Moscow Nights: The Van Cliburn Story-How One Man and His Piano Transformed the Cold War (29 page)

PLEASE DELIVER FOLLOWING TO PIANIST VAN CLIBURN: “HEARTIEST CONGRATULATIONS. SPLENDID PERFORMANCE. SIGNED WILLIAM S. B. LACY, SPECIAL ASSISTANT TO THE SECRETARY OF STATE.”

John Foster Dulles had signed the order himself, but the hawkish secretary of state evidently preferred not to associate his name with the Soviet event. Finally, the following day, the White House woke up and sent a telegram in which Dulles’s boss went straight over his head:

DEAR MR. AMBASSADOR:

WILL YOU PLEASE EXTEND MY OFFICIAL AND PERSONAL

CONGRATULATIONS TO VAN CLIBURN. I KNOW THAT ALL AMERICANS JOIN WITH ME IN PAYING TRIBUTE TO HIS ARTISTIC TALENTS AND ARE PROUD THAT HE WAS AWARDED FIRST PRIZE IN THE INTERNATIONAL TCHAIKOVSKY PIANO CONTEST. WHEN HE RETURNS TO THE UNITED STATES, I HOPE HE CAN COME TO THE WHITE HOUSE SO THAT I CAN CONGRATULATE HIM PERSONALLY ON HIS TRIUMPH. IT IS GOOD TO SEE ARTISTIC TALENT RECOGNIZED, AND I BELIEVE SUCH CONTESTS ARE GOOD FOR A BETTER UNDERSTANDING BETWEEN PEOPLES OF ALL NATIONS.

WON’T YOU ALSO EXPRESS MY BEST WISHES TO DANIEL POLLACK WHO TOOK NINTH PLACE IN THE COMPETITION.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER.

Tommy Thompson, now back in Moscow, wrote pointing out that Pollack had in fact placed eighth, and Joyce Flissler had come in seventh in the violin competition and had been completely overlooked. The message was duly amended, though since Flissler had already left Moscow, the embassy sent a cable to New York to await her upon her return.

Van quickly composed a reply, accepting the invitation. The Soviet propaganda machine was determined to get value from the winners, and he had precious little time to himself—just enough to call home for forty minutes and visit Kondrashin’s house to see his new baby. There were tapes to make for Moscow Radio, for which Van and Daniel Pollack were paid
two hundred rubles a minute. Conservatory officials gave Van a private viewing of their prized collection of original manuscripts; among them was Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto no. 1, which Van handled like a
holy relic. They asked him to visit the studio of the sculptor Bachic-Serbien to have a life mask made for its collection. On Thursday he and fellow gold medalist Valery Klimov
made a pilgrimage to Tchaikovsky’s museum-home at Klin. As they approached the large blue-and-white dacha, the composer’s
great-great-nephew came forward to greet them and then gave them a guided tour. When the movie cameras were ready, they took turns performing, Van playing Tchaikovsky’s own piano and perspiring under the klieg lights, until most of the day had gone by. Even then, newsreel cameramen and reporters followed his every step, but it was hard to complain when everyone was so kind and hospitable.

To give Van a break, Paul Moor took him to a concert, which turned out to be one of his most memorable experiences. Sviatoslav Richter had not played in Moscow for nearly a year—he preferred to turn up on short notice and perform on bad pianos in small halls in obscure towns—but he had decided to burn off the grime of judging by giving a recital and two concertos. The recital opened with Schubert’s great last Sonata in B-flat Major, which made Van weep unabashedly for minutes. After the Schumann Toccata, Richter launched into three Prokofiev pieces and finished with the Seventh Sonata, building up with unfathomable subtlety to a thrilling finale. The audience shouted so vehemently that he came back and played it even better.
“I really don’t think I’m in a daze or anything,” Van said, turning to Moor, “but I honestly believe this is the greatest piano playing I’ve ever heard in my life.” Moor, who agreed, reported that the feeling was mutual: Richter had called Van a genius—
“a word,” he had added, “I do not use lightly about performers.” Hearing that,
Van cried again.

Friday evening a
“wildly pushing crowd” jammed the conservatory for Van’s prize recital and demanded seven encores. With Shostakovich listening, Van boldly played a teenage composition of his own called “Nostalgia.” Afterward, Tommy Thompson hosted a buffet supper at his residence, Spaso House. The event was
nearly derailed when Van asked if he could invite several of the leading figures from the competition. The sticking point was not the Soviets but Liu Shikun: the embassy could hardly welcome the Chinese pianist as the representative of a government the United States did not recognize. With the State Department’s cognizance, the supper was declared to be a purely informal affair, and a diplomatic incident was
averted. In the end Liu stayed away, perhaps on his own embassy’s advice, as did Emil Gilels, Lev Vlassenko, and the Soviet violinists. But Shostakovich brought his wife and his son, Maxim; Kabalevsky and Kondrashin also came with their wives; and Richter, who had been in the audience, briefly put in a rare social appearance. Danny Pollack had left to play a tour of southern Soviet cities before
returning to Vienna, but Jerry Lowenthal was present, and overheard Van talking with Tommy Thompson:
“I said to Mr. Khrushchev,” he was explaining to the ambassador, “that in this post-Sputnik age we have to love each other.” How about that, marveled the earnest Lowenthal; the mad-looking kid had turned out to be a natural diplomat.

Thompson was fully aware of the impression Van had made on the Soviet Union. When Secretary Dulles sought his opinion of the young pianist, the ambassador wired back that his victory had done much to disabuse the Soviets of the impression that the United States was a nation of Philistines. He added a caveat, though:
“Because of his immaturity and some personality traits, there is some danger that public and official adulation will go to his head and I took occasion of [a] luncheon which I gave for contestants to give him some friendly advice.” More alarm bells rang when Van found time to write a short article for United Press that was reprinted across America.
“There are no political barriers to music,” he boldly began:

The same blood running through Americans also runs through the Soviet people and compels us to create and enjoy the same art.

I’ve become even more aware of this since I have been in Moscow. What has thrilled me so much is the great spirit of musical unity achieved here at the Tchaikovsky Competition by the different peoples of the world whose governments are at political loggerheads . . .

Russian reaction to my playing has been a wonderfully heartfelt one. These people have long felt that America has a fine culture but until recently have had not much proof of this. I helped to show them that their feelings are right.

They are so pleased to learn that America loves their music—Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich and other Russian composers—as much as they do.

In his enthusiasm to build bridges, Van also made a big fuss about his friendship with Eddik Miansarov and Naum Shtarkman, recounting their first meeting and emphasizing that they had stuck together ever since. Apparently it never crossed his mind that, for their sake, such a show of warmth to a Westerner might have been better kept out of the world’s press.

As Van left the next day, with Henrietta and Paul Moor, for a victory tour of Leningrad, Riga, Kiev, and Minsk, the U.S. embassy in Moscow kept up its dispatches to the State Department.
“Among Moscow teenagers he appears to have somewhat the same appeal which Elvis Presley has in the United States,” Minister-Counselor Richard H. Davis reported. “On the occasion of his recent departure by train for a concert in Leningrad, a crowd of approximately 200 teenage girls saw him off, showering him with flowers, requests for autographs, and chanting in English, ‘we love you.’” In the old czarist capital, there were fevered scenes as scalpers prevented students from getting tickets, and Van spontaneously opened his rehearsal to thousands of disappointed fans. Among them was the
schoolgirl who had watched his finals on TV; she had since gone Van-mad and felt she was in heaven witnessing this mysterious messenger from a distant country in the flesh. Some who had obtained tickets to the evening concert had waited in line for three days and nights, and halfway through the concert, one woman fainted;
others openly wept. Afterward, strangers ran up and hugged and kissed Van, shyly holding out presents. He hugged them back, picking up one girl and twirling her round, and he endeared himself still more when he made a
pilgrimage to Tchaikovsky’s grave, dug up a handful of earth, and took it away in a jar. Equally moved, Van
called Rildia Bee and told her that he had performed on the stage where her teacher Arthur Friedheim had played.

SOMEHOW BILL
Judd managed to get through to his most famous client, and after they spoke he contacted the State Department, which cabled the embassy in Moscow:

NEW YORK AGENTS OF VAN CLIBURN REPORT FROM TELEPHONE CONVERSATION WITH HIM THAT HE MAY BE UNDER CONSIDERABLE RUSSIAN PRESSURE AGAINST HIS WILL TO EXTEND HIS TOUR OF RUSSIA AND THUS JEOPARDIZE FIRM US CONCERT COMMITMENTS. HIS AGENTS REQUEST THAT YOU EXTEND APPROPRIATE ASSISTANCE TO HIM.

The embassy tracked Van down while he was still in Leningrad, and
he explained that he was trying to finish his tour in time to give one last concert in Moscow and then rest for three or four days before flying home. He added that he hoped to return to the USSR afterward, in late May or June. This did not sound like a man who was under duress, and soon another telegram arrived from the State Department, this one marked
SECRET
:

DEPARTMENT HAS RECEIVED REPORT THAT MANAGER OF VAN CLIBURN, WHO HAS BEEN IN TELEPHONIC COMMUNICATION WITH CLIBURN IN MOSCOW, AND ANOTHER FRIEND OF CLIBURN ARE CONCERNED OVER WHAT THEY CONSIDER TO BE DECIDED CHANGE IN ATTITUDE OF YOUNG PIANIST. IN ONE CONVERSATION CLIBURN REPORTEDLY STATED HE WAS PLANNING TO RETURN TO MOSCOW FOR LONG VACATION. IN ANOTHER CONVERSATION WHEN QUERIED AS TO HIS PLANS WHEN IN WASHINGTON, CLIBURN STATED THAT IF PRESIDENT WANTED TO SEE HIM WHITE HOUSE COULD GET IN TOUCH WITH HIM. ADDITIONALLY, THESE FRIENDS NOTE THAT CLIBURN HAS BECOME QUITE LAUDATORY OF HIS RECEPTION AND STAY IN SOVIET UNION. UNDER CIRCUMSTANCES, THEY ARE PARTICULARLY APPREHENSIVE AS TO WHAT MIGHT HAPPEN WHEN CLIBURN FIRST RETURNS TO US AND MEETS PRESS. THEY BELIEVE HE IS LIABLE TO MAKE SOME VERY UNWISE STATEMENTS IF QUERIED ON POLITICAL MATTERS, ABOUT WHICH HE KNOWS VERY LITTLE, PARTICULARLY IN VIEW OF HIS REPORTED CHANGE IN ATTITUDE. THEY SPECULATE IN THIS REGARD THAT CLIBURN MAY HAVE BEEN “APPROACHED” BY SOVIETS.

The information, which was doubtless obtained by listening in on Van’s calls, had first been passed to the office of FBI director
J. Edgar Hoover. According to the report, Van had told Judd that he intended to stay in Russia indefinitely “and further stated ‘If Eisenhower wants to see me, he knows where he can find me.’” The informant added that Judd was “very much concerned in that he believes when Clibern [
sic
] returns he will make a fool out of himself with his pro-Soviet attitude.” Hoover suggested that the president’s press secretary, James Hagerty, be alerted and added, “Also suggest Johnson (Senator) be
confidentially
advised.” The two men were duly informed; Hagerty replied that the president was committed to meeting the young pianist, but the White House
“would play it very cautiously from now on.”

Fears that Van’s enthusiasm might convert a cultural triumph into a propaganda debacle were bad enough, but the suggestion that Soviet recruiters might have turned him was deeply grave. When he finally returned to Moscow on May 10, somewhat rested after swallowing another potent Soviet sleeping pill on the night train from Minsk, he was met by a party of U.S. embassy officials who protested that they hadn’t spent any real time with him and declared that this was to be
his embassy day. Two days later Minister-Counselor Davis replied to Foggy Bottom with a
lengthy telegram, also marked
SECRET
. Van was planning to bring his parents to the Soviet Union that summer and to return for three months the following spring, he noted. But he had “so far kept away from any political comment and I would judge from
my talk with him today he will continue to do so.” While the young pianist was undoubtedly naive and politically unsophisticated, Davis concluded, “I would doubt that he has been ‘approached’ by Soviets or that he has any idea other than pursuing his musical career in US and abroad in fashion normal to life of an international artist.”

Between his triumph and the traditional heated Russian hospitality, Van would have been hard-hearted indeed if he had not lost his head a little. During his absence, hundreds of letters and boxes of
pink floral telegrams had piled up in his hotel room, some simply addressed, “Conservatory, Vanya Kleeburn.” Many came from students: not only musicians but entire classes at the
Faculty for History and Philology of the Ivanovo State Pedagogical Institute and the
Faculty of Soil Science and Biology of Moscow State University, who signed themselves, “Your friends forever.” Others came from a
forestry engineer, a geographer, and a telegraph operator named Saida Nurmukhamedova, who asked Van, “on behalf of all
Soviet telegraph operators, to pass our friendly greetings to the American telegraph operators. Our telegraph operators will always be happy to hear your exceptional playing.” She added, “When I have a son I shall definitely name him after you.” Many declared undying love, sometimes in the form of
tearful verses written on paper adorned with roses or lilies of the valley.
“Vanyusha my dear,” one simply read, “please stay in Moscow and the USSR. Nowhere else would people value and love you more.” Two girls in the seventh grade told him,
“You set our hearts on fire.” Other letters were anonymous, including one from a pianist, a graduate of the Moscow Conservatory, who had been reduced to tears by Van’s Rachmaninoff.
“How hard it is going to be to say good-bye,” she concluded. “You will probably never know about me, but I want you to know that when you leave you will take with you a piece of my heart, and that I will be with you till the end of my days. Don’t forget me. I won’t tell you my name. What for?” Occasionally there was a hint of distrust for the West—one writer asked Van to pass on his best wishes
“to all honest Americans”—or a brave barb at the Soviet Union. The students of the Vilnius Conservatory wrote
saying how delighted they were that he had won and how sorry they were to be
“living in this nasty place that isn’t one of the cities that you will visit.” Yet many letters, some very long and earnest, voiced hopes that Van’s triumph would improve world relations.
“I would like to express my deep gratitude to our compatriot Rosina Levina who has instilled in you the love for Russian music and the Russian people,” wrote twenty-year-old medical student Klara Gribanova. “I would like the friendship between the young people all round the world to become even stronger.” In comradely fashion, she signed off, “With a warm handshake.”