{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/iiif/9c6rx9496j/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["Andre Watts oral history, 2003 November 19"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/008/original/peabody-institute.logo.large.horizontal.blue.cropped.png?1549570058","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["Andre Watts made his concert debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra at the age of nine, and he has maintained himself since the 1960s as one of America’s leading concert pianists. Born in Germany in 1946, he moved with his family to Philadelphia, where he continued his studies with Doris Bawden and Clement Petrillo. In 1963 he earned critical acclaim with his performance of the first Liszt piano concerto with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic.  The next year he undertook a world tour sponsored by the U.S. State Department. Watts studied with Leon Fleisher at the Peabody Conservatory from the late 1960s until 1974, with Watts all the while maintaining a busy concert schedule. Watts has performed with many of the world's major orchestras and has released more than 100 recordings.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\nInterview with Elizabeth Schaaf conducted at Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in Baltimore. (Abstract)","The collection is open for use. Contact peabodyarchives@lists.jhu.edu for more information. (Conditions Governing Access)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2003-11-19 (Creation)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Agent"]},"value":{"en":["Watts, Andre (Interviewee)","Schaaf, Elizabeth M. (Interviewer)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Format"]},"value":{"en":["audio/mpeg"]}},{"label":{"en":["Rights Statement"]},"value":{"en":["Single copies may be made for research purposes. Researchers are responsible for determining any copyright questions. It is not necessary to seek our permission as the owner of the physical work to publish or otherwise use public domain materials that we have made available for use, unless Johns Hopkins University holds the copyright. All requests for permission to publish or perform materials in this collection must be submitted in writing to the archivist of the Arthur Friedheim Library.\n\nMore information about use of digital assets can be found at \u003ca href=\"https://musiclibrary.peabody.jhu.edu/home/duplication\"\u003ehttps://musiclibrary.peabody.jhu.edu/home/duplication\u003c/a\u003e."]}},{"label":{"en":["Source Metadata URI"]},"value":{"en":["https://aspace.library.jhu.edu/repositories/4/archival_objects/242656"]}},{"label":{"en":["Collection"]},"value":{"en":["Sounds and Stories collection"]}}],"summary":{"en":["Andre Watts made his concert debut with the Philadelphia Orchestra at the age of nine, and he has maintained himself since the 1960s as one of America’s leading concert pianists. Born in Germany in 1946, he moved with his family to Philadelphia, where he continued his studies with Doris Bawden and Clement Petrillo. In 1963 he earned critical acclaim with his performance of the first Liszt piano concerto with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic.  The next year he undertook a world tour sponsored by the U.S. State Department. Watts studied with Leon Fleisher at the Peabody Conservatory from the late 1960s until 1974, with Watts all the while maintaining a busy concert schedule. Watts has performed with many of the world's major orchestras and has released more than 100 recordings.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\nInterview with Elizabeth Schaaf conducted at Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in Baltimore.","The collection is open for use. Contact peabodyarchives@lists.jhu.edu for more information."]},"requiredStatement":{"label":{"en":["Attribution"]},"value":{"en":["Single copies may be made for research purposes. Researchers are responsible for determining any copyright questions. It is not necessary to seek our permission as the owner of the physical work to publish or otherwise use public domain materials that we have made available for use, unless Johns Hopkins University holds the copyright. All requests for permission to publish or perform materials in this collection must be submitted in writing to the archivist of the Arthur Friedheim Library.\n\nMore information about use of digital assets can be found at \u003ca href=\"https://musiclibrary.peabody.jhu.edu/home/duplication\"\u003ehttps://musiclibrary.peabody.jhu.edu/home/duplication\u003c/a\u003e."]}},"provider":[{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/008/original/peabody-institute.logo.large.horizontal.blue.cropped.png?1549570058","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/161/340/small/watts_photoshop_jpg.jpg?1656606335","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 1 - open-uri20220629-325479-c1phbu.mpga"]},"duration":3002.04408,"width":640,"height":360,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/161/340/small/watts_photoshop_jpg.jpg?1656606335","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-peabody.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/161/340/original/open-uri20220629-325479-c1phbu.mpga?1656527674","type":"Audio","format":"audio/mpeg","duration":3002.04408,"width":640,"height":360},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["WattsA1_OHMS_20220729 [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"ELIZABETH SCHAAF: I like to start by asking people where they were born and\nwhere they spent their early years. There is one thing I did want to ask you\nabout and that's the gypsy violinist.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Oh, you've heard that story. Okay, well I was born in Nuremberg in\nGermany in 1946. My father was in the army and he was stationed there and I\nlived in Landshut and Stuttgart and mostly I remember Neu-Ulm. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=0.0,60.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/2","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Ulm was I believe\nthe first position that [Herbert von] Karajan ever had, even before Aachen. I\nmight be wrong about that but anyway. So, the gypsy violinist. Well, I don't\nremember which town and I don't remember the violinist's name anymore. I used to\nknow when I was younger. I've forgotten. My mother said there's a gypsy\nviolinist who is coming and we're going to go to the concert and we sat in the\nfirst row. And of course, well, look -- I mean, how many brown little boys were\nsitting there in this concert!\n\nAnyway, for openers, I was sitting in the front row and he was playing. He came\nto the edge of the stage and he looked down and he winked and sort of acted like\nhe was going to play especially for me and I was transfixed. I was! I thought it\nwas really exciting and he was such a virtuosic player. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=60.0,120.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/3","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"There is nothing else to\nthe story. Really, that was the first concert I ever went to. That was the first\ntime I had ever gone to a concert.\n\nSo I lived in Germany. What's usually not in the bio, because it gets elided by\npeople and I don't bother to correct it, is we came to the United States for six\nmonths when I was about six years old. Maybe even four months only, I'm not\nsure. It was probably only four months. Not really a whole half a year and\nimmediately went back and that's really never mentioned. It's usually, I came to\nthe United States when I was about eight, or something like that. Because that's\nwhen we returned to Philadelphia and the first time I came was in New York. We\nstayed in the Henry Hudson Hotel for two weeks. I remember the hotel because\nthey gave me a post card of the hotel and I kept looking at the postcard and\nlooking at the building outside, comparing. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=120.0,180.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/4","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I kept that postcard for a long\ntime. Anyway, then I lived in Philadelphia when I returned to the States and I\nlived there for thirteen years.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: Someone, not very long ago, remembered you from his childhood\n-- Wilmer Wise.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Oh my God! The trumpet player! Oh, we played the Shostakovich\n[Symphony No.] 1 together, which is a piece I've played with [Yuri] Temirkanov. Yes,\nWilmer, when I was fourteen -- I think we both won a competition. Maybe I was\nthirteen. I don't know what the difference in age is between Wilmer and me. I\nthink the conductor was Robert Mandel and he decided that I had to learn the\nShostakovich 'Concerto' so that we could both play together and we played this\npiece together which was my first ever performance of that piece. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=180.0,240.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/5","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I remember I\nplayed the Franck Symphonic Variations with the Philadelphia Orchestra that year\nand I played the Shostakovich 1 with -- I don't remember what the name of this\norchestra was. I remember Wilmer's name and Robert Mandel. Mandel was the\nconductor and it was a good performance as I recall. Not bad! So is he here in Baltimore?\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: No, he's in New York. He's certainly working in New York. I\nthink he lives just over in New Jersey.\n\nANDRE WATTS: I see, all right.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: He sounds like he's doing incredibly well, and very happy and\nenjoying his work tremendously.\n\nANDRE WATTS: I haven't seen him in quite a while. I used to see him every once\nand a while on the train, between New York and Baltimore.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: What kind of music were you listening to at home when you were\ngrowing up?\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, I always tell people it was a combination. I listened to some\ngypsy music and I listened to things like \"Chattanooga Shoe Shine Boy\" and\n\"April in Paris\" and Schubert Impromptus and Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsodies.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=240.0,300.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/6","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Were both of your parents musicians?\n\nANDRE WATTS: No, neither, actually. My mother wasn't really a musician. She knew\nhow to play the piano. They both liked music and my father loved listening to\nmusic. My mother had some relatives who were also amateur musicians. So the idea\nof actually learning an instrument was more in her family than in my father's family.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: I see.\n\nANDRE WATTS: I actually studied the violin first. I studied the violin for about\nsix months in Germany. Actually I made fairly good progress, which is surprising\nin retrospect, but I didn't enjoy it and we had these two dogs and they used to\nsit next to the music stand. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=300.0,360.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/7","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I used to practice standing up and they would sit\nnext to the stand and bay at the ceiling -- howl at the moon kind of, and the\nneighbors would complain.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: So you were doing chamber music very early.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Right, very early. Yes, the ensemble was not good. So, I just told\nmy mother, \"Well, you just said that I had to learn an instrument.\" She thought\nlearning an instrument was like learning arithmetic and reading and writing,\nlike that. She never thought that I should be a musician and so I said 'Well,\nyou just said that I had to do an instrument. Couldn't I do the piano instead?\"\nbecause there was a piano in the house. We had a piano in the apartment and so\nshe said sure, fine. She didn't care. She just wanted me to learn some music and\nI had been allowed, even while I was learning the violin, once I did whatever\nlittle work I had to do -- I mean, I was little. I was a child. But whatever\nwork I had to do, once I had gotten that done, I could go to the piano if\nwanted. You know, as long as I wasn't abusive, which wasn't really my interest\nanyway. But, I could just do whatever I wanted unsupervised. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=360.0,420.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/8","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So my big pleasure\nwas I would put my foot on the pedal -- I would stand of course -- and keep the\npedal down and just play things and let them build up and run into each other,\nand just listen to all these sonorities. That's my first real -- I don't want to\noverstate it -- but my first real obsessiveness with sound is from that. Just\nmixing all those harmonies and having all those overtones.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: Sonic building blocks.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Right, yes! That's nicely put. Thank you. Yes, So that was always\nmy big interest in music. Just sheer sound. Sound is almost like food, you know,\nit's like chewing something. It's the same.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: Yes.\n\nANDRE WATTS: And so then it became clear. When we came to the United States I\nguess it became clear that it was the thing I was best at. I learned real fast.\nAnd so my mother said well, she wasn't going to teach me anymore. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=420.0,480.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/9","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I had to have\na regular teacher and I studied with a wonderful, wonderful woman named Doris\nBawden. I still have some music. I don't use it to learn, but I mean I have kept\nsome of the music that Mrs. Bawden wrote in and talked about blocking chords.\nShe was a great teacher. She was really nice and made me very comfortable and\nwas my teacher when I played my first orchestral concert with the Philadelphia\nOrchestra when I was ten. I played a Haydn concerto.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: You managed to elude the fate that often falls on very young,\nvery gifted musicians. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=480.0,540.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/10","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"It sounds like you kept things under control somehow.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well because, you know, my mother wasn't really a stage mother, and\nshe had been offered when I was (right after I played with the Philadelphia\nOrchestra -- we didn't have a lot of money) she had been offered money for me to\ngo on a television program that was called \"The Children's Hour\", and they said,\nwell, you can come and play a little piece every week. You know, be a regular\nand we'll pay you twenty-five dollars each time, which was a lot of money. What\nis this -- 1956 or '57? So that was a lot of money and my mother said, \"No, he\nwon't be able to learn anything. He'll spend all week learning a little piece\nfor the next week. What good is that? He won't learn real music.\" So she turned\nthat down, and when I was sixteen I played with [Leonard] Bernstein. Well, I was\nvery fortunate. Bernstein suggested which manager I should go to. It wasn't\nreally my doing. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=540.0,600.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/11","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Look, I probably would have played a hundred concerts the next\nyear, just because it was fun. I would have played the same piece day and night\nand been burned out in no time, but my mother didn't allow that. My first\nmanager, Bill Judd, who is now dead, was my manager for the first seventeen\nyears. He said right out to my mother, \"Look, if we want his career to continue,\nthe company will make money on him eventually. We're not interested in squeezing\nhim like some lemon and then discarding him.\"\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: How amazingly enlightened.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Yeah, it's extraordinary. Very unusual. Really! Kind of unheard of,\nI have to say. So I played, I think, six or eight concerts the first year and\nonly with great orchestras and great conductors. I remember Bill Judd said to\nme, he said: \"Look, when you get older and you have experience and you can offer\nsomething. Then you can play with lesser orchestras and you can be useful. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=600.0,660.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/12","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Right\nnow you need all the help you can get. You're only going to play with the great\norchestras and great conductors and you'll learn a lot.\" And that's how it went.\nSo it was easy for me and I didn't have this kind of exploitation. You know a\nlot of those things I only recognized after the fact. At the time, look I was\n\nsixteen. What did I really know about burnout?\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: That was a pretty good year for you.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Yes, it was a great year, but I didn't know anything about burnout\nor how difficult the life could be. It just seemed like, 'My god! People are\ngoing to pay me money to do the only thing I really want to do anyway?' I always\ntold people it seemed like a scam. I mean it really did. It was incredible and\nso I would have made poor decisions but I was very fortunate. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=660.0,720.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/13","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And by the time I\nwas twenty-one, when I could legally sign my own contracts, well I already had a\ncompletely different view of what a career is and what kind of life I wanted. I\nhad learned a lot and so I was very fortunate. Also, I wasn't really a prodigy,\nso I wasn't saddled with that part. Lots of kids played with the Philadelphia\nOrchestra in those days. I mean, much younger than ten! When I was ten there was\na wonderful player named Linda Child. She was seven. I think she played better\nthan I did, I mean really. So it was not so unusual, and I didn't play very\nmuch. I played when I was ten and I played when I was eleven. Then I played some\nother small concerts and I played with the Philadelphia Orchestra again when I\nwas fourteen and then I didn't really have any concerts. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=720.0,780.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/14","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Two weeks before the\nBernstein auditions for the Young People's Concert I went to audition for the\nMerriweather Post and I didn't even get past the first round. I actually played\nbetter there than I did for the Bernstein audition. So I didn't have any of the\nproblems of the prodigies. So I was lucky.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: That is lucky.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Yes, really amazing.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: How did you find your way to Leon Fleisher?\n\nANDRE WATTS: Very interesting actually -- all kinds of odd things. I wanted to\nstudy with real concertizing artists. I felt I needed to hear something from\nsomebody who had really had a career and I wanted to study with a man because,\nexcept for Clement Petrillo, all my teachers had been women. I studied with Clem\nfor about a year and a half, two years, but it was kind of off and on. So my\nmanager, Bill Judd, was at Columbia Artists, and they had divisions at the time\nthat I was there. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=780.0,840.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/15","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"You know, things always change, but in his division was Judd,\nReese and Dalkrin. I just saw Carl Dalkrin, by the way. Judd and Reese are both\ndead now, but Carl Dalkrin is alive and well and I just saw him in Arizona. I\nplayed in Tucson and we actually had lunch with Katie. Anyway, I spent a lot of\ntime in Bill Judd's office learning a lot about the business. But I would also\nspend time in Michael Reese's office, and Carl would sometimes go on the road.\nSo I was talking to Michael: \"I want to study with someone,\" -- I was about\nnineteen then -- \"I need to study with somebody.\" And he said, \"Well, what about\nLeon Fleisher?\"\n\n[Interruption -- Someone comes in to tell Watts that Maestro Temirkanov is\nwaiting for him on stage.]\n\n","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=840.0,900.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/16","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So I went to Michael Reese, and he said, \"Well you know Leon Fleisher.\" I had\nalready been given some Epic recordings of Fleisher years before and I had\nactually heard him play with Tossy Spivakovsky --I think the Beethoven sonatas.\nSo I said, \"Okay, great,\" and Michael was going to arrange it.\n\nSo he arranged it and I came down and played for Fleisher, and he said, \"Well,\nthat's fine. It would be great to work together.\"\n\nHe said, \"I want to be clear about this --\" I'm paraphrasing but basically what\nhe said was, \"You know, you're already playing concerts. You might find the\nfloor knocked out from under you, doing this kind of work, and might not be able\nto play. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=900.0,960.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/17","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I don't know.\" And I was polite and whatnot and I thought: you're nuts!\nI'm not going to blow a career that I started. I'm not going to risk being\nunable to play at this point. I didn't feel I was just going to be able to put\ndown my career and pick it up again. So I went back and I said to Michael, \"He\nsaid he might knock the floor out from under me. I can't!\" Then Michael said,\n\"Oh, well I'm sure he just wanted to make sure you were serious, that you really\nwanted to learn -- you didn't just want to go and play for him and have him say,\n'Gee, that sounds great. Nice kid. Be on your way.'\" I said, \"Well no, of course\nnot. No, I don't think so.\"\n\nSo it took another six months before Michael could persuade me. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=960.0,1020.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/18","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And then he\ntalked to Leon, and Leon let it be known that, no, that's exactly what he meant.\nHe wanted to make sure that I really wanted to work.\n\nAnd so I said okay, and he [Fleisher] said he was willing to teach me. So about\nsix months later, then I started. So the first lesson I was supposed to have,\nthe train stopped. There was something wrong with the train and of course --\ndon't know --- I couldn't use the phone on the train or something like that. I\ndon't know. So, something like three hours later it pulls into Baltimore and I\ncall him. Of course I just turned around and went back. Then the second time, I\ndon't know what happened. It was certainly my fault, but I don't know what I did\nwrong. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1020.0,1080.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/19","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"But I didn't make it and the third lesson! Now this is extraordinary. The\nthird lesson, my mother gave me a twenty and a five. I was in Philadelphia then\nand the five was for the cab and I would get a dollar and something change and\nthe twenty was to buy the ticket --a round trip ticket. So I got to the train\nstation in Philly and I gave the cabbie a twenty without realizing. I gave him\nthe twenty instead of the five! There had been some traffic, so I needed to give\nhim the five without getting change back, which was okay. So I gave him the\ntwenty and ran out because now I was close and got to the ticket window and I\nhad a five dollar bill and I ran back out to look for this cabbie. So now this\nis three times in a row! He [Fleisher] says he doesn't remember this, but three\ntimes in a row and I thought he was going to say, ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1080.0,1140.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/20","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\"Look, its clear you don't\nreally want to be here. You don't want to do this. Get lost kid.\" And he was\nvery nice. He was very kind.\n\nI was mortified and so finally the fourth time, then I went to -- he lived on\nPark Avenue then. I think it was Park, and so I started studying with him. I\ntell people now, when I talk about studying with Leon that, it was only after I\nstopped studying with him, and years after I stopped studying with him, that I\nrecognized how much care he must have taken with teaching me. Because the\nbusiness of, you play for a couple thousand people one night, you walk out on\nstage and you tell them with your attitude, \"You should listen to what I'm going\nto play because I have something to say.\" ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1140.0,1200.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/21","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And the next day you fly into\nBaltimore, take the train whatever and say, \"Please help me because I'm an\nidiot, I don't know anything.\" That seesaw could be very, very destructive.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: Well, I always wondered about that because when here you are,\nyou're already out there and having to make that mental shift.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, yeah. It wasn't so much the mental shift. What was important,\nI think, was that he erased self doubt and insecurity by making you recognize\nyou were building your musical knowledge. You were growing and that was to the\ngood. He would never have said something like that, but when you brought him a\nMozart sonata that you didn't have the faintest clue how to play. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1200.0,1260.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/22","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"He didn't\nunderline that part. He would just start teaching you the piece and having you\nlisten, and then you figure out why, and what does it mean, and what should I go\nafter, what should I try to do, what did he want, what did he mean, how can I\nget that across, and so forth and so on. And then that would help.\n\nI remember we had once a very funny session and it was a Mozart sonata. It was C\nmajor. Was it [Koechel] 330? Yes, 330, and I remember --it was bad and I was\npretty depressed by the time this session was over, and he had been quite tough.\nHe was not happy because I played it like a typewriter. I practiced real hard,\nlike a mindless drone and played like a typewriter. There was really no Mozart\nthere! ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1260.0,1320.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/23","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\"Well, fine. You know how to turn a phrase, you know how not to poke it\nin the eye at the end of the phrase and all that. Well good for you. So...? You\ndidn't play me anything. You didn't make any music.\" We went through it, and I\nwas very depressed, and he said, \"Okay, all right. Look, go home and make\nyourself feel good. Tear through the Prokofiev Toccata. You'll feel better. It's\nokay.\" I said, \"I never learned the Prokofiev Toccata.\"\n\nI remember that session. I only remember him being angry twice, genuinely angry.\nI mean angry where he showed me that he was irritated. He might have been angry\nmore often. That was that Mozart sonata, and the other time I came in with the\nMacDowell Concerto for him and I brought in the two piano score by Schirmer. He\nlooked at me, and in a way you have to understand that I had now a career for\nmaybe what, six years? ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1320.0,1380.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/24","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I mean, I was supposed to be a professional. I might have\nbeen only twenty-one or twenty-two. But still -- And so he picked up the music\nand he said \"What's this?\" He slammed it back on the music rack, and I knew\nthere was trouble and didn't know want to say. I said, \"That's the piece you\nsaid I could play for you, the MacDowell.\" He said, \"How can you tell the\nplayers without a score?\" Boy, and I must tell you that I had seen colleagues of\nmine use two-piano scores to come to rehearsals with orchestras and I always\nthink about Leon. I have to say it's a little silly, isn't it? It is silly. Why\ndon't you have a score? I mean, I know, maybe you know. You have a good memory.\nYou remember: that's the clarinet, and this is -- but it's better to look at it,\nyou know, to see where they are and who's playing what. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1380.0,1440.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/25","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So anyway, that was the\nbeginnings of my studying with Leon and I think I studied with him for, I don't\nknow, maybe six, seven years. I think that is about right.\n\nI talked to him about this once, briefly, not really at great length, I think at\nTanglewood. We never really formalized my stopping my studying with him. It was\nnever formally stated. It just got longer and longer between sessions somehow.\nTime got more complicated, and then it stopped. Then of course, and at some\npoint, I had the pleasure of playing with him as a conductor as a soloist. I\nremember the first time was in Annapolis and I remember sitting there. That I\ntold him about: \"It's scary playing with you.\" Aside from normally scary,\nbecause he's my teacher, a great artist and all that. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1440.0,1500.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/26","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"But you know Leon has a\nway of looking, very often, without turning his head. So, he would be conducting\nand I would be playing and I'd look up and I'd see this eyeball over there in my\ndirection. I think, oh God! He's thinking, 'I told you not to do that, you\nmoron!' And he said, \"No, no, I'm just listening. I'm listening.\" But I couldn't\nget over the sense that I'm just playing shit and he's really irritated and it's\nawful. But I actually did a fair number of concerts. We did a really good\nconcert together once at the Lyric with this orchestra [the Baltimore Symphony]\nwhen they were . . . as kind of a strike thing. So we've had some really nice times.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: And then back here with the Peabody orchestra.\n\nANDRE WATTS: That's right! We did the Second Rachmaninov. That's right, that's\nthe last time we played together.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1500.0,1560.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/27","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I've always loved hearing you play because its like you hold\nthe soul of the music in your hands. I love courageous musicians, because if\nyou're not, you don't belong in music.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, yes I guess that's true.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: And you always were!\n\nANDRE WATTS: That's interesting that you said that because Leon found that in\nthe Schnabel book (there is more than one Schnabel book). There's the Schnabel\nbook where there are questions and answers and he mentions someone he'd taught\nwho had courage. The word was courage, and that's Leon. That's in the Schnabel\nbook. He's talking about Leon at that moment. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1560.0,1620.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/28","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So that's really great, yes,\nthat's wonderful!\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: But you have that. You really do.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, I don't know. I don't always feel so courageous.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: It is like there is not going to be anything missing from a\nperformance that you give.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Don't say it. It'll make me nervous! I won't be able to play this\npiece. Never mind how you run the rest of your life, but if you're going to\nplay, recreate music pieces, at least at that moment, you mustn't hold back and\nyou mustn't hedge. You mustn't -- that's true. I think that's true for everyone\nand you try, I mean you do your best not to and I don't mean go for broke, and I\ndon't mean in a superficial way, but give everything. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1620.0,1680.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/29","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Give everything and don't\nworry about, 'Well, it might not work and I'll look like a fool.' We don't have\ntime for that. There is no time for that kind of thinking. Just play absolutely\nwhat you believe. [Interruption] Yes?\n\nMIRIAM YARDUMIAN: Yuri wants to see you before you go.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Is he leaving?\n\nMIRIAM YARDUMIAN: No, he's on stage -- he'll be leaving in a few minutes.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Okay. We're almost done.\n\nMIRIAM YARDUMIAN: You just carry on. He'll be upstairs. He'll call on this phone.\n\nANDREW WATTS: Okay, good. Yes, but isn't that funny that you would say courage\nand what a great thing! That Leon can read Schnabel speaking about courage and\nhe's referring to him. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1680.0,1740.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/30","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"That's pretty spectacular.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: But you would never make me believe that you are not playing\nwith that same gift.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, I hope so. I don't know. Yeah, well one tries, you know? It's\ninteresting that it's easier to do, I think. It's never really difficult. It\ncomes unbidden. I mean it's either in you or it isn't and you can, yes, I guess\nyou could kill it, but you obviously cultivate, hopefully, the positive stuff.\n\nYou know knowledge is great, but knowledge also has some negatives. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1740.0,1800.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/31","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"When you\nknow more, there is more risk that you can -- coast is too strong, because that\nwould be just plain wrong, but when you know a lot and you have lots of\nexperience, there is some risk. You have to be vigilant, to stay right there\nwith the piece and with what you believe and what you want and what your ethic\nis, et cetera. You have to keep that in front of you, because there are other\nthings that intrude and, you know, the realities of the pedestrian aspects of\nplaying concerts. There are pedestrian aspects to it. I mean the realities of\nbad instruments and bad collaborators.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: And bad hotels.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, that, yes, but I mean actually on stage where you can really\nget to the point of saying, ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1800.0,1860.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/32","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\"Well look, I know how the piece goes. It's not\ngoing to work. I'm just going to beat myself to death here, and I'm not going to\nget where I need to be, because I'm not going to get any help.\" But, when you\ndon't beat yourself to death anyway, that's a failure. That's a failure. That's\na bad concert. You beat yourself to death and it didn't work -- fine. That could\nbe a good concert. At least you're doing what you're supposed to be doing and\nthat is easier to do. I mean that you always did what you were supposed to be\ndoing when you were very young, when you really didn't know anything and a\nconcert was like once in a blue moon. When you get into a certain kind of\nroutine, that's where I think vigilance is necessary and you see that with\nartists every once in a while. Someone that you know -- it's an exaggeration and\nit's a cruelty that's I think maybe a little inappropriate, but for sake of\nargument -- when you see somebody that phoned it in. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1860.0,1920.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/33","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"That happens. It's not\nsupposed to happen.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: How do you keep that spark and that approach? I mean how many\nconcerts a year are you doing now?\n\nANDRE WATTS: Oh, something between eighty and a hundred. Actually, the truth is\n-- I mean I shouldn't talk so big about it -- but vigilance is, of course,\nimportant and you try and pay attention to that, but I think the core is\ncompletely unbidden. It's either there or it's not, and probably it could have\nbeen thwarted, but I had wonderful people always, from the beginning. I was very\nfortunate. Even in the collaborations that I did when I was young. People I\nlearned from, I mean [conductor Vladimir] Golschmann, Bernstein, [Eugene]\nOrmandy. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1920.0,1980.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/34","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Only great people. The fist time I played with Joseph Krips was to\nsubstitute for Leon, and I think I may have just started studying with him. It\nmight have been within the first year of my studying with Leon that I\nsubstituted for him in San Francisco. And then Krips invited me every year to\nSan Francisco. He would tell me what concerto to play the following season. You\ncan't do that nowadays so much, but you could do it then, and I would play and\nhe would teach me. We would sit on stage of the opera house and he would teach\nme: \"Don't breathe in. Breathe out when you play that chord. When you play that\nchord, breathe out. Pianists play pianissimo and they hold their breath,\" he\nsaid. \"Don't be like them. You want to breathe out. Music has to breathe.\" And\nhe would teach me all kinds of things.\n\nI was so fortunate. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=1980.0,2040.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/35","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Some basic core impulse that you have is constantly not only\nnourished, but (how do you call it, underpinning?) it's given structure. It's\nbolstered. Bolstered by all these people that you admired, who say \"Yes, that's\nthe way one makes music. That's the way music is made.\" And so now, for me, it\nhas to be.\n\nI'll give you an example: Quite some years ago now, I played for a couple of\nyears with a violinist, Charles Trager and Charlie and I got to\n\n-- I remember the place -- California, and we were exhausted. The piano was\nterrible, and the presenter was kind of a jerk. We were exhausted. We were so\nexhausted. I had an alarm clock with me, and we both laid down on the floor and\nset the alarm for fifteen minutes. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2040.0,2100.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/36","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"We thought we've just got to, because we had\ntraveled, and it had been bad traveling and whatnot. So we got up after the\nalarm went off, and we got dressed, and we went to play this program, that we\nknew, and we looked at each other. \"How are you doing?\" \"Aw jeez, I'm --\" and we\nboth kind of at the same time said, \"Hey look, we're decent musicians and we're\ndecent people. We're not going to cheat anybody. Let's go out there and really\nplay our best, but let's not kill ourselves. Let's not go nuts like the way we\nusually do, because we started with the Schubert Rondo Brilliant, and we'd go\nwith the downbeat, yum baam baam -- just going berserk. Let's not do that. Okay,\nalright.\" And we agreed. We went out there, and I mean the minute we started,\noff we went. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2100.0,2160.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/37","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"We were doing it again, and we looked at each other, like \"Are you\nnuts? It's your fault! What are you doing?' So that was a great example of 'we\ncouldn't help it!'\n\nThat's a blessing, in a way, when you don't really have to work for it. You only\nhave to remember not to sit on your duff. You know what I mean. That's all. When\nyou get down, when you're in a bad situation in a concert, you're going to the\nrehearsal and it's a bad orchestra, bad conductor, you know. Then you just have\nto remember, \"Come on. It doesn't matter.\" And it doesn't matter if you feel\nyou're not being joined by them. You have an obligation. For me it's very\nsimple. I don't have to use it much, but I use it certainly with students. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2160.0,2220.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/38","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I\nsay, \"Well, if you're playing a Beethoven sonata, the best thing you can do is\nyou hope that if Beethoven were here, he wouldn't hit you when it was over.\" He\nmight say, \"Ah, you got some stuff to fix here, but it was okay. At least you\nwent in the right direction.\" That would be heaven, if Beethoven said that, but\nyou really don't want to play in such a way that he would say, \"Don't ever play\nanother piece of my music again!\" -- that kind of thing.\n\nMostly it's unbidden, so I don't take a lot of credit for it. These pieces are\ntoo great. I mean, I don't really understand quite how it's possible to play\nBrahms [Symphony No.] 1, in a tired way. I mean the piece is just too -- Jesus,\nit's just too great and it's too big! Even if you played it yesterday and it\nsounded okay, or especially if it sounded okay, that means you could probably\ntry to make it better today. Right? It means you're sort of on the right track.\nSo there's a never-ending carrot that's in front of you. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2220.0,2280.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/39","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"You know, I know how\nthis piece goes. Why can't I play it? I want it and I'm going to try it today\nand, well, then I'll try it tomorrow and the next day and you just keep going.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: How long have you been teaching?\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, master classes I've done for lots of years. I think I did my\nfirst -- I taught one summer, all summer, at Tanglewood. I did six weeks of\nteaching at Tanglewood. I think I was twenty-three at the time. I think that's\nright -- and that was great. That was wonderful, because there was continuity.\nIn the intervening years, until about three years ago I always only did master classes in different\nplaces. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2280.0,2340.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/40","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I would go and sometimes there were repetitions, but not very much and I\ngot a little tired of the no follow up. You'd hear someone and then you wouldn't\nhear them again, and so I looked around at a number of schools and talked to a\nvariety of people and settled on the University of Maryland; but I teach other\npeople's students. I don't have any students of my own. My contract calls for\nfour visits of two days each. This year I'm doing seven visits of two days each\nand I do five hours a day. A couple of times a year we have open master classes,\nwhich last from ten to twelve [o'clock], but the rest of the time there are hour\nsessions with different people privately in the studio and I like it a lot. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2340.0,2400.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/41","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"It\nworks for me. I like it selfishly also.\n\nI hope I'm imparting decent things to people, but I like it selfishly also,\nbecause it reverberates. It echoes what you've been saying, and then you go and\npractice and you think, 'Whoa, whoa, why don't you try practicing what you\npreach?' You're telling them, pay attention here and so it's kind of nice that\nway. Also, the things you take for granted in yourself, when you have to\nrearticulate them for someone else, where it isn't already something in them,\nit's interesting. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2400.0,2460.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/42","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"You get a different insight into it as you're explaining it to\nsomeone, which makes you reopen the case, so to speak, for yourself. So that's good.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: I guess I always secretly hope to someday just find you in the\nConservatory. It would be wonderful to have you back, because some of us miss\nyou to death.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Oh, that's sweet. Thank you. Thank you. Well, we talked and I don't\nthink our needs coincided. You don't have to put that in there. No, no, it's all\nright. Our needs didn't seem to coincide. It might have. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2460.0,2520.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/43","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"I don't know, it might\nhave been a kind of little full circle for me. It might have been nice. I knew\nthe one thing that I certainly didn't want was, even if I could con someone into\nit, to be under false pretenses. To be some place as a professor, and then not\nbe there enough days to really fulfill what that means.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: What with your schedule --\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, you can adjust your schedule, but I knew I wasn't going to\nadjust it enough, and so we were very, very clear. It was easy for me to arrange\nthis with the University of Maryland. The communication seemed very clear, and\nwe kept checking and making sure what our needs are, what your needs are, how we\nwill proceed. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2520.0,2580.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/44","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And therefore, you see, it made it comfortable for me the first\ncouple of years and so these [were] added. There are three more this season than\nthe contract calls for, simply because there was no pressure, and so it made it,\nsince I like to teach, easy for me to find. I said, \"Well, I have two days here,\nI have two days there, two days there, we'll add them in.\" So it's good. It's\ngoing well.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: That's great.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Yeah, it's nice. It feels good.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: I think it's wonderful that you do that, because someone who\napproaches music with such intelligence and such sensitivity -- what more could\nyou ask in a teacher?\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, I always feel that I learned about teaching from Leon. I\nmean, I really spend an awful lot of time invoking his name. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2580.0,2640.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/45","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And I think I had\nwonderful teachers before I went to study with him, and I played perfectly okay\nconcerts also, but I learned very much from him. It's dangerous, in a way, to\ntalk about ideals, but he is in a way an ideal teacher. He really is pretty\nspectacular stuff.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: Yes, and such a remarkable person.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Yeah, well, that's it. I think that he brings everything to bear.\nHe uses all of himself, and he focuses if you play for him.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: He's another one that doesn't hold back. It's all there.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Yeah, and that's good. That's great, and so for me that's my model\nfor teaching. And I've always been very pleased, because you know that's also a\nlittle bit chance -- the fact that I don't play like Leon. You know, that's a\nchance. He could teach people who are more inclined to play like him. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2640.0,2700.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/46","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Not a matter\nof imitating, but by inclination he and I play very differently, and so that\nmakes it even more fabulous, in a way, for me that -- It makes it so much easier\nfor me, I'm so much freer about invoking him constantly when I talk about music,\nbecause I learned so much and I parrot so many of the things that he said. But\nthey come out altered, because they go through me, and I'm very, very different\nthan he is. There is no attempt to be a Fleisher clone. Which would not be a bad thing.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: We think you're perfectly fine as is.\n\nANDRE WATTS: Thank you. Thank you.\n\nELIZABETH SCHAAF: ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2700.0,2760.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/47","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"What do you tell the young pianist who's just trying to get\nhis wings dried off and ready to fly?\n\nANDRE WATTS: Well, I guess you try to persuade them to take seriously what you\nsay, because of course it's easy for someone with a career to talk about how the\ncareer is not the primary importance. And they can say, \"Sure, that's easy for\nyou to say. You've got all the concerts you want. I want concerts.\" You try to\npersuade them that you understand that, and you're not implying that concerts\naren't important. You are implying that concerts will be ultimately meaningless\nfor you, never mind for the listener, but for you -- they'll be meaningless if\nyou don't continue to search out your interior and follow it. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2760.0,2820.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/48","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"If that is not\nyour primary aim and your primary objective, you will have some problem down the\nroad. There will be some difficulty. There will be a great loss of satisfaction.\n\nYou know, when I was much younger, I thought that the private place that you\nhave, that every individual has with their music, with their muse, or whatever\n-- it doesn't have to be music obviously, but we're talking about musicians -- I\nalways thought, when I was younger, that that place would never really be\ndamaged. And as I got older and looked at other people, and I felt that's not\ntrue. I don't believe that anymore. I believe that it's a thing that needs to be\nprotected. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2820.0,2880.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/49","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And by 'protected', [it] doesn't means shielding. It means nourished and\nburnished and polished. You need to take care of it, because if you don't, it\nwill atrophy. The light will go out. It will become sullied by the dross of\neveryday existence, and you may, some years down the road, decide that you'd\nlike to have a look at it or like to utilize it and it won't be there. It'll be gone.\n\nSo basically what you do is you remind or encourage younger players to take care\nof themselves -- take care of the special place that they have, that is only\ntheirs and no else's, and try to remember that it is separate from everything\nelse. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2880.0,2940.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/50","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"That it is separate from mundane matters. And you try to protect that\nfirst, listen to it, and then see how mundane matters fit --mundane things that\nare necessary. Hey, everybody has to eat. You have to go buy bread. Either make\nyour own or buy it -- you know what I mean. You make your own, you've got to buy\nsome produce, you've got to buy some grain. So you have those realities. But the\npoint is, and I wish I could find a better word, you make the mundane things\nconform to the jewel. You don't make this jewel that you have sitting inside you\nconform to the mundane things. You make the mundane things conform to the jewel.\nThat's what you try and tell young people.\n\n","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=2940.0,3000.0"},{"id":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340/transcript/39163/annotation/51","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"[END OF INTERVIEW]","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://streaming.peabody.jhu.edu/collections/1178/collection_resources/75266/file/161340#t=3000.0,3060.0"}]}]}]}