美国国家公共电台 NPR A 'Cosmic Connection' Between 2 Violinists

 

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Halloween is near, so how about a spooky story about a violin?

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

SIMON: This piece of music is from the 1930s. It's called "Hobgoblin" or "The Witch Of Harlem." It was written by a pretty unknown composer named Audrey Call. It's played here by Geoffry Wharton on an old Italian violin. And as we'll hear, the connection between Call and Wharton - total strangers and that violin - turns out to be an extraordinary story filled with serendipity¹. His brother NPR's Ned Wharton picks up the tale.

NED WHARTON, BYLINE²: Geoff has worked as a professional violinist in Europe since the late 1960s. He often ended classical performances with these jazzy pieces by Audrey Call. Here he is in the early '80s playing "Hobgoblin" at a music festival in France.

(SOUNDBITE OF GEOFFRY WHARTON PERFORMANCE OF AUDREY CALL'S "HOBGOBLIN")

N. WHARTON: Maybe to Europeans it was the exotic sound of jazz played at classical concerts that won their hearts. But Audrey Call's "Witch Of Harlem" was a hit.

GEOFFRY WHARTON: You know, they would literally³ scream, and I'd have to play it twice.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

N. WHARTON: Geoff's discovery of Call's musical jams dates back some 50 years.

G. WHARTON: There might've been some magic involved.

N. WHARTON: He was a student at Sacramento State in 1969.

G. WHARTON: One day I was practicing in the practice room and there was some music, which I didn't recognize, just sitting on a shelf. And they were just great little pieces. That's when I started using them as encores in my recitals⁴.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

N. WHARTON: So who was Audrey Call? Geoff spent decades trying to find out.

G. WHARTON: I wrote to her publisher Carl Fischer in New York. They wrote back to me, no, we don't know anything about her. We know that she wrote three pieces because we published them in 1937. But we've got no biographical information on her whatsoever⁵.

N. WHARTON: He kept looking. And then Internet search engines came along. And finally, Geoff got a hit.

G. WHARTON: And I was just so excited. And it was sort of an old record collector in London. And he had a little bit of biographical information, basically that she worked in the studio orchestras in New York specifically for NBC and worked on radio shows - mostly for one called "Fibber McGee and Molly."

(SOUNDBITE OF RADIO SHOW, "FIBBER MCGEE AND MOLLY")

JIM JORDAN: (As Fibber McGee) Maybe little Audrey Call will play us something on that there fiddle⁶ of hers. What's the name of that piece, Audrey?

AUDREY CALL: "Hobgoblin."

JORDAN: (As Fibber McGee) Oh, "Hobgoblin." Is that one of them numbers you wrote yourself?

CALL: Yes it is, Fibber.

N. WHARTON: Geoff learned that Call was married to an Italian-born born composer and radio orchestra bandleader Ulderico Marcelli and that Audrey Call in her youth won competitions for her violin playing.

G. WHARTON: You know, she studied at the Paris Conservatory⁷. And that's in a time when there were all these famous composers running around, you know, the circle around Lili Boulanger - so Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, 1920. I mean, we're talking this is when Ravel is still alive and Paris at that time was just such a hotbed.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

N. WHARTON: Now to Geoff's violin.

G. WHARTON: Oh, this violin is so beautiful. It's got this glowing golden varnish⁸. And, I mean, I've been looking at this violin every day for 50 years. And it's just as beautiful today as the day I bought it.

N. WHARTON: It dates from the middle of the 18th century made by the Italian violin master Januarius Gagliano. Geoff purchased it in California in 1970 not long after he discovered the music of Audrey Call. But it was 25 years later - this is after Geoff had spent decades learning as much as he could about Call that he made a startling discovery.

G. WHARTON: And I was going through papers that had been stored at my mother's house, certificates that had to do with my having bought the Gagliano violin. And I nearly fell over because I looked closely at one of these papers. It said this violin belonged to Audrey Call Marcelli dated 1945.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

G. WHARTON: And that was the moment that I realized there was a kind of cosmic connection between the pieces I've been playing all these years and the owner of my Gagliano violin.

N. WHARTON: Crazy coincidence, right? Was it just because both lived in California that their fates crossed? We may never know. Audrey Call died in 2001 in, Santa Rosa, Calif., at the age of 96. Geoff eventually tracked down Audrey Call's son, Victor Marcelli, who currently lives in the Bay Area.

VICTOR MARCELLI: This is the yearbook of 1929 and...

N. WHARTON: They met up this past summer. Victor says his mother probably sold the violin to raise money to travel. Later in life, she devoted⁹ her time to raising a family and teaching violin to hundreds of students.

MARCELLI: Her whole life had to do with music. And she shared it with everybody. She shared it with the community. And she shared it with her students. And she shared it with the world because she was professionally active late into the 1950s.

(SOUNDBITE OF VIOLIN PLUCKING)

N. WHARTON: At the Marcelli home, Victor showed Geoff another violin she owned and said she played it just a few months before her death.

MARCELLI: She just realized that she couldn't do it anymore. And I remember very touching¹⁰ - it makes me want to cry - she put the violin in this very case, this very violin and said goodbye old friend.

N. WHARTON: This violin isn't in quite the shape of Geoff's Gagliano and could use a new set of strings¹¹. But Victor was happy to hear it come back to life.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

G. WHARTON: Recognize that? Your mother's music played on her violin.

MARCELLI: Yes, that's absolutely right.

(SOUNDBITE OF VIOLIN PLAYING)

N. WHARTON: And here's the final turn to the story. Victor surprised Geoff with this.

MARCELLI: What I would like to just tell you is that I want you to have this violin.

G. WHARTON: What?

MARCELLI: I think it would be meaningful to you more than anybody I can think of in the world. I believe in legacies¹². The value here is not that great, but the value to you might be more. Just the fact that you could play on a violin that she put away and said goodbye old friend, she would be thrilled.

G. WHARTON: I really don't know what to say. Thank you so much.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

N. WHARTON: So Geoff left the Marcelli home with another violin to carry forth¹³ the legacy¹⁴ of Audrey Call. He says he won't sell the violin, eventually he'll pass it on in the same spirit he received it from the Marcelli family. And he hopes to work with a publisher to get her compositions back in print and available to more violinists.

G. WHARTON: They're not meant to be art works, but they're beautifully composed, seriously written - really gems¹⁵.

N. WHARTON: That's Geoffry Wharton, violinist and champion of the music of Audrey Call Marcelli.

For NPR News, I'm Ned Wharton.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

1 serendipity   

n.偶然发现物品之才能；意外新发现

参考例句：

• "It was serendipity all the way,"he says.用他的话说是“一直都很走运”。
• Some of the best effects in my garden have been the result of serendipity.我园子里最珍贵的几件物品是机缘巧合之下意外所得。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

4 recitals   

n.独唱会( recital的名词复数 )；独奏会；小型音乐会、舞蹈表演会等；一系列事件等的详述

参考例句：

• His recitals have earned him recognition as a talented performer. 他的演奏会使他赢得了天才演奏家的赞誉。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Her teachers love her playing, and encourage her to recitals. 她的老师欣赏她的演奏，并鼓励她举办独奏会。 来自互联网

5 whatsoever   

adv.（用于否定句中以加强语气）任何；pron.无论什么

参考例句：

• There's no reason whatsoever to turn down this suggestion.没有任何理由拒绝这个建议。
• All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you,do ye even so to them.你想别人对你怎样，你就怎样对人。

6 fiddle   

n.小提琴；vi.拉提琴；不停拨弄，乱动

参考例句：

• She plays the fiddle well.她小提琴拉得好。
• Don't fiddle with the typewriter.不要摆弄那架打字机了。

7 conservatory   

n.温室，音乐学院；adj.保存性的，有保存力的

参考例句：

• At the conservatory,he learned how to score a musical composition.在音乐学校里，他学会了怎样谱曲。
• The modern conservatory is not an environment for nurturing plants.这个现代化温室的环境不适合培育植物。

8 varnish   

n.清漆；v.上清漆；粉饰

参考例句：

• He tried to varnish over the facts,but it was useless.他想粉饰事实，但那是徒劳的。
• He applied varnish to the table.他给那张桌子涂上清漆。

9 devoted   

adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的

参考例句：

• He devoted his life to the educational cause of the motherland.他为祖国的教育事业贡献了一生。
• We devoted a lengthy and full discussion to this topic.我们对这个题目进行了长时间的充分讨论。

10 touching   

adj.动人的，使人感伤的

参考例句：

• It was a touching sight.这是一幅动人的景象。
• His letter was touching.他的信很感人。

11 strings   

n.弦

参考例句：

• He sat on the bed,idly plucking the strings of his guitar.他坐在床上，随意地拨着吉他的弦。
• She swept her fingers over the strings of the harp.她用手指划过竖琴的琴弦。

12 legacies   

n.遗产( legacy的名词复数 )；遗留之物；遗留问题；后遗症

参考例句：

• Books are the legacies that a great genius leaves to mankind. 书是伟大的天才留给人类的精神财富。 来自辞典例句
• General legacies are subject to the same principles as demonstrative legacies. 一般的遗赠要与指定数目的遗赠遵循同样的原则。 来自辞典例句

13 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

14 legacy   

n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西

参考例句：

• They are the most precious cultural legacy our forefathers left.它们是我们祖先留下来的最宝贵的文化遗产。
• He thinks the legacy is a gift from the Gods.他认为这笔遗产是天赐之物。

15 gems   

growth； economy； management； and customer satisfaction 增长

参考例句：

• a crown studded with gems 镶有宝石的皇冠
• The apt citations and poetic gems have adorned his speeches. 贴切的引语和珠玑般的诗句为他的演说词增添文采。