Philip Sabransky Interview with Bruce Duffie . . . . . . . . .

Pianist Philip Sabransky

A Conversation with Bruce Duffie

See my interview with Menahem Pressler

In mid-November of 1994, I had the pleasure of spending a few minutes with Philip Sabransky. Our discussion centered on his recent recording which was made on the Horowitz piano, as well as other aspects of his career.

Bruce Duffie:   You mentioned that a pianist today has to have a wide range of repertoire. Is it more now than twenty, thirty, fifty or a hundred years ago?

Philip Sabransky:   I am thinking about that a lot now, and it’s created a transitional and creative period for me. I’ve been told by several musicians at various levels in the business, very different and conflicting things about what is important to do in music and in your repertoire. I can remember having a conversation with Alfred Brendel at Orchestra Hall, and he asked me what my specialty was, and if I had one. I thought about getting one, and he suggested Mendelssohn, which was not a bad suggestion.

BD:   He implied that you have to have a specialty?

Sabransky: Right, and I’ve had several conversations with other successful and outstanding musicians who feel this way. Many artists do specialize these days. Mitsuko Uchida specializes in Mozart, and it’s worked very well for her. But one is risking quite a lot by specializing in one composer, especially if it’s not the one that works for you.

BD:   Is it not good to specialize in the instrument and its literature, rather than in a composer and his ideas?

Sabransky: Absolutely! That’s what I’m thinking about, and the literature of the piano is tremendous. It is all-encompassing, not only just in the area of what we think of as classical music today — the Renaissance, the Baroque through the twentieth century — but also in its ability to be useful in jazz, and pop, and rock, and all the different kinds of statements of cultures that have come together in this country. They are all being performed, and all are very important to different listeners. So, what I’m thinking about, and what I have been doing, is a concept which I call ‘designer programming’. My first CD is based on that. It’s based on the salon style of performance, and it’s an overview of the romantic repertoire, but it has a specific listener in mind, as opposed to just simply a style of music, or a single composer.

BD:   Is this a record that you put on and listen to while you’re eating dinner, or is it something you put on and listen to while you’re concentrating on it?

Sabransky: I would like to think that you can do both, and that’s exactly what I have in mind. It’s music which can be listened to in many different frames of mind. All music can be listened to like that, and if it’s a good enough performance, which hopefully this is, you have that ability to listen to it in any situation.

BD:   Even to minds that are going at lightning speed?

Sabransky: Even in that case it could be applicable. But the idea that I’m trying to have is about this communication with my audience. This is more than just presenting a program which I have thought about, and that I like and want to play. It is music that I think is interesting. This is something that orchestras and musicians are grappling with today. Perhaps we need to be niche players, and we need to address specific listeners and specific audiences, but the most successful players will be the ones that can do this over a wider range of audiences. For instance, when you have a major symphony orchestra, like the Chicago Symphony, they are so wonderful and so capable that they can play anything from movie scores to very serious classical works, modern works, and even pops concerts. Their version of The Stars and Stripes Forever brings you to your feet because their musicianship is so incredible.

BD:   It’s their virtuosity.

Sabransky: Exactly.

BD:   What is your virtuosity?

Sabransky: What I am trying to bring about is a combination of the various influences that I have experienced in my life, which range from American pop to Euro-centric very serious classical music. When I say that I’m thinking about ‘designer programming’, I’ve been playing some programs in smaller settings in which I have a central host who has friends, colleagues, and people either in the business world that they have been working with, or something more intimate with family, where I have a sense of who I’m playing for, and what they like, and the atmosphere of the evening. I bring these things together, and I will program specifically for this audience. It’s been very effective.

BD:   Just as the caterer will prepare food for a certain gathering?

Sabransky: I hate to think of it in that way, but in a sense that’s what it is. It’s just as a person who plans an evening or an event, and thinks about what it is, who is going to be there, what the intention of the evening is, and then brings it all together.

BD:   Are you the event, or is the evening the event, or is the event the event?

Sabransky: I’d like to think of myself as the high point of the evening! [Both laugh] Whether or not I would consider myself the entire event depends on what the host has in mind when bringing together the evening, and is paying me my commission. For example, in one that I did recently, the repertoire ranged from the first few works on my CD — which are Debussy’s The Girl with the Flaxen Hair (which is the title of the disc), the Rachmaninov Prelude in G, and the Chopin Fantasie Impromptu, which seems to work well in many circumstances. Then in the middle of the program, I was playing k.d. lang and a Beatles tune in my own arrangements. It also gives me an opportunity to play some of my own music. I like to compose, and I’ve been composing since I was in my teens. I call my music ‘post-Russian romantic American pop’, trying to bring into the picture all of the various influences which are unavoidably part of my musical language.

BD:   Do you write for an occasion, or are you writing because you have to write?

Sabransky: I’m writing because I have to write. Then I choose from what I’ve written, finding something which might fit a particular occasion.

BD:   When you go to someone’s home, or a small banquet hall, you’re going to be faced with different instruments, just as you would in any concert hall. I’m making the assumption that the variability of the piano is going to be much wider than if you were giving a concert at Orchestra Hall. Are you able to cope with all of these changes, and make the instantaneous adjustments?

Sabransky: One has to. That is probably the most difficult thing a pianist has to face, and that is one of the wonderful things about my CD, which was done on the Horowitz piano. It is such a wonderful instrument, and in such finely honed shape. Everything was attended to very carefully. The piano spoiled me! The disc was recorded live, so the majority of the music on the disc is in its original live form. We sometimes would go over it once or twice, just to make sure, and I don’t want to spoil any illusions. I had a full day on the piano, first practicing on it, then playing the performance, and then having a few run-throughs afterwards. When I finished, I was spoiled. It is such a marvelous instrument.

BD:   Have you played on other instruments that come close to that one?

Sabransky: Not really, I have to say.

BD:   It’s far and away above all the others?

Sabransky: Yes, I would say that. I don’t know whether all pianists would agree, but that is the way I felt.

BD:   Is it perhaps that you had about the same strength and touch Horowitz had, so that it was comfortable for you?

Sabransky: I was very surprised. I expected to have to wrestle with this piano. I thought that there would be a stiffness or heaviness to the action because it seemed like he was so powerful. He got this breathy sound in the bass. I imagined the strength in this man’s hands and fingers, but to my surprise, it was like butter. The action was so gentle that you could just slightly depress a key and get a sound. There was a very subtle pianissimo, or even triple piano sound just by depressing the key ever so slightly. That created this wide range of sound. I began to realize this was his genius. He created this instrument, and this is partially how he created this tremendous variety of sound, and color, and tonal quality when he played it.

BD:   He had everything at his command, but the variety was in his hands and arms?

Sabransky: Yes, yes, exactly.

BD:   Do you think he would have been able to do the same kind of thing on another piano, or was it peculiar to that instrument?

Sabransky: That is what was behind his desire to have his own instrument, and to have this instrument in the kind of condition that it is in.

BD:   As a younger pianist, you have to make adjustments all the time for the different instruments you use.

Sabransky: Right, which is horrible sometimes. It’s a terrible thing that the pianist has to go through.

BD:   But once in a while, it must be a wonderful thing when you come to a fine instrument.

Sabransky: Yes, and when you play with a major orchestra, they have a music director and a staff which has gone to great lengths to find the best instruments. That is when you often have a very fine instrument to play on, but I still wish I could afford to have my own instrument to bring around with me... as well as a personal physician, a shrink, my wife, and the entire entourage that one could travel with when you’re in the league of a Horowitz! [Much laughter]

* * * * *

BD: Has the life of the wandering musician become too complicated?

Sabransky: That’s a very good question. Indeed it has become very difficult, and that is because the audiences are changing. There are fewer opportunities, especially for a soloist, and especially in a recital format. In the traditional recital format, there is a lot of truth to it being complicated, and that is why someone such as myself has to become creative, and think about what exactly a musician can do to survive, and to prosper in this environment.

BD:   [With mock horror] You mean, you actually want to prosper???

Sabransky: [Laughs]

BD:   You don’t just want to give Great Art?

Sabransky: Absolutely not! [More laughter]

BD:   You’ve already indicated this a little bit by your choice of repertoire, but where is the balance between an artistic achievement and an entertainment value?

Sabransky: I’m kind of radical on that issue. I believe that music ultimately is entertainment, although it is created as an art form with the artistic seed, and with the inspiration that is behind what someone might call Art and Great Art. What I have found hard to do in my life is define what Great Art is.

BD:   Do you know it when you hear it or see it? [Vis-à-vis the program shown at right, see my interviews with Kenneth Jean, Daniel Barenboim, and Sir Georg Solti.]

Sabransky: I know what I think Great Art is, but very often that is very different from what someone else thinks is Great Art. This is another aspect of the changing face of music, and performance, and art in the twentieth century.

BD:   But you’re in a position where you are presenting this as Great Art. Whether you think it’s all Great Art or not, you’re presenting it, so presumably you’re giving it that quality.

Sabransky: I’m not sure that I am presenting what I think is Great Art. What I strive to present is a great performance of a particular work of art, and there is a difference in my mind. Thinking of art in this way allows a personal approach from a more objective point of view. If one insists that the art a person likes is Great Art, then it loses a sense of objectivity. What happens for me as a performer is that I’m getting old enough now to have experienced the swing of the pendulum in terms of what I think is great, and what is not. What I thought twenty years ago, and what I think now, and my conception of what Great Art is, is always changing.

BD:   Is it expanding or contracting?

Sabransky: It’s expanding. What I’m finding is that the expression of human emotion can be achieved in so many different ways, and given the mental equipment that we have, and the perception that we have of these emotional conditions that we live with and are trying to express, there are infinite ways to go about realizing them in any art work. The nice thing about music, as someone else told me recently, is that what happens with music is that you are required to step into the art work on its own terms, and you can do this without the subjectivity of someone else telling you how to do it. You may decide to listen to someone else telling you how you should approach a work of art, or how you should look at it, but you don’t have to. It involves giving up of oneself, and getting involved in a kind of religious doctrine and fanaticism that it involves. Then, in order to really understand what the religion is all about, you have to accept the principles, and live by them to a certain extent. You can do this with music, and with all works of art. You can give yourself up to them, but you don’t have to accept this doctrine. You don’t have to have the same brainwashing. You can move into it on your own terms.

BD:   How far have you taken this into your own personal beliefs? I’m assuming that because you’ve said it is about worshiping at the shrine of music, this is what you have devoted your life to.

Sabransky: I would move in the other direction. What it has done is created a sense of atheism. It has created an ability to not have to cling to one set of principles, meaning the music itself, including one particular composer, or one particular style.

BD:   You embrace all music, and all the styles?

Sabransky: Right. If you can approach them on these terms, they indeed can be a rewarding experience. That’s why we have the pluralism that we have today in this society, because it’s rewarding for people. The rock music and rap audience get the same emotional intensity that the Ninth Symphony of Beethoven gives to a classical audience.

BD:   Should we try to get the rap audience to understand Beethoven?

Sabransky: Ideally, I think it would be nice, yes.

BD:   Shall we get the Beethoven audience to understand rap music?

Sabransky: Ideally, yes, I think so.

BD:   Great! Now we’ve horrified everyone. [Both laugh]

Sabransky: That’s part of accepting the Global Village that everyone talks about, with the crossing of borders, and the ability to understand cultures. It’s probably very different than the idea which has been so controversial when it was expressed in the recent book The Bell Curve, by Richard J. Herrnstein.

Measured by the media attention and controversy it has attracted, The Bell Curve by Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray was the publishing event of the decade.

The book presents a disturbing and highly pessimistic view of trends in American society. The United States, according to the authors, is rapidly becoming a caste society stratified by IQ, with an underclass mired at the bottom, an elite firmly ensconced at the top, and only a limited scope for public policy to boost the disadvantaged. But the bulk of the attention and controversy that swirled around the book focused not on its sweeping vision of what is happening to U.S. society, but on the authors’ application of their theories about IQ to the question of race.

Charles Murray complained in the Wall Street Journal last December that the critics’ focus was too narrow. We sympathize with Murray’s frustration over the content and tone of some of the criticism that the book received. But the book may have fared even worse had the discussion of race and genetics not distracted attention from some serious problems of analysis and logic in its main arguments. There are indeed some useful messages in the book. But there is also much wrong with it.

[* * *]

While most criticism of The Bell Curve has focused on the authors’ claim that racial differences in IQ test scores are, in part, genetic, many of the book’s most important claims have escaped scrutiny. They shouldn’t. The book’s basic premise–that IQ is becoming the decisive force in determining economic rewards and social position–is demonstrably false. Herrnstein and Murray’s evidence on the difference between black and white test scores in various occupations does not show what they imply it does–massive reverse discrimination. In fact, their own evidence showing blacks and whites with the same test scores earn the same wages contradicts such a claim. Further, differences between blacks and whites in annual earnings, and the employment discrimination revealed in employment audits, suggest that blacks continue to be disadvantaged in the labor market. Because the authors sharply exaggerate the importance of I.Q, the book is excessively pessimistic about the potential role of carefully selected government programs in improving the lives of the disadvantaged. In all the controversy over the authors’ claims about race and intelligence, these points should not get lost.

[The opening and closing statements of a long article by William T. Dickens, Charles L. Schultze, and Thomas J. Kane, posted June 1, 1995, on brookings.com]

BD: Everyone must make choices for themselves, and you have obviously made some choices for yourself. How do you make those choices?

Sabransky: It depends on what is important to me at that point in time. My choices may change...

BD: Do you think your repertoire will change?

Sabransky: Yes, and that is what allows me to design the program, and enjoy the program. I identify with my audience, and relate to them, and then design this program with the same kind of feelings that they might be having about the music, whatever they may be.

* * * * *

BD:   If you could design your life any way you wanted, would you give more concerts, fewer concerts, or more diverse concerts?

Sabransky: Definitely more concerts. I would like to work a lot more, and that’s part of what we talked about earlier, in that there are fewer opportunities. Ideally, I would like to revive the recital situation, and do so through this kind of program on my CD. It’s no longer so important to have three major sonatas on a program, and to display one’s ability to the utmost level of virtuosity of understanding. We need to get back to relating to the audience, and understand why they come to hear a concert.

BD:   Why do you think they come to hear a concert?

Sabransky: The bottom line is they come to be entertained.

BD:   Are they going to be entertained more by three big sonatas, or one sonata, and a k.d. lang song, and some transcriptions?

Sabransky:   It depends on the audience! [Both laugh] What you’re seeing in the programming of the major symphonies is some of this niche playing, where they expect a certain audience to come to a certain style of program. They might even develop and design a series around a certain style of music which connects to a certain type of listener. That might be all new music from the twentieth century, or it might be the romantic works, or popular works, or it might even include music outside of the traditional classical definition, and move into more popular menus.

BD:   Assuming that you are this all-encompassing kind of artist, how do you decide if you’re going to play this or that? You have to spend a great deal of time and energy learning it, getting it into your fingers, and getting it into your mind.

Sabransky:   The timing is involved, and it becomes more difficult trying to design a program for a larger audience, as well as an audience of which you don’t really know their make-up. I haven’t really thought too much about how one can approach knowing a larger audience better, and that is one of the things which is delaying going into a second CD. I’m trying to take this concept of the designer program, and put it into something which I can have in fixed form, and not have to worry about redesigning any programs. It would need to have some other source of affluence that we touched on earlier.

BD:   Rather than just have each CD be a different program that you designed?

Sabransky: The idea is to have each CD designed as a program, but the question is what program? What audience am I speaking to and playing for? Then I would figure out how to design the CD toward that audience.

BD:   Rather than just using the previous existing design?

Sabransky: Right.

BD:   I would think people would enjoy it if you just have a few pre-existing designs available.

Sabransky: Maybe that’s not such a bad idea. That would also work.

BD:   [Musing] Phil comes to the office party and plays, and you can go home with the CD of what you heard.

Sabransky: Exactly. Wonderful. It’s like going to see a rock concert or a musical, and then going home with the t-shirt and the disc. [Both laugh]

BD:   Merchandising, then, is not a dirty word for you.

Sabransky: No, I don’t think so. The Three Tenors are equally great on their very sophisticated and serious recordings of less accessible works as they are on their fabulous seller discs. There’s a lot of merchandising going on there, a lot of marketing, and I say why not? You develop audiences that way. We have, in this day and age, the wonderful ability to reach millions of people with a single performance, so why not do that?

BD:   If you reach millions of people with a single performance, does that leave a lot of other performers out in the cold?

Sabransky: But that’s not the spirit of capitalism! [Both laugh]

BD:   So, you’re really trying to make capitalism and artistry exist side by side... or are they already existing intermingled?

Sabransky: Ultimately, I would like to make my living entirely as a musician, so why shouldn’t I approach what I do, my work, as do many people, with the idea of creating the best product that I know how to create, as well marketing that product, and making it as successful as I can?

BD:   Do you think Debussy enjoys being a product?

Sabransky: I can’t speak for Debussy. It’s like trying to decide if Mozart would have liked a particular interpretation of a performance. Maybe some of the giants of composition would have enjoyed it, and some others wouldn’t.

BD:   This is the niche you’re carving out for yourself, and you’re happy with that, and the direction you’re going?

Sabransky: Yes, absolutely.

BD:   Do you also do some teaching?

Sabransky: Yes, and again, I’m a little more commercial in my sense of teaching.

BD:   How so? Are you not just teaching kids to play the piano, or students to write music?

Sabransky: I have some adult students that I enjoy very much. I have two doctors and two attorneys, and there is a quite a bit of talent in two of the four students. I won’t say which ones...

BD:   Oh, no, no, no, but I assume you’re not trying to turn them into concert pianists. You’re trying to turn them into enjoyers of music.

Sabransky: Exactly, and in my opinion, this is the very thing. Teaching a student on that level creates the growth of audiences, and the enthusiasm for the music. It does not have to be perfection for them. I often wonder who the perfection is for when we create the performances that we try to make so perfect. [Answering his own question] Certainly, it’s for ourselves as musicians. It’s for the creator and the recreator.

BD:   But if you’re performing for other people, shouldn’t you strive to make it the very best you possibly can?

Sabransky: Yes, absolutely, and that is where the professional differs from the amateur. But it’s very important for the amateur to have this in their lives. There is an inspiration that one can transmit, and that can have a ripple effect in a community. That’s what I’m getting at when I say I enjoy the teaching. Also, it’s very nice for me, as I get something in return. There’s good conversation and there are good comments. You have a relationship around the music, but the relationship involves much more than just the music. It’s a very rewarding experience, which is different from the traditional ideal of teaching the child and the young artist to become a great performer.

BD:   It seems that you’re quite content with it all, and that’s good.

Sabransky: Yes.

BD:   I trust that will permeate your performances?

Sabransky: I think so.

* * * * *

BD: How do you divide your career between concerto appearances and solo recitals?

Sabransky: It’s getting harder and harder to play solo recitals in the bigger venues. There are very few opportunities these days, so the majority of the serious performances are in the concerto situation. That’s one of the reasons I have this desire to do things in a smaller setting. This includes listening to the audience, listening to the consumer, and finding out what we need to do to revitalize what we have to offer. This idea seems to be working very well, and at some point in the future, as the pendulum swings again, it will be effective to bring this style of performance into a larger hall and to a larger audience.

BD:   But then, would you not lose a lot of the intimacy?

Sabransky: Right, which is just one of the things that you would have to deal with.

BD:   Despite (or because of) all this, is playing the piano fun?

Sabransky: [Laughs] I can have a great time playing the piano under certain conditions. I love to play the piano, there’s no question about that. I love music, otherwise I wouldn’t be doing it. But is it fun? It’s fun when I feel like I’m playing well, and when the audience is responding. It becomes harder when I don’t feel like I’m playing well, but as long as the audience is responding, I’m not entirely upset. There are days when these things don’t come together, and then it’s more difficult. But, in general I have a great time playing, and I enjoy playing these different styles, and listening to the audience, and exchanging ideas with people about music.

BD:   I hope you always retain this enthusiasm. [Vis-à-vis the item shown at right, see my interview with James Levine.]

Sabransky: Thank you. I always like to talk about the influences of my youth, and the fact that my father is a long-standing member of the Chicago Symphony. He was, and still is a tremendous support to me, and has provided a tremendous amount of musical guidance... as do many of the Symphony members in chamber music settings.

BD:   Did you ever feel that you were being forced into a musical career, rather than into medicine or insurance?

Sabransky: [Laughs] If it were up to my father, I would be in medicine! Sure, I went through periods of time where I wasn’t sure why I was in music. If you have this ability, you grow into it. I read a wonderful book recently called Body and Soul by Frank Conroy [shown below]. It’s a fictional story about the life of a concert pianist, and there’s a little note at the end by Peter Serkin. Serkin communicated quite a bit with Conroy, and they talked about what it’s like coming into the consciousness of the concert pianist, of the musician, and the different feelings that you experience. You have this ability, which very few people have. You grow up in the neighborhood of a city, and you’re maybe one of two people close by that do anything like it. It’s very difficult coming of age having this ability. I grew up in Rogers Park [at the North-East corner of Chicago]. I was the only kid in the neighborhood that stayed in to practice for an hour or two, instead of going out to play ball and just hang out. You have this sense that sometimes it just doesn’t seem right, but in general I feel I’ve grown into a very comfortable sense of who I am, and what I do with music.

BD:   Are you able to combine this with a family life?

Sabransky: Yes. I have a wonderful wife of almost thirteen years now, and two children.

BD:   They must be very patient to put up with an artist.

Sabransky: [Laughs] We talk about that all the time. The question becomes, do I close the piano, or do they close the door when they’re watching cartoons in the morning?

BD:   [Trying to be helpful] Get them an earpiece for the television.

Sabransky: Yes, but that’s too easy. [Much laughter] Then you can’t fight about it! The logical other side of the argument would be to get one of these new pianos that you can use with earphones, particularly when practicing the rap music!

BD:   [Musing again] “My daddy’s a concert pianist who plays rap music!”

Sabransky: Right! That’s an interesting concept.

BD:   I hope they’re proud of you, because you seem to be having a good career.

Sabransky: I think so, yes.

BD: I wish you lots of continued success.

Sabransky: Thank you very much. It’s been a pleasure talking to you.

Frank Conroy (January 15, 1936 – April 6, 2005) was an American author. He published five books, including the highly acclaimed memoir Stop-Time. Published in 1967, this ultimately made Conroy a noted figure in the literary world. The book was nominated for the National Book Award.

Conroy graduated from Haverford College, and was director of the influential Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa for 18 years, from 1987 until 2005, where he was also F. Wendell Miller Professor. He was previously the director of the literature program at the National Endowment for the Arts from 1982 to 1987.

Conroy's published works include the memoir Stop-Time (1967); a collection of short stories, Midair (1985); a novel, Body and Soul (1993), which is regarded as one of the finest evocations of the experience of being a musician; a collection of essays and commentaries, Dogs Bark, but the Caravan Rolls On: Observations Then and Now (2002); and a travelogue, Time and Tide: A Walk Through Nantucket (2004). His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in such journals as The New Yorker, Esquire, GQ, Harper's Magazine, Glamour, Parenting, and Partisan Review. He was named a Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French government.

In addition to writing, Conroy was an accomplished jazz pianist, winning a Grammy Award in 1986 for liner notes. His book Dogs Bark, But the Caravan Rolls On: Observations Then and Now includes articles that describe jamming with Charles Mingus and with Charlie Watts and Bill Wyman. The latter session occurred when Conroy was writing about the Rolling Stones for Esquire. Conroy had arrived at a mansion for the interview, found nobody there, and eventually sat down at a grand piano and began to play. Someone wandered in, sat down at the drums, and joined in with accomplished jazz drumming; then a fine jazz bassist joined in. They turned out to be Watts and Wyman, whom Conroy did not recognize until they introduced themselves after the session.

This conversation was recorded in Chicago on November 14, 1994. Portions were broadcast on WNIB in 1998. This transcription was made in 2022, and posted on this website at that time. My thanks to British soprano Una Barry for her help in preparing this website presentation.

To see a full list (with links) of interviews which have been transcribed and posted on this website, click here. To read my thoughts on editing these interviews for print, as well as a few other interesting observations, click here.

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Award - winning broadcaster Bruce Duffie was with WNIB, Classical 97 in Chicago from 1975 until its final moment as a classical station in February of 2001. His interviews have also appeared in various magazines and journals since 1980, and he now continues his broadcast series on WNUR-FM, as well as on Contemporary Classical Internet Radio.

You are invited to visit his website for more information about his work, including selected transcripts of other interviews, plus a full list of his guests. He would also like to call your attention to the photos and information about his grandfather, who was a pioneer in the automotive field more than a century ago. You may also send him E-Mail with comments, questions and suggestions.