Joshua Bell will join the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields at the State Theatre.
By: Michael Redmond
Although Joshua Bell denies that he’s taken up conducting, he admits he’s "halfway there" and having a blast in the role of the "leader" or "director" of the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, the renowned British orchestra with which he’s touring the United States, then Britain, Spain and The Netherlands.
"I enjoy doing this sort of thing with St. Martin’s because I get to do some great repertory I wouldn’t otherwise get the chance to do, like Tchaikovsky’s serenade and Beethoven’s seventh symphony," says the violinist, star of stage, screen and recording studio. "I’m not dropping the violin and picking up the baton, and I don’t know how much of this I’m going to do in the future, but it’s very rewarding to have the chance of preparing a piece the way you see it, then bringing that vision to the audience."
Before conductors arrived on the scene in the early 19th century, an orchestra’s concertmaster that is, the first violinist or "leader" typically performed much of a conductor’s function, the "traffic cop" stuff such as starts and stops, entrances and exits, and rates of speed. This is exactly what Mr. Bell will be doing with St. Martin’s as soloist and leader of Antonio Vivaldi’s ever-popular The Four Seasons (1723), the anchor of most programs on this tour, including the concert to be played at the State Theatre in New Brunswick March 29.
Itzhak Perlman and Pinchas Zukerman are already doing a lot of conducting. The consensus among critics is that they shouldn’t quit their day jobs. Yet Mr. Bell’s attraction to a new musical role is easily understood, as is the willingness of the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra to allow Mr. Bell to explore that role. The fact is, Joshua Bell has already achieved just about everything a classical violinist can be expected to achieve, and then some and he’s just shy of age 40.
Some 20 years ago, when Mr. Bell began his career, the joke in the industry had to do with a Hollywood casting director who was looking for a violinist. Not a European, thank you; not a foreign accent, thank you; not silver-haired and high-browed, thank you; no somebody American, somebody young, good-looking, easy to talk to, attractive to young people, comfortable chatting with Jay on The Tonight Show, and spectacularly gifted. The casting director picked up the phone. "Get me Joshua Bell!"
Well, it’s all true and it has all come true for Mr. Bell, a Hoosier who could play the same 10 concertos for the rest of his life and still enjoy a lucrative career. That’s the story, in short, of many a classical virtuoso. But Mr. Bell, who frankly describes his musical taste as "in many ways, conservative," is liberal in his musical interests. While it’s true he can afford to be, having won three Grammys, having topped Billboard charts, having received invitations from all over the world for years to come, still, he enjoys pushing certain edges.
Mr. Bell has gone out of his way to champion new works he believes in, such as Nicholas Maw’s Violin Concerto, and he worked closely for some three years with Pulitzer Prize-winning composer John Corigliano in the creation of the Academy Award-winning score for the film The Red Violin (1999), for which Mr. Bell recorded the solos. Mr. Corigliano who exulted that "Joshua plays like a god" during his Oscar acceptance speech proceeded to derive a concerto from the film music, which Mr. Bell has recorded with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Marin Alsop. It’s due out any day now from Sony Classical, paired with Mr. Corigliano’s violin sonata.
"I love working with composers and being part of the birth of new pieces. It’s exciting to be part of making history," Mr. Bell says. "Working with John (Corigliano) was just an incredible experience. It was fun being part of a film project, but there’s no reward like being given a brilliant new concerto, 40 minutes of music it’s a big piece."
Commissioning a piece can be risky, Mr. Bell admits. "With old music, you know how great it is. With a commission, you might end up with something you don’t like, but you’ve promised to play it." Still, he’s not trimming his sails. He has commissioned a piece from Jay Greenberg of New York, the 16-year-old prodigy composer who has been profiled on 60 Minutes and has other projects in the works.
Another measure of this artist’s character can be found in his collaborations and the way he does "cross over." Mr. Bell is so confident a player that he invited the sensational Russian soprano Anna Netrebko to perform on Voice of the Violin, his CD of classical arias and songs. (Other instrumentalists wouldn’t have allowed her within a mile of the recording studio and they would have been right.) Mr. Bell has appeared with popular artists as different in style and medium as Chick Corea, Sting and Béla Fleck, and he has a longstanding relationship with double bass virtuoso Edgar Meyer, with whom he went on tour in the company of "a group of legendary bluegrass players."
"I got a lot out of that," Mr. Bell says. "In some senses, they were the most amazing musicians I’ve ever worked with. The way they improvised, night after night, with a whole different way of approaching rhythm it was just amazing."
Timing is everything. As the on-the-road interview comes to an end, Mr. Bell arrives at the public school in the Bronx where he is to give a music education program. He does that kind of thing, too, everywhere he goes. Among his numerous credits, industry people agree, one more needs to be added. In a field brimming with prima donnas, egocentrics and eccentrics, Josh Bell is a genuinely nice guy.
Joshua Bell will perform with the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields at the State Theatre, 15 Livingston Ave., New Brunswick, March 29, 8 p.m. The program includes Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons and Brahms’ String Quintet No. 2 in G, Op. 111. Tickets cost $60-$90. For information, call (732) 246-7469. State Theatre on the Web: www.statetheatrenj.org

