Thursday, March 15, 2007

For Slatkin / Zlotkin friends and fans...

Review from the New York Sun:
Fashioning a Lyrical, Fluid Line Classical Music
BY FRED KIRSHNIT
March 14, 2007

Cellist Frederick Zlotkin had the honor of introducing the most beautiful melody ever written by Robert Schumann, the main theme of the Andante cantabile from his Piano Quartet, aboard the chamber music barge Sunday afternoon at Brooklyn's Fulton Ferry Landing. Mr. Zlotkin is most likely tired of being described as Leonard Slatkin's brother, so let's introduce him instead as the son of the fine cellist Eleanor Aller. This day, he teamed with another local celebrity, concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic Glenn Dicterow, along with violist Karen Dreyfus and pianist Gerald Robbins.

Mr. Zlotkin made the most of his opportunity, fashioning a lyrical line notable for its fluidity and grace. He did not employ a great deal of vibrato, but did include a delicious portamento slide toward the conclusion of this infectious melody that brought to this reviewer a flood of memories and at least a trickle of tears. The other two string players each had their turn at this type of gorgeous music making and each acquitted themselves admirably.
...
Although it was the third movement of Brahms's Piano Quartet No. 3 in C Minor that grew out of the aforementioned Schumann Andante cantabile, it was the Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor that the quartet performed this day. The piece has a special place in the history of the California ex-pat community so dear to Mr. Zlotkin's parents, as it was this mighty work of chamber music that Otto Klemperer convinced Arnold Schoenberg to orchestrate so that he could conduct it with his Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl.

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