Visiting Dmitry Sitkovetsky: Bella Davidovich
Haydn: Concerto for Violin and Piano: Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Bella Davidovich, & Musica Viva Orchestra
I have been very lucky as a musician.
I was born into the family of the brilliant violinist Yulian Sitkovetsky
and the outstanding pianist Bella Davidovich. 
I barely knew my father – he died when I was very little,
but it’s the naked truth that I grew up under the piano of Bella Davidovich.
I grew up among the musical elite; great musicians used to visit our home:
David Oistrakh, Mstislav Rostropovich, Yakov Zak, Daniil Shafran, and many others. 
My mother never taught me, 
but from a very early age I breathed the air of highest professionalism, 
and it was she who created such an atmosphere. 
I was able to appreciate the full extent of its influence when I became a professional musician. 
Very few people prepare themselves for a performance in such a thorough manner –
– working on every single note –
– and treat the composer’s score with such care as my mother has. 
In this sense, Bella Davidovich is a unique phenomenon in the musical world.
My late grandmother’s name was Bella Davidovich. 
Of course, my grandfather had dreamed of having a granddaughter –
– so that her name would be the same as his late wife’s!  
And it turned out exactly like that: 
My grandfather’s nephew came from Kiev, 
and having met my mother-to-be,
started courting her, and later married her.
He married her, and – in due course – I was born. 
My grandfather was extremely happy, because I was then named Bella Davidovich! 
There were other musicians in the family: 
My mom was a wonderful concertmaster at the Baku Opera Theater.
My grandfather led the orchestra there. 
In our house we had…a piano, of course,
because Mom’s colleagues from the theater came to practice their singing with her sometimes…
and we had…we had the radio. 
They adjusted headphones for me so that I could listen.  
I would climb the chair that stood by the piano and try to play something by ear.
While I was doing this, they noticed that I played by ear – in the right key;
it turned out that I had perfect pitch.
Yes, so I started to play by ear.
I especially liked one waltz by Chopin – the one in B minor. 
I was then three and a half years old.
My hands were – well, they are not very large even now – they were really small then,
yet I tried to play that waltz with both hands, by ear…
probably not to the end, but one could hear that it was Chopin’s Waltz in B minor.
The family noticed it, and when I was five, they made me take an exam –
– an audition to join a group for musically-gifted children.
But it was the first piece by Chopin.
Yes, it was the first piece by Chopin, and I came to love it a lot.
So I had an exam when I was five. 
There was a panel of professors, and...
what some lady played for me was a minuet – they explained it –
– a minuet from the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach.
I had to turn my back as she played; she played the minuet twice.
After that, the panel asked: “Can you play it back – with both hands?”
I went to the piano, 
not knowing the notes or anything at all, 
and played it back from the beginning to the end.
So you played it by ear when you were five?
Yes, I played it when I was five.
Do you still remember this menuet at 85?
No problem!
And then?
And then they started thinking about a pedagogue for me,
so that I could start playing more.  
I started to play children’s repertoire. 
Step by step it became more advanced,
and one day – when I was nine – 
– I was entrusted to play Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in C major
with the Symphony Orchestra of Baku Philharmonia. 
Nikolai Pavlovich Anosov, Gennady Rozhdestvensky’s father, was the chief conductor at that time.
Incredible!
It was, of course, a big event, and for the first time 
I was surrounded by a symphony orchestra on stage. 
In the beginning – at the first rehearsal – it felt strange, 
because there was a real orchestra instead of the second piano: 
the strings, the woodwinds…
Luckily, Nilolai Pavlovich was very supportive 
and took into account the fact that I was young. 
At the second rehearsal it was all very clear to me, 
and I didn’t get nervous when the other instruments were played.
The Baku Philharmonia attracted all the best that was available on Moscow’s musical horizon. 
They were all famous names:
Oistrakh, Zak, Flier, Gilels; 
one of these names was that of Konstantin Nikolayevich Igumnov. 
He had already taught such pupils as Oborin, Zak…Flier…
The question was raised: “Shouldn’t we have Bella play for Igumnov?” 
And so I was introduced to him. 
I have to say that by that age I had already played Schumann’s Piano Concerto as well.  
I played something for him on the piano, 
and he said to my parents, without much enthusiasm:
“I don’t teach children, but if you are willing to bring her to Moscow, I will teach her.” 
I was then around twelve.
We came to Moscow; Dad got a room... 
and a surgeon’s job,
and for the first half a year the two of us lived together. 
It was quite far from the school…it was near Khimki. 
I had to commute to school…and to Igumnov’s. 
Of course, the memories of my lessons with him will remain with me till the end of my life.
The most important thing that Igumnov taught us was sound production. 
Let me show you how Igumnov asked me to press the keys to the very bottom. 
He had these silent exercises.
(The keys had to be depressed to the bottom, but without producing sound.)
It was very hard to master in the beginning, 
not to mention that now I have a Steinway, 
but back then we had old pianos in bad condition.
The exercises had their benefits, though: 
They made our padded fingertips feel the depth of the keys.
Later, it all translated into sound. 
Schumann: Concerto for Piano & Orchestra: Bella Davidovich & Svetlanov Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: A. Katz 
And how did Konstantin Nikolayevich teach you pedaling?
He taught us to pedal with our toes –  
– not with the entire foot,
because very often young musicians panic on stage
and press the pedal too hard with their entire foot.
That’s why he taught that one should think about it all the time 
and remember that one should pedal like this.
This goes for both the right and left pedal.
We didn't use the middle pedal very often.
And then...there was the culture of playing…
Yes, he demanded…demanded respect for the composer, for what is written.
It’s known that a note only sounds for as long as one holds it, 
so notes value (duration) should be same 
for both the right and left hand.
One should lift off both hands at the same time. 
If one’s right hand is still on the keys 
while the left hand is in the air, 
it’s called a lack of culture in piano playing.
Yes, yes…it’s a totally different attitude…
this and the pedaling…
not to blur the sound, but to add color to it.
One should follow notes values as they are written by the composer.
It’s in Chopin’s Concerto No. 1:
played simultaneously and held for the same duration.
Yet I hear – and see...
the left hand gets lifted off too soon.
Or in Chopin’s Préludes for example:
an entire prélude is played 
without lifting off one’s hands. 
That’s how Chopin wrote it.
Yes, yes…it’s a huge difference…
Yes, it sounds different.
Besides, visually…
if someone sees the left hand lifted off before the right, 
they will only hear the upper voice.
And then the war started…
Dad enlisted in the army 
and started working as a surgeon 
at a naval hospital in Baku. 
As soon as it became possible,
we got a very big room in a communal apartment…
But the room had a balcony, as I remember…
Yes, that big room had a balcony…
but in Baku people used to live on balconies!
I always remember Baku very fondly, with genuine nostalgia. 
We Bakuvites…
Here in New York, I am surrounded mostly by Bakuvites.
We love our city so much 
and we always have something to reminisce about. 
And as with most people of my age, 
it’s the unforgettable years of our youth.
The war ended.
The delegation from Baku attended the All-Union Piano Competition in 1945, which took place in Moscow.
On the way there our train passed Stalingrad…
I saw that railway station – it was a horrific view.
I met with Igumnov…
I played for him, and he said: 
"Come to my class when you finish school."
And so began the life of an ‘out-of-town student’. 
In March, 1948, Konstantin Nikolayevich Igumnov passed away,
and I had to decide who to study with.
Everyone else from the group of our famous and distinguished pedagogues was still alive. 
I could have studied with any one of them…
I think any one of them would have taken me on as a pupil, 
but I knew for certain that I wished to study with someone who was a pupil of Igumnov. 
That school and that method were very familiar and very much in harmony with my own way of playing, 
and so I understood that I wanted to study with no one but Yakov Vladimirovich Flier.
“The School of High Excellence at the Moscow State Conservatoire – the center of the Soviet musical culture. 
Here, under the guidance of Professor Igumnov,
works the young pianist Yakov Flier,
who won the first prize at the Second All-Union Competition for Performing Musicians."
Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1: Yakov Flier
Sometime in December, there was a rumor
that the Chopin Piano Competition was set to return.
It was such a rarity, it was even impossible to dream of.
And indeed, in January the next year,
the members of the piano faculty at the Moscow Conservatoire 
got an assignment to prepare two students each.
So my professor started preparing two of us – 
– me and the talented Lyubov Edlina. 
And so the selection process started... 
By that time, my personal life had changed somewhat.
In my third year at the Conservatory, 
I was asked to accompany a student of Yampolsky, 
with whom Yulian had studied in his time.
Once at the piano in Professor Yampolsky’s house, 
when I asked, “Who is going to turn pages for me?”, 
someone replied, “I can do that.” 
And so this was how I met Yulian, your dad.
Tchaikovsky-Kreisler: Song Without Words: Yulian Sitkovetsky
According to numerous accounts,
the couple Yulian Sitkovetsky/Bella Davidovich 
was a gem of the Moscow musical elite. 
Young, beautiful, talented... 
winners of international competitions who performed together –
– they were a golden couple.
Then, at the zenith of their career,
no one could have imagined such an untimely and tragic finale.  
For me – as a violinist –
– it wasn't easy to grow up in the shadow of the great Yulian Sitkovetsky. 
One doesn't become, but is rather born a virtuoso like him. 
His virtuosity was effortless, natural, 
and always served the music alone.
I grew up listening to his recordings…
I admired them... 
Yet I am certain that I would never have become a violinist had he been alive.  
I wouldn't have been able to,
even though I know my father had dreamed about it.
My parents had only been married for eight years at the time of his death, 
but those years were the happiest in my mother’s life. 
My father’s passing away has remained an irretrievable loss for her.
After all the auditions…
Yes, after all the auditions I was sent to Warsaw.
Competitions were huge then…
and this was the first piano competition after the war.
At first, we were placed in a hotel that was close to a railway station – the noise was terrible.
Nothing much was left of Warsaw, it was in ruins. 
Of course there was no concert hall – it was destroyed: 
the hall that used to host Chopin Piano Competitions before the war, the last competition being in 1937.
It so happened that I was the first to perform from our Soviet delegations. 
They brought me to the venue where I got to try out the pianos for the first time. 
I was going back and forth between the Steinway and the Blüthner…
The Blüthner’s wooden parts were taken off: the lid and some part at the bottom. 
There was a Polish piano tuner there – a young man – who saw my confusion.  
I saw right away that the Steinway wasn’t good enough for the virtuosic works that I had prepared,
so I turned it down; it was hard to play on. 
I did play Chopin’s Piano Concerto on it later, as it had a more sonorous sound.
So I tried playing on the Blüthner… 
Time was running out…
I tried to play a few things…
my face revealed a sense of horror. 
The piano tuner came to me and said: 
“I will fix everything. Everything will be ready for pani Bella.”
My hands were freezing-cold. 
The only thing I asked for was some hot water in a bowl. 
So they brought it. 
I held my hands in the water for a while and went to perform. 
The venue was full…the audience was everywhere.
Poles were craving Chopin’s music! 
I played a Polonaise, a Nocturne, and a Ballade, 
and Professor Lefeld, who was standing backstage,
allowed me to go there and shake my hands to release the strain.
The only phrase he uttered was: 
“Tell me, do all Soviets make the piano sound like this?”
As I went back to the piano I replied: “Of course!”
In the end of 1949,
in a central Russian-language newspaper in Baku,
on the front page, 
there appeared an article titled “Republic’s achievements for 1949.”
There were a few lines for the month of October: 
“Bella Davidovich from Baku received the first prize at the Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw.” 
It was the republic’s pride.
Chopin: Mazurka Op. 68 No. 4: Bella Davidovich (Warsaw, 1949)
How did it happen that – of course I had a direct bearing on it – 
 – how did you decide to leave Russia?
It was in the spring of 1977…
I got an exit permit…
You had to leave the Soviet Union…
I had my concert tour in Italy planned by Goskoncert at the same time.
I was 150% sure the authorities wouldn't let me out of the country –
– but they did.
A day before my departure...
They let me out, and we met…
Yes, I came to see you in Milan…
…because your route was Vienna – Rome, 
and you were let out to attend my concerts.
Yes.
After my return to the Conservatory I was told that
some of my so-called ‘well-wishers’ 
were betting on whether or not I would return,
but I couldn't leave my mother behind…
And your sister…
…so I came back.  
And you couldn't leave your sister behind, too...
The next month – February – I had a lot of two-piano concerts to play, 
so I was looking for a partner to play with.
I chose Katya Novitskaya, the winner of a prestigious competition.
When I asked her to play with me, she gladly accepted.
We rehearsed together a little bit...
but then I got a phone call:
“Bellochka Mikhailovna, because of Dima you are not allowed to go to Holland.”
Numerous concerts were in danger of being cancelled.
It was impossible to find substitutes for two eminent pianists in the middle of the season.
So they cancelled the concerts?
Impresarios have their own very different mentality
once they've already paid money from their pockets. 
So my impresario organized a press conference in Amsterdam, 
where it was openly announced that...
because of her son, who had emigrated from the Soviet Union to America,
Bella Davidovich was not allowed out of the country.
I then understood that my future was going to be very bleak if I stayed in the Soviet Union.
But at the same time, there was no man, Dima, there was no help. 
I had to take my elderly mother and my sister with me.
I couldn't leave either of them behind. 
It wasn't an easy decision, not an easy one at all.
Behind me is The Lucerne Hotel – on the corner of 79th and Amsterdam Avenue. 
On September 11, 1977, I arrived here from the Soviet Union. 
The first thing to ‘welcome’ me to my new life in America was a huge cockroach
sitting on the pillow in my room. 
I had a dollar...
I went outside to break it…
I walked into this Irish bar – it’s still here.
I had no idea where I was, in which district: Brooklyn, Queens…Bronx?
Then I got to the corner of the street and saw a “Broadway” sign – I understood I was in Manhattan.
One and a half years later, my mom found herself here as well, together with my aunt and grandmother.
It was from this place that Bella Davidovich started becoming familiar with New York –
– something I tried to assist her with to the best of my ability. 
Nowadays, Mom’s apartment is located here, on West End Avenue. 
By the way, musicians who left Russia always favored this area:
Sergei Rachmaninoff, Siloti, Stravinsky, Heifetz, and many others.
Let’s go back to the fall of 1979…
It turned out to be quite important for…
Very important for two musicians in our family…
In September that year I attended the Kreisler Competition 
and won the first prize.
In October you had a debut performance at Carnegie Hall.
Please tell me how it was.
My manager, Jacques Leiser, did a lot for it to happen, of course, 
because my interviews and pictures appeared in the ‘right’ –
– large and prestigious – magazines and newspapers.
My name was very well publicized, and that must have borne fruit:
they called me just before I left for Carnegie Hall, 
informing me that all the tickets were sold out 
and asking me if I would allow people to sit on stage. 
Of course I allowed that! 
So that’s how I saw “Sold out”; it was very pleasurable and quite unexpected.
I had my favorite composers on the program:
in the first half I played the 24 Préludes by Chopin,
and in the second half I played Schumann’s Arabeske and Carnaval.
Then people came into my dressing room…
Fima Bronfman came…
then I met Gary Graffman…
Was he at the concert too?
Yes, he was at the concert.   
And Siloti’s daughter was there...do you remember?
She came into my dressing room and said: 
"My name is Kyriena Siloti. Does this name mean anything to you?"
And I said: "Of course! Did you even have to ask?!"
Musical aristocracy…
Schumann: Concerto for Piano & Orchestra: Bella Davidovich & Svetlanov Symphony Orchestra. Conductor: A. Katz
A couple of years ago, when you had already stopped performing in public, 
I offered you the idea to start writing, and you started this elaborate – and sometimes painful process.
By hand, because I don’t have any gadgets... 
And now, thank God, very recently…   
As my son says: “Mom, it’s the ‘Stone Age’…and he’s right!”
Yes, that’s true! 
But this ‘Stone Age’ now looks wonderful – a remarkable book has been released, 
full of interesting pictures, anecdotes, and stories.
Lots of your friends are in here...and conductors, of course, and not only…
Here’s the unforgettable Misha Tal...
Mark Evgenyevich Taimanov – Uncle Mara – 
– who plays chess with me in this picture, pretending that I can play.
In my time, Yulik, your dad, managed – 
– with Mark Taimanov’s help – to introduce me to some chess players. 
Despite the fact that I don’t play chess – 
– your father did, and you can – 
– I had a lot of chess player friends.
Here is our big friend Vitaliy Wolf…
That’s from Baku’s past…Zorin!
Leonid Zorin…
That’s from Baku’s past as well…
Yes, we had a wonderful evening together…And Boris Messerer, of course…
When I started writing this book – and as it was moving along – I knew I would dedicate it to my listeners.
There are a lot of them all over the world. 
They are grateful listeners, and I am very happy that they will be able to read my book.
Haydn: Concerto for Violin and Piano: Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Bella Davidovich, & Musica Viva Orchestra
Being as I am a witness of and a direct participant in Bella Davidovich’s life,
I can say that her musical life turned out to be a success:
she left a big mark in the history of the performing arts
and became one of the most outstanding interpreters of Chopin’s music.
Nowadays, not too many people possess such mastery and knowledge as does Bella Davidovich.
I am talking about a very rare quality for a pianist: 
being able to extract a very special sound out of the piano – so called bel canto – 
– the singing, that’s so hard to extract out of a percussion instrument, 
which is what the piano is, essentially.
These ‘old school’ traditions are unfortunately disappearing irrevocably nowadays. 
Many people can play with technical virtuosity, but only a few can ‘sing’ on the piano. 
The great pianist Bella Davidovich is one of them!
