Reminiscences about János Starker

I recently read The World of Music According to Starker by the cellist János Starker, and a few days ago I wrote a post containing my notes about the book. János Starker is considered to be one of the world’s greated cellists, and there are many articles about him on the internet. While I was reading the book and composing my post, I collected reminiscences about Mr. Starker from students and from professional cellists.

Internet Cello Society

Tim Janof of the Internet Cello Society interviewed János Starker twice: Conversation with János Starker (1996) and Conversation with János Starker (2004).

John Cloer in 2008 provided the long article, Janos Starker: One Student’s Reflections, which gives a flavor of Mr. Starker’s teaching style.

CelloBello

The cellobello website has a page dedicated to János Starker that provides essays and links to interviews and performances.

The Art of Listening

Anthony Arnone’s book The Art of Listening: Conversations with Cellists, in which he provides conversations with thirteen highly regarded instructors of cello, contains many stories about János Starker.

Stephen Geber (p. 109):

Another person that I got to know and I liked very much, although I was never really enamored with the playing, was Starker. He could play anything.

… He had a great sense of humor. He could be a caustic guy. He could also be very hard on the students, even nasty to them. I remember him in a class when he was chewing out a young lady saying, “You know, dear, they are looking for burger flippers at McDonalds. Maybe you could find a career there.” Underneath that, he could be a pussycat. He could be so nice and embracing if he liked you.

Steven Doane (page 47):

I played to Starker for three weeks in the classes, and that was a searing but valuable experience.

Gary Hoffman, who studied with Mr. Starker and was his assistant for several years (page 153):

When I started studying with Mr. Starker, I started to lose a lot of what was natural for to me, because I became very conscious of everything.

I remember my parents being a bit worried, because I started to lose things that were just me. I remember in my second year as a student, I won the concerto competition playing the Elgar Concerto. When I listened to a recording of the performance, I was shocked. I didn’t realize how I had actually come to sound like him. That wasn’t my or his intention, but happened because of the strength of his personality and all the things that I was being conscious about at the time.

Gary Hoffman (page 154):

I owe Mr. Starker the largest debt of gratitude that one can have for somebody, because I’ve always felt that there is and maybe never will be anybody who brought the teaching of the cello to that level.

…[Mr. Starker] ended up accepting students that he knew that he couldn’t have time for right away. He sent them to Gary Hoffman, and eventually maybe they would go to him. That’s normal—but in that way, I was still a little bit like his assistant … but I wasn’t his assistant…. He would take more students that he could handle, and some of those people were not always happy.

Gary Hoffman (page 167):

You know, with Starker, he could explain everything to me. That’s why I considered him supreme. because he knew everything, and understood everything, and could articulate it. It’s just absolute complete knowledge, and that was unique, really. I have never seen anybody else like that.

Helga Winold, who was also Starker’s assistant at the same time as Gary Hoffman (page 294):

I was both Starker’s student and did a lot of his teaching as his assistant while I was getting my doctorate, because he was gone so much. This was at the high point of his career, so basically, he would be gone for three weeks, appear, be there for two or three days, and be gone again. He could be rather hard on his students, especially back then. He would tell you everything you were doing wrong, rightfully so, but he wouldn’t remember what he said at the last lesson, because three weeks would pass in between.

In the meantime, you would work your tail off fixing what he had told you to do, and then he would never mention it again. He wanted his students to be good, but was less interested in how they became good. He showed students how he played, and then expected them to play better after he’d shown them what he did. It seemed he was asking, ‘I showed you, so why aren’t you that good?’

Helga Winold (page 295):

Starker didn’t have much patience. You were supposed to bring in new pieces all the time. He was not happy hearing something he had heard before. It was not very easy to do, and I think we would have learned more if he could have followed up on some of the things we played only once.

Starker’s intonation was famous. Helga Winold (page 295):

I always swore there were magnets on his fingerboard and in his fingertips, because he just never played out of tune. I don’t know anyone else that can do that, it’s just absolutely miraculous.

At Indiana University, where János Starker, Gary Hoffman, and Helgo Wingold taught, the Music Education majors were often treated less respectfully by the professors, including Starker, than the Music Performance majors. Helga Wingold (page 300):

Not all of the … teachers took Ed. students. … There will still violinists that said they wouldn’t even look at one. … I don’t think Starker ever took an Ed. student. He would listen to them from time to time, but he wouldn’t take them in his class. I was always happy to do so because those are the students that will inspire young players and help educate future audiences for all of us.

Mr. Starker’s Joke About Himself

Mr. Starker liked to tell a joke about himself, and he included the joke in his autobiography; I quoted it in my notes about his autobiography. Stephen Geber tells a better version of this joke on page 109 of Anthony Arnone’s The Art of Listening.

There were three cellists that died all at the same time. One by one they went up into heaven and went to the gates of St. Peter. St. Peter was there to greet them. He opened the gate for the first cellist and said, “What did you do back on Earth?” The cellist replied, “Well, I was a cellist.” St. Peter asks, “With whom did you study?” The cellist responded, “I studied with Leonard Rose.” Immediately, St. Peter slammed the gate. The next cellist comes up, and St. Peter asks, “Well, what did you do?” The second cellist answers, “Well, I was a cellist, a well-known cellist.” Again, St. Peter asks, “Who was your teacher there?” The cellist tells him, “Rostropovich.” Immediately the gate slams. St. Peter opens the gate again, and the third cellist steps up. St. Peter asks, “Now, what did you do?” He answers, “I was a very well-known cellist.” “With whom did you study?” St. Peter asks. He answers, “I studied with János Starker.” The gate opens, the lights shine, the trumpets are blaring. He says to the cellist, “Come on in, you’ve already been through Hell.”

A third version of this joke is included in Remembering Janos Starker, The Cellist ‘Born To Be A Teacher’.