And, a few words from another medalist

Last Sunday, I visited a MacDowell Society ceremony at CCM to see Paavo Jarvi receive the 2007 MacDowell Medal. In a discussion with Mary Ellyn Hutton, critic for the Post who is writing a book about the Jarvi family, Jarvi spoke about his upbringing in Estonia and a bit about how he became a conductor.

He was, of course, following in his father's footsteps. "It's an old-world tradition. It's always Steinway and Sons," he said. Conducting, he said, is "a strange thing -- it's kind of a charlaton art."

After the family emigrated to the United States when he was 17, he recalled taking the train each weekend from New Jersey to an orthodox Jewish neighborhood in New York, where he studied with conductor Leonid Grin. He followed Grin to Houston for more study. It was Grin who brought Paavo to the Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute, where he met Leonard Bernstein.

After a falling out with Tanglewood, Bernstein had created a West Coast equivalent of Tanglewood. "That experience literally changed everything. I was 19. I knew everything, and somebody showed me that I didn't know everything. It was just the realization that there are no shortcuts to knowledge," Jarvi said.

On being of Estonian birth, he said, "I have deliberately become an American. One of the great things about this country, is that it takes people in and allows them to retain their culture and flair of their culture. I'm an American citizen, I pay taxes, and my children are born here. My relationship with Estonia is almost like a religion -- these things never conflict. ... It is a privilege to be in a country that has taken us in when we had nowhere to go."

MacDowell president Janet Light (former dance critic of the Cincinnati Enquirer) presented the medal, saying, "You have brought a new pulse, energy and artistic vision that enhances the life of this community."