Great. Enjoyable. Superb. Moving. Masterful. Virtuoso. Iconic. Sublime. Luminous. Transcendent. The descriptions of Itzhak Perlman’s performances soar ever upward, as does his worldwide reputation as a consummate, technically perfect musician.
Perlman has performed on “Sesame Street,” at the White House, as well as at every legendary concert venue on the planet. Now, the violin superstar is appearing at the Pikes Peak Center for the Performing Arts for a remarkable one-night-only concert called “Cinema Serenade.”
Itzhak Perlman: “Cinema Serenade”
7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 18
Pikes Peak Center for the Performing Arts
190 S. Cascade Ave., Colorado Springs
Tickets: csphilharmonic.org
“This will be a lot of fun for him and, I think, for the audience, too,” says Michael Hanson, first violin and concertmaster of the Colorado Springs Philharmonic. The concert is the opening event of the Philharmonic’s American Soundtrack festival, spotlighting the titans of American music in a series of concerts honoring the 250th birthday of the United States.
Among the achievements Perlman is most proud of is performing the violin solos in Steven Spielberg’s Academy Award-winning film “Schindler’s List.” This iconic piece of music will be one of the selections from famous films performed that night. Selections also include music from “The Color Purple,” “Scent of a Woman,” “Yentl,” “Far and Away,” “The Age of Innocence” and “Out of Africa.”
“They’re designed to capture dramatic characterization,” Hanson says of the orchestral sections of film scores for the evening’s program. He calls them vignettes that touch, inform, delight or charm. “He [Perlman] is a master of that,” says Hanson. “What he’s presenting is iconically beautiful…is quite remarkable.”
“I had heard the violin on radio when I was 3, and I immediately asked for a violin,” Perlman recalled in a March 1982 interview with Frederick Winship of United Press International. Recovered from polio at age 4, his parents gave him his first violin. Since that time, he has pursued his love of music and walked using leg braces and crutches or riding a motorized scooter.
Born in Israel, Perlman was just 13 at his U.S. debut on the “Ed Sullivan Show” on Nov. 2, 1958. Sixty years later, he returned to the Ed Sullivan Theater for a special guest appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.”
Hanson has played with Perlman a half-dozen or so times and is honored to share the stage with him. “Music has an incredible capacity to connect people. … Perlman is certainly one of those [performers] who embodies that,” Hanson says. “His warmth and his charming personality come through in so many of his performances.”
He describes Perlman’s performances as captivating, romantic, charming and expressive, and full of humanity and prowess. In person, Perlman has a remarkable sense of humor and humanity, Hanson says.
The warmth and radiance of his sound, and the sensitivity in phrasing, make Perlman one of the most iconic, respected, admired and enjoyed violinists in history. He has been honored with 16 Grammy® Awards, four Emmy Awards, a Kennedy Center Honor, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and a Genesis Prize.
“He has made so many iconic recordings,” Hanson says. “You just go, ‘Oh, that is a lovely way of doing that.’”
But to see and hear him, in person, in a concert hall — “It’s totally different from a recording,” he says. “Hearing the nuance of his sound, and the shading of the colors that he’s capable of, is an inspiration.”