Andras Schiff ends Carnegie Hall recital with Hatikvah

Andras Schiff ends Carnegie Hall recital with Hatikvah

News

norman lebrecht

November 18, 2023

The Hungarian pianist András Schiff asked his Carnegie Hall audience to sing along with the Israeli National Anthem that he played to conclude his recital on Thursday night.

Watch.

More here.

Comments

  • Ex-conductor says:

    In just a few seconds the war stopped!

    • F. Parry says:

      Stopped for who? Not the people of Gaza!

      • Pnina Shanzer says:

        One day the ISIS extremists who worm their way into your american society, will feel secure enough to attack you in your house ,rape your wife in front of your eyes, than shoot you in the head and murder your wife with a bullet through her vagina, than we shall see what you politically correct americans will do. Sorry to be so blunt, this is exactly what happened in south Israel, and this is still a censored
        episode. In reality it was even worse.

    • Louise says:

      Shameful

      • rob says:

        It was a beautiful gesture. You are clearly a brainwashed armchair activist. I would say more but it would involve an expletive.

    • Louise says:

      You should be ashamed of yourself

    • soavemusica says:

      On the one hand:
      After a terrorist attack by Hamas this would be move universally moving than after the response of Israel (remember 911 and the war in Iraq, and all what followed, and continues).

      On the other hand:
      Hamas won the last election in 2006… “The innocent civilians in Gaza” seem to include terrorists, hiding/being protected by the people.

      Both Israel and Palestine want a one state solution, and the absence of the other.

      “How do you square that circle?” professor John Mearsheimer might ask. Well, you don`t.

      The continent is most likely as doomed as Ukraine, thanks to the US and Russia.

  • Tamino says:

    Almost nobody in the audience who could sing it. Shame.

    • Maria says:

      Why? As most probably either not Israeli and don’t know it – or know the language. I’d be very hard-pushed to sing the Irish National Anthem – Irish as I maybe by background with Irish parents, but born, brought up and educated in the English-speaking eastend of London surrounded by the Jews in the 50s and 60s. One cannot just assume.

  • Not Again says:

    Look I support Israel in principle, but this is getting old.
    The inept harmonization and the weak old-people humming is really not attractive – from a musical standpoint Hatikvah is shall we say not the most remarkable or memorable creation in history. And please come to terms with it: not only is not everyone in the audience Jewish, not everyone in any audience – not even an audience full of out-of-tune-hum-alongers – is sympathetic. It wears thin.

    • Prayer for peace says:

      The humming along of people, weak and strong, is beautiful. It’s human, and music is a story about humanity, not about perfection and being in tune. Music is for peace, and we need more of it, for all the world, including all those suffering in both Israel and Palestine. Please do not silence beauty. It may be our only hope toward finding peace in this chaotic world.

    • Lokman says:

      Well, I’m not Jewish and I don’t know know the words but I can hum and I’ll remember this a long time (the tune, not your petty comment)

    • Marvin says:

      Guess you don’t care for The Moldau, then, you ignoramus.

  • Sue Sonata Form says:

    Ok, all well and good but Schiff is such an incredibly dull musicians!!

  • Des says:

    That is just virtue signalling stuff. Gaza is obliterated. He needs to wise up.

  • Daniel Guss says:

    He did not end his recital with Hatikvah. It was the first of three encores, the others being the first movement of the Mozart C Major “facile” Sonata and Schumann’s Merry Farmer from Album for the Young.

  • M2N2K says:

    It was a nice gesture by a very fine pianist.

  • Anonymous says:

    This is similar to playing the US national anthem after their disproportionate response to 9/11. supporting and showing empathy to Israeli people is different than supporting their de facto apartheid government, in the same way that supporting and showing empathy to Americans after 9/11 is different than supporting their de facto imperialist government.

    • YourstrulyLouise says:

      Americans are the number one terrorists. They fund and are behind all Israeli wars since the 1950’s.
      Preparing the American Empire but unlike previous Empires they do it secretly. Advertising works !

  • Audience says:

    I was at the performance. Schiff was great, but this, plus his comments about antisemitism during the recital, was just too much to ask of the audience. Not everyone was Jewish, and there surely was a diversity of opinions among the audience about what’s going on in the Middle East. I was there to listen to some good music; if I had wanted to go to a political rally, I would have spent my evening somewhere else (and there are plenty of options in NYC to express whatever opinion people have).

    • Ronald Cavaye says:

      If one dislikes the actions of the French government, for example, no one accuses one of being “Anti Roman Catholic”. Abhor the actions of this extreme right-wing Israeli government and one is accused of antisemitism. People need to understand the difference.

  • Dmitri says:

    Respect to Maestro.

  • Pauker says:

    And what about all the suffering, innocent Palestinian men,women, and children? No thoughts for them? Shame. There is no right or wrong side in this. The issue goes back millenia.

  • Harry Collier says:

    No doubt, when he plays in London, he’ll end with “Rule Britannia!”. And he’ll play the Marseillaise in France, and “Deutschland über Alles” in Germany. I didn’t know Schiff was an Israeli pianist. But he appears to be great at self-promotion. Can’t play Mozart or Bach in a competitive environment, however. Have to make the headlines somehow.

  • Daniel Reiss says:

    Humgarian-British, Sir Andras Schiff.

  • mollig says:

    If he was wants to make a show of solidarity against antisemitism, play a bunch of encores by underappreciated Jewish composers. By playing the Israeli anthem he’s implicitly supporting the massacre of innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza and I actually expected better of Schiff than that. Being against antisemitism does not mean you have to be pro Israel under a vile government like Netenyahu’s

  • Mike says:

    Wow. It’s a shame the antisemitism is alive and well on this site.

    I imagine not one commenter would appreciate missiles being fired their way on countless nights, and especially would quickly lose sympathy for the animals that do this on the other side, even if their government had a defense system in place.

    No empathy, just political tools I see.

  • Yad Vashem says:

    A moving gesture and in memoriam those who lost their lives in the worst pogrom since the Holocaust.

    Sadly, it appears antisemitism remains as much of a cancer throughout the world as it has ever been.

  • PMA says:

    These comments are either petty, bitter, childish or moronic. And whomever took that poor video should not have done so as it is not allowed. Surprised Lebrecht included it

  • Alfred Terra says:

    The comments in this section merely demonstrate how much antisemitism runs deep in the veins of the so-called educated public as illustrated by some of the overtly anti-Jewish ruminations displayed above. Not being able to understand the extraordinary circumstances of utterances by Sir Andras, merely solidifies the notion, that many people who go to concerts and have had elite educations, would rather side with murderous, death cult Hamas, than Jews, who have since time immemorial added to civilization and culture. The day these pseudo-intellectual cretins have to recite sharia law in their homes in NY or London, that day they will remember the brave IDF the Jews who fought to defend the values of culture and civilization.

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