 (October 1962); Moor, “Sviatoslav Richter: A Troubled Life,” American Record Guide 60, no. 6 (November/December 1997).

  233“knew that Van Cliburn was a homosexual”: “Van Cliburn,” FBI summary, February 19, 1968. The position of the individual concerned is redacted but may be inferred from the context. The date of the original report is unavailable.

  233anniversary of the revolution speech: Max Frankel, “Consumer Wooed at Moscow Fete,” NYT, November 7, 1958.

  233“holiday”: Stanford Daily, January 5, 1959.

  233recent ultimatum: In a speech of November 10, 1958.

  233insisted Van be invited: Aschen Mikoyan, interview with the author, August 9, 2014.

  234Beaux-Arts mansion: The embassy then occupied the current Russian ambassador’s residence, the Mrs. George Pullman House at 1125 Sixteenth Street, Northwest.