Yesterday at the Hawaii Symphony Orchestra’s “Tschaikovsky Spectacular” concert, it was revealed at the pre-concert conversation that both the piano soloist, Olga Kern, and the conductor, Carlos Miguel Prieto, came from musical families. Both of them, however, said that they both dealt with the problems that all parents, musical or otherwise, face: That kids think that Mom and Dad know NOTHING, even when your parents are professional musicians. 

You may remember my telling you about the situation that my late husband, Carl Crosier, and I had with our son. We didn’t want to “force” music lessons on him and waited until he indicated to us he wanted to learn. It was not until he was 7 that he asked us for piano lessons, and we found him a wonderful teacher. However whenever we tried to help him practice, we would have these screaming sessions, his bedroom door slammed, and cries of “Mom and Dad, you guys don’t know ANYTHING!” Later, when he went to middle and high school, he voluntarily signed up for band and took up the oboe, an instrument neither of us played, so we didn’t try to help him. Amazingly, he played the oboe in band (percussion during marching band season) and orchestra until his senior year of high school.

In the case of Olga Kern, she said that her 19-year-old son “knew all the answers,” even when the two of them play piano duets together. I found out her son’s name was Vladislav Kern, and that they played Mozart’s “Double Piano Concerto” in May 2016 in Milan. They performed the same work  together on June 1st of this year in San Antonio, TX.

Olga was born into a family of musicians (both her parents were pianists) with direct links to Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rachmaninov. She began studying piano at age five and won the historic Gold Medal at the Van Cliburn piano competition, the first woman to do so in more than 30 years.

She was absolutely stunning in her Hawaii Symphony concert yesterday, and wore a purple sequined dress and stiletto high heels! Her virtuosity and driving sense of rhythm propelled us all on an exciting roller coaster ride.

Maestro Prieto grew up in Mexico City and said that his family were all chamber musicians—four generations! It was his grandmother, however, who was tasked with getting him to practice every day—he had the same issues with his parents! Maybe skipping a generation is the way to deal with this problem!

And just think, in the Bach family, music was the family business, with over 50 prominent musicians named Bach (all related) in 200 years!

Wonder if getting anybody to practice in that family was ever an issue?!

P.S. It is always a bit unnerving when a complete stranger calls out your name! Yesterday at the Symphony concert, someone I never saw before asked me a question about the program, and knew my name. Wonder if he reads the blog?