Belonging Begins Before Permission: Nancy Shear Part 2 | Creativity, Mentorship, and Life Inside Music

The room changes when a true maestro enters—yet the most revealing stories often happen offstage. We sit down with Nancy Shear to explore the hidden lives behind classical music’s brightest names and the personal courage it takes to step through doors that weren’t built for you. From a conductor who needed worship more than love to a cellist whose wild openness defied a regime, this is a lived portrait of power, devotion, and the craft most people never see.

Nancy takes us inside a world of stage doors, library stacks, and late-night score study where color, balance, and bowings decide the fate of a performance. She speaks candidly about navigating inequity in the 60s, the “good girl” codes that marked the era, and the boundary crossings that come with proximity to influence. We trace the contrasts between Stokowski’s controlled, ageless aura and Rostropovich’s expansive, risk-soaked playing, then follow her to Cold War Moscow on a mission of friendship that became a lesson in fearlessness and human connection. Along the way, she reveals the origin of her book’s title, the thrill of shaking a hand that once shook Brahms’s, and the ritual of leaving soil from Beethoven and Mahler at a mentor’s grave.

This conversation is as tactile as it is philosophical: the scissors pressed into her palm, the hushed terror of a dressing room standoff, the way recordings fuse with memory until you can’t tell vibration from recollection. We talk about archives, firings, and where the music lives after the music stops. Most of all, we talk about belonging—how to claim it without permission, how to practice “good trouble,” and how persistence becomes destiny. If you’ve ever loved a sound enough to rebuild your life around it, this one is for you.

If the story resonates, follow the show, share it with a friend who loves music and history, and leave a review so more listeners can find conversations like this. Your notes help keep these doors open.

Transcript

Boundaries, Power, And Respect

SPEAKER_00 0:08

Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Anne. I am Anne. Last week we had part one with Nancy Sheer. This week we're going to be doing part two. We're going to move beyond the stage and into the heart of what it means to grow, to belong, and to listen deeply to your own voice. This is where the stories become more intimate, where lessons are learned in silence as much as sound, and where we explore the unseen journey behind mastery, identity, and courage. This is part two. You once wrote that you could read him in much of the same way that you did your mom. And yet throughout your childhood and young adult life, you know, he never, you know, younger, he never crossed that line with you. And he was a womanizer, three wives, and affairs. And if he would have crossed that line with you when you were younger than you were, do you think that your book and your life would have been different?

SPEAKER_02 1:05

Absolutely. It would have been a horrible betrayal and probably would have it would have been it would have been abuse. Um but many years later, I knew him for, let's see, from about 65, no, earlier, 62, it's about 15 years. And I grew up during that time. And there was a time later, and I write about it with um I was attracted to him. And and I knew him, came to know him differently, which was had its own beauty. Um but if that had happened without my was more than consent, I I I was the one who had changed, and he was very pleased about that. But uh i if it had been when I was much younger, a very naive, protected kid, it would have been very damaging.

SPEAKER_00 2:04

Yeah, I thought so too.

SPEAKER_01 2:05

Uh what do you think stopped him?

SPEAKER_02 2:11

That's a really interesting you've asked some wonderful questions, and I have to tell you, some really perceptive, knowledgeable questions. What stopped him? I think I think there was some respect there for a a kid, a curious kid, who also worshipped him. And he knew that I did. I don't think it was any i it couldn't have been any secret that that he was a heroic figure in my life. And I don't think he wanted to lose that or or um or hurt me. I think I don't think he wanted to take a chance in hurting me. And I think he knew too that I I I wasn't looking at him in in that kind of a light. That this was the heroic musician. And and thank goodness he respected that. He he there was a lot of respect that went both ways. A lot.

Adulation Versus Love

SPEAKER_00 3:13

Yeah, I thought he really respected you, and he I think he genuinely loved you, and that was why. You know, so I mean that's what it felt like. Dikovsky created this youth orchestra, and he genuinely loved sitting with young people, and he really loved connection with everybody, but in general, he kept the closest people to him distant, and even his wives didn't truly know him. And he was married to Gloria Vanderbilt and had affairs with Greta Garbo, and still those women described him as being close in bed, but distant in life. And you wrote something that really stayed with me. You said that you think that he needed adulation more than love. Looking back, why do you think that was?

SPEAKER_02 4:05

Well, to really love someone, you have to you you have to and to have them love you, you really have to make yourself vulnerable and known. And known. And I think he was very frightened of people really knowing him. And I even I had to be very careful. Um there there were so many times, especially, you know, just at the dinner table, uh, where I would know how he would react to something and I'd avoid it. And I and I would just be but I didn't want him to know that I knew him that well, because then he he would sort of back up. But um I've always felt that um he grew up in in Victorian England, you know, he was born in 1882.

SPEAKER_01 4:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 5:00

In the England of that time, whatever your social class was, that's how it stayed. It wasn't so easy in those days to to make a great career if if and his parents were not poor, but they were not rich either. It was middle class.

SPEAKER_01 5:19

Right.

SPEAKER_02 5:19

And they lived in in a London suburb. And I think in his mind, he wanted to be royal. He wanted to be more certainly, if not royal, aristocratic. He wanted to be a member of the ar uh of the aristocracy, and and it was very important to people in England at that time. So um I think to really make yourself vulnerable in a love, loving relationship, that's risky to some people. Not everybody can do that, but he needed to be worshipped. And when I wrote that I think he needed adulation more than love, I think there were reasons. When when you worship somebody, they're up on that pedestal, and there's no risk involved uh for them. They don't have to make themselves known. But to to make yourself psychologically naked and known to someone else is can be very risky. And I think that's what was going on. You know, he climbed up on that podium as conductors did, and he was autonomous.

SPEAKER_01 6:35

Right.

SPEAKER_02 6:36

That was that was it. Um they did people did what he wanted as he wanted. Um and in a loving, close relationship, that doesn't fly. You don't want one person to to dominate. You'd hope that a loving relationship would just be more equal.

Class, Image, And The Mask

SPEAKER_00 6:54

Yeah. Um when you were uh, I think possibly the person that he did confide in the most about those things, about who he really was, about his father being a cabinet maker, uh, and about the history, his history. And he had lied about so much about his origin, his age, and his background, and wanted to be, you know, associated with affluence when he wasn't, well, you know, not to the degree that he wanted to. And yet you, you know, with you, he told you the truth. He even read you letters from his wife, Gloria Vanderbilt. And before, you know, what was really cool that I thought that he referred to you before you as B you, which says so much about how significant you were to him. So I wanted to ask you, do you think that you were the person who was truly closest to him? And do you think that anyone ever really knew him?

SPEAKER_02 8:00

I suspect that I probably was closer to him where he confided more in me than he did to to anyone else, but I don't know that for a fact. I I wasn't it was before I moved to New York. I was with him occasionally, but I didn't there m there may have been someone else. I don't know them, and I I don't suspect that there was, but I don't know uh definitively that he never confided in anyone else. I don't know that. But I want to say something that don't forget that I was not a member of royalty or the aristocracy, okay, nor nor was I a very wealthy woman. I wasn't socially prominent, I was not um what's the word I'm looking for? Um fashion model, beautiful. He he confided in me. Had I been someone with tremendous stature, maybe it would have been too risky for him. But I and I'm not I'm not belittling my relationship with him or the strength of our connection, but I'm being honest. That if I had been a very prominent person on my own at that time, he may not have risked that kind of closeness.

SPEAKER_00 9:25

Mm-hmm. It it just it seemed that he was ruled by control in all areas, even in closeness. And the women he chose were all decades younger than he was, which feels significant. Did you mind him calling you good girl? Because every time I read that I just kind of cringed a little.

SPEAKER_02 9:46

Don't forget this was the 60s. Uh women were identified as school teachers or secretaries, and the options were far fewer than than there than they are now. And the women in those positions would call their boss Mr. So-and-so, and the boss would call them by their first names. So there was tremendous inequity. Um this was before feminism. This was before this this was a whole different era. So, but also don't forget, there were four, there were he was sixty some years older than I was. Yes, yes. And and truth of it was I was a girl. I wasn't a woman yet. I was a girl. Right, right. And it was kind of fun. It was kind of cute when when he wrote something about sending him a bill, so be a a good girl, and then he put the parenthesis, but not too. It was just fun.

SPEAKER_01 10:47

It was cute.

Control, Age Gaps, And Language

SPEAKER_00 10:48

Well, it is really true that it was just completely different back then than it is now.

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Totally.

SPEAKER_00 10:53

Later in life, he did tell you that he did love you. And he did cross that boundary much later when he was in his 90s, and you know, there was that significant age difference that you talked about 60 years, and by then you were also involved with other well-known musicians in a romantic way. I want to ask this gently: do you think that uh Stakovsky was your person in the same way? Because you said that you really didn't want marriage or a traditional commitment. Do you think that if time had been different or if you had been closer in age, that the relationship could have been something more? Or did you want it to still exist the way it did?

SPEAKER_02 11:39

Um, I don't think it could have been more because I didn't have the stature that he needed. He really needed women who were who were either from great families or had tremendous amount of money. I'm not talking about, you know, upper middle class. I'm talking about much different situation. I certainly don't think there it would have been a a marriage relationship or a permanent relationship in that way. But one thing I that's really important, and I've talked to so many people about this, people who knew him really, really well in a business way. Okay. Um he was ageless. There are some people who don't get old. And even when he had trouble walking, when he was in his 90s, he he he was this incredibly impressive human being with an energy. You know, sometimes you don't have to run around the room to show how much energy it was some people can just be silent and still, and they exude this energy energy force. And he did. And I remember the one thing that everybody said about him. He is ageless. We would talk about it, you know, but well, like when I'd get back from England or France and I'd I'd see some musicians and and they'd say, Hey, where were you did you know you were visiting with Stokey, which was his his nickname in the world. And um, and I'd say, Yeah, and then and and they'd say something about, you know, well, he's in his eighties, his nineties, and we'd talk about the fact that he was ageless. It's a it's a phenomenon, but that's how it was. So I never felt there was an age gap at all.

SPEAKER_00 13:26

That is incredible.

Was More Ever Possible

SPEAKER_02 13:27

No. That is but you know, he was he was forty-two years older than Gloria Vanderbilt. His Right. Right. She was when they married, she was twenty-one and he was sixty-three. Um, Greta Garbo, there was a an age discrepancy. His second wife, I forget how, I think 15 years. She was fifteen years younger. It age meant numbers meant nothing. They have no meaning with him.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

Yeah. I mean, that's great. That's a really great way to be, I think. Because we could all meet if they're, you know, we don't pay attention to the age. And we can all, you know, learn so much from each other. So sometimes age gets in the way.

SPEAKER_02 14:08

Oh, absolutely. And and so I just had this discussion with with my close friend last night. We're talking about that if you want if you want an excuse not to do something, age is sometimes very convenient. Um now I understand, because I get it, that when you get older you don't have as much energy. You feel a little bit fragile, but still there's a hell of a lot you can do in life when you get older.

SPEAKER_00 14:36

He was working all the way up until the end.

SPEAKER_02 14:38

Eighteen I was with him eighteen days before, and right until literally the day he died. Uh, he was studying his score of the Rahman and Off Symphony number two, which he had never recorded in a studio recording. And the day he was supposed to record it was the day of his funeral. But he worked, he worked until the last minute. How wonderful. He was doing something he loved and he was accomplishing things. And oh, I I I can't think of a of a greater situation if that's what you want.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

Right. Yes. Now I want to switch gears to Slava Rostropovich. He was Russian, he did not speak much English, and he was open, emotionally defiant, and uncontained, and he lived large. He was a very famous cellist. How different was he from Stachovsky? I mean, they just seemed so different in that he woke something up in you that was different.

Ageless Energy And Legacy

SPEAKER_02 15:41

Rostropych was wild. I mean, what you didn't know what was gonna happen. It was wild everything about him was larger than life. His music making and and his personality and and what he did in the world, and it was just huge, and and you just never knew. Now, Stakovsky was not predictable, but he was never, ever wild, or you never had the feeling that his music making or he were gonna be out of control with Rosterpool, but you didn't know. I remember sitting at Carnegie Hall and he was playing, and I thought, what he it was so fa it was fabulous and not and certainly not out of place musically. I'm not saying he did things that the composer didn't want, but you just didn't know when it was gonna veer out of control. It was it was remarkable. He and also, as you mentioned, his openness as a human being, he would tell, you know, it was like there were no secrets. He would not only tell me things, but I think he shared with other friends. He was extremely open, where Stukovsky was not. Their music making, both of them had this Slavic extroverted expressiveness. And so there were similarities in that way, as as well as the differences.

SPEAKER_00 17:05

His story really was interesting. And you there are opportunities, and then there's just like next level. And I have to tell you that, you know, Slava was still in Russia at the time, and he was in trouble. I mean, the Soviet government was not happy with him and he was banned, and they didn't want him touring, and eventually he would lose the citizenship and get it back. But I mean, you know, there was a lot going on. And before all of that really unfolded, you were worried about him and you needed to know if he was okay. So you went to Moscow during the Cold War as a young American Jewish woman to check out a dissident. I mean, that tells me everything about who you are. I mean, you've said that you didn't feel fear in those moments, only purpose and adventure, which I mean, I can feel that through the entire book, honestly. And you know, it comes down so clearly in your story that you weren't about fear, but would you do that again?

SPEAKER_02 18:14

Oh yeah. Now, are you talking about would I do it again back then or would I do it right now?

SPEAKER_00 18:19

Ever. I mean, yes.

Fearless Trip To Soviet Moscow

SPEAKER_02 18:21

You know, now it it's different now. Um, I'm I don't have the old energy that I did. I hope it's coming back, but been through a difficult time. I'm older. Um, I it it snowed two days ago in New York. And that's usually a major event in my life is snow. I love snow. I didn't go out. This is this is the only the second time in my life because I'm afraid of slipping. A friend of mine fell on the ice um Saturday afternoon. We were all together as a group on Friday. She, and she's younger than I am, she fell on the ice and broke her kneecap. So would I go charging off now to Russia? No, I I think I'd be uh I'd be concerned physically, uh, maybe even as far as the authorities were concerned, because there were stories about Americans being arrested or or they would take a photograph of an empty lot and they'd end up in jail. And um, but I had zero I had zero fear. I was just gonna find my friend Rostropovich, whom I cared deeply about, and and I was gonna have one of the great adventures of my life. It may have may have been the greatest adventure. It was really oh well, you know, also I'm Jewish third generation, second and third generation American. Um so my great-grandparents and and one of my no then two of my grandparents came here. They were extremely young. My grandfather was five, my grandmother was two, and they came to the United States. Um, so I had I had a feeling for what they called in those days in Jewish homes the old country. That's how they would refer to Russia, Poland, Austria. Oh, my aunt, one of my uncles said you're going back to the he says our our family, our grandparents, our parents and grandparents risked their lives to get out of there, and you're paying to get back. Right. You know, they didn't understand that I wanted to it's also the Russian culture with classical music. We're talking about Tchaikovsky, Rimsky Korsikov, Mzorgsky. I can go on and on. Uh Pushkin, poets. There was a romantic quality about that country, and I wanted to get to know it. Great, great, great experience. The the um the powers there, the government was horrible. The people were beautiful. I had so many deeply touching encounters with Russians who were supposed to be enemies. We weren't supposed to care about each other on New Year's Eve 1971 and Red Square passing bowls of champagne through this whole crowd. I mean, if there was one germ, we were all gonna get it. Um everybody was drinking out of these bowls. It was like a communal bowl of champagne, and I looked around as as the you know the great Kremlin clock struck midnight and the bells rang, and I'm looking around and I'm thinking, these human beings are supposed to be my enemies. Yeah, I had I had very profound connections with a lot of people in those days.

SPEAKER_00 21:51

You know, I often say if we let go of all of those things, you know, we're more alike than people realize. We really are.

SPEAKER_02 22:00

Absolutely right.

SPEAKER_00 22:01

Absolutely right. What a beautiful experience that you had. Oh my gosh. I'm you know, as terrified I w as I was for you when I read that. I mean, you know, look what you walked away with.

SPEAKER_02 22:15

Yeah, that w that was it was really was astonishing. Uh you know, I I I I think we regret what we don't do more than what we do. Hundred yep. And what scares me is that if I hadn't gone in 1970, if I hadn't gone to Russia, um, I never would have known what I had missed. I wouldn't have known what this trip would do and and the worlds it would open. And and there it you know, there is something that's like this is from Eleanor Roosevelt too, is about courage and taking chances and putting yourself out there, especially if somebody else is going to benefit.

Enemies, Culture, And Connection

SPEAKER_00 22:55

You know, I want to talk for a moment about Eugene Ormandy because your relationship with him feels complicated in a very different way. And he was a powerful conductor at the Philadelphia Orchestra and instrumental in your early access to the concert hall. I mean, he's literally the one that gave you the ticket to get in. And he opened the door for you. I mean, literally and figuratively, really, in a way, but he was also not well liked and not that kind at times. And he didn't um want you to have a relationship with Leopold Stakovsky and explicitly ordered you not to. So that alone put you in an impossible situation. And then there were moments where he crossed boundaries. Now talk about your life changing um or what it could have been. You know, I mean, he courted you, he cornered you for a kiss. He asked you to deliver music to his apartment, and he wouldn't let you leave. And he was controlling in ways that extended even to how you looked, you know, the sunglasses on your head, take them off. And you complied. What made it even more complicated was that Ormondy later discovered through the Philadelphia newspaper after Stakovsky's death that you had been working with both of them. And he refused to talk to you after that for years. And when you look back on that period now, being young and dependent and on access, navigating powerful men, mixed gratitude, fear, and silence. How do you make sense of it? And what do you wish that people understood about what it cost to simply exist in those spaces?

SPEAKER_02 24:37

I had to be very, very careful because Ormond D was very petty and very easily threatened. He did not have a whole lot of confidence in any way. A lot of it came from his height because he was, I think, five, five foot six. Okay. Yeah, and he did wear platform shoes, but you know, Sttukovsky was 6'2. So I there were there were a lot of reasons. There was a tremendous amount of jealousy and regret from Sttukovsky, who was King of Philadelphia. Ormondy never reached that. But Ormondy was highly, highly regarded. Even to this day, people will say, You worked with Eugene Ormondy. And I'll and I'll sometimes I explain my feelings, sometimes I don't. So he still had and has a tremendous reputation. Um, I did not respect him as a person. I did not like what he did musically. Um everything was very predictable. He didn't take chances. I do like people who take ch take some chances or have a an unusual voice, especially artists. That's what that's part of what they're supposed to do is have a different vision of the world and the art. So no, Ormondy and I did not like each other. Um what hurt me was that I loved Ormandy's wife. She was a darling human being who was long-suffering. And um and we both we looked very much alike. So after the concerts, I would go back with his scores, and people would look at me and say, Oh, you're the Ormandy's daughter. And I loved that because she was she was such a a warm, good soul. And she stopped speaking to me too. She considered it uh that I was disloyal to both of them. But she had her problems with him. I remember conversations when I was up in the library and she would call and she she put up with a lot from him. So she knew.

SPEAKER_01 26:51

She knew.

Ormandy: Access And Retaliation

SPEAKER_02 26:52

But we were reunited at the Van Kleibern competition in 1989. I hadn't seen her in many, many years. Well, it was probably, let's say, 1970s, 19 maybe maybe it was 17, 18 years. But I saw her at the Van Kleibern competition. And she ignored me completely. And I and I went over to her and I bent down and I said, Do you know who I am? And with the very angry, she said, Of course I know who you are. And I was so wasn't being hurt. I was just sad. And I looked at her and I said, I always loved you. And I walked away. And we had a couple of words after that, just you know, small talk, but but it hurt. It hurt a lot. She was someone I had cared about.

SPEAKER_00 27:46

Yeah, because it was something over so trivia something so trivial.

SPEAKER_02 27:51

They didn't consider it trivial, they considered it, you know, a It was a big deal. It was to them, which which shows how insecure he was and transferred it to her. Yeah. Complicates, these human beings.

SPEAKER_00 28:07

All about Yeah. You guys were all strong personalities. I mean, Strakovsky was, and Slava was, and you were, and you were all very enmeshed in each other's lives, and you hid the men from each other, not letting Strakovsky know that you were still involved, involved in Slava's life, and you didn't let the conductor Ormondy know that you were still working with Strakovsky. So, I mean, it was a constant juggling on your part. It was nice to see, though, that even though you were doing that, that these men wanted you, they they wanted you to do it, but you were still in control and you knew what you wanted, and you were actually a great chess player in their game. I that's what I thought is that you were a great player in this game, and you belonged there. You were the reason the only picture of the two of them together exists, and you met Stakovsky at the door, at the stage door, and then you walked to the the dressing room, and there was Ormandy in the dressing room, and they ended up, they stood there and they stayed for a a picture, and that photo represented 53 years of orchestra music dictatorship. What did it feel like to witness that picture?

SPEAKER_02 29:32

Oh, I was terrified because the problem was that I the tradition uh what that I had with Stokovski is I'd meet him at the stage door, and then I he'd hand me his briefcase, and it was kind of a fun thing, and he put his hand, he'd have his hand uh on on my shoulder, and and we'd go back to his dressing room, never ever thinking that Ormandy would be there, and and that my cover was blown. Now I walk back and I'm holding the suitcase. Dukowski has his hand on my shoulder and we o and we knock on the door and Ormandy opens it. So I was petrified that I was gonna lose my job, and I came very close to it. Then Ormandy, you know, the this honorific people don't use it always in the right way of maestro. Uh maestro, which translates in Italian to master. Okay. Everybody will will refer to a conductor as maestro. No, no, no, no, no. That you can do to their face, but behind their back, very few orchestras call the conductor, refer to him as maestro. But with Stukovsky, the Philadelphia Orchestra did. It was always the my the maestro. So when I walked back with Stakovsky, and and there was Ormandy who walked over to me, I was still holding the suitcase out of fear. I I mean, I was frozen with fear.

SPEAKER_01 31:02

Right, right.

SPEAKER_02 31:03

And Ormondy says, put that down quietly enough so Stukovsky wouldn't hear him. And I made that horrible mistake of saying, I don't know where Maestro wants it, Mr. Ormondy.

SPEAKER_01 31:18

Terrible.

Juggling Giants And A Photo

SPEAKER_02 31:19

I went, oh and the next morning Ormondy had his secretary call the librarian of the orchestra and say, you tell Nancy to stay away from Stakovski. But you know, it's interesting. I never thought of this as a game or a chess game or making moves. It wasn't, it was just living life.

SPEAKER_00 31:41

Mm-hmm. But you were good at it, regardless of if it was a game or not. You you were very good at reading, and it does does probably stem back all the way from your childhood of being able to read the people in the room and knowing what to do.

SPEAKER_02 31:58

I had to have antenna like this. I had to know everything that was going on all the time because I had to know when my mother was upset or if something would upset her or trigger an emotional response. And that is always that that's that's a skill you develop that that you never lose.

SPEAKER_00 32:20

I agree. I agree. You you worked really hard for your degree, and when Stakovsky told you to complete it in three years, I mean you did it. You didn't even question him. And that decision led you into extraordinary spaces. You went on to work with already were working with some of the finest orchestras in the world, eventually landing what you've called your best job at the Curtis Institute of Music, one of the most prestigious conservatories anywhere. Only 140 students get in, you said, and on full scholarship. Even millionaires don't pay to attend, you said. And along the way, you worked in radio and a journalist, and you held the original scores of the great composers in your hands, studying them line by line. You helped the maestro and legendary conductors shape performances, adjusting music for acoustics, space, mood. And you weren't just near history, you were trusted with it. So when you look back now, I want to ask this: was this the life that you wanted? Was this the life that you dreamed of as that young girl sitting on the steps hoping someone would let you in?

SPEAKER_02 33:37

Going back just for a second to the Curtis Institute, that wasn't what I considered my my most beloved job. Um the Philadelphia Orchestra really that was, yeah, even at my age now, I look back on that as just a golden time. Uh Curtis Institute, the students were so wonderful and so loving and lovable, and that 50 years later, I am still in very close touch with a number of them. I thought I was gonna be a journalist. I thought I was going to devote my entire life to writing. I wrote in when I was like 14 years old to Eleanor Roosevelt, because I've received the letters, that I was gonna be a United Nations delegate because I was gonna help get peace in the world, you know. Okay I didn't really dream about it. It it happened. I'm I'm thrilled that it did. It did because every next minute I was involved in something else with music. Uh but I will say that the last 60 years, and I don't feel that old, have been a great, great privilege to work with the way I have. That's a privilege.

SPEAKER_01 35:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:02

I'm still endlessly thrilled to have had that. I hope to continue with it.

SPEAKER_00 35:07

Yeah, you know, decades after that you had earned your place in the music world and were deeply respected in your own right. Uh you said that you, when you sat in the audience, you sometimes still felt like a gate crasher.

SPEAKER_02 35:19

Oh, absolutely. I'll never lose that.

SPEAKER_00 35:22

Yeah, okay. I was wondering.

Gatecrasher Feelings Persist

SPEAKER_02 35:25

Oh no, I'll never lose that. You know, in fact, I'm hoping to hear um Tristan and Isolda at the Metropolitan Opera in March. And I was thinking about it because I'm gonna buy a ticket. And um, you know, there are times where I'm offered free tickets, whatever, but it doesn't matter whether I have how I got the ticket when those ushers start coming up that aisle, and I immediately, it's like, you know, am I sitting in a seat where where I don't belong? Or are they gonna find out that that uh that I I snuck into this concert? So yeah, I think that that really stays with me.

SPEAKER_00 36:05

I want to circle back to the title. I knew a man who knew Brahms. Talk about that.

The Man Who Knew Brahms

SPEAKER_02 36:12

Well, I was 18 years old working with the Philadelphia Orchestra in the library, and this very old man, but I mean he really was. You know, sometimes, you know, you'll say, uh when you're young, anybody who's past 30 or 40 is old. But this guy was probably in his 80s, late 80s or or 90s, and uh very small, uh, what I remember very little hair on his head and and dark circular glass frames, and spoke with a a uh a Germanic accent and or a Viennese accent. And um he walked in and and one of the people in the library, William Smith, said very was he had this dramatic flair, shake this man's hand. So he walked over to me and I partly stood up and took hold of his hand. So we were holding hands, and Bill said, You are now shaking the hand, shook the hand of Brahms. When when you're 18 years old, when you're 18, it's it it changes who you are. It's that intimate contact with history. You know, now if I had I met a lot I've met a lot of composers of my time, you know, but Brahms was Brahms. So but it puts it puts everything into a fascinating perspective about being a certain age, meeting um uh legendary composers who who um I was meeting at that time through the Philadelphia Orchestra, but this was Johannes Brom's. So that would that was a thrill. So so while I was writing the book, I needed it a working title. And I didn't, I called it something else, a different title. And then one day a friend of mine said, Well, what are you you're working on this book? Well, what's it about? And I said, Well, you know, I started in classical music so young that I knew a man who knew Brahms, and I thought, hey, I'll I'll use that as a title. And and a lot of people like it and they talk about it, and some people said, Oh, but it didn't play that. Somebody said this inconsequential event, when you're 18 and you meet somebody who knew Brahms, it's not inconsequential. But of course, Brahms stands for a lot of great creative minds. So it was Brahms for me, could have been would have been somebody else for for another human being.

SPEAKER_00 38:50

So of course, we all know Brahms. So uh, you know, that would have resonated with just about anybody, I think, how important that moment was. I want to ask you about Strakowski's music for a second because he really was about this free Boeing technique. What did you think about it?

SPEAKER_02 39:10

Oh, I loved it, but I knew that I shouldn't. Um because uh because it went again against a lot that that people wanted out of music with which was being very strict and doing everything that the composer wanted, and having a very, very different style for music of the Baroque era and and with orchestras of the classical era and then the romantic and then more modern. So I knew, but I love the sound that that seamless lush sound where there is no perceptible gap in what you're hearing. And all the bows change, they're going in the same direction, they won't change. There's a little tiny gap in the sound. A lot of some people can't hear it, and others it's very prominent.

SPEAKER_00 40:11

I actually went and I watched videos of him conducting after I read your book.

SPEAKER_02 40:17

Oh, that's wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 40:18

Yeah, it really it made it I wanted to get to know him more. I wanted to uh watch him actually do uh what he was known for. And I was I was watching all the aspects of what you talked about.

SPEAKER_02 40:36

So you know that's thrilling for me that you did that.

Free Bowing And The Sound

SPEAKER_00 40:41

Yeah, and there were quite a few videos of him. I was really surprised that there were that many. Uh, but he was everything that you said. So and thank you for you know saying what you did about him in a way where musically and everything that wanted me to go and find his videos and and start watching.

SPEAKER_02 41:04

Oh, that's so touching to me. That's exactly what I hoped would happen.

SPEAKER_00 41:10

You know, he was known for changing composers' arrangements, and he said when he went to heaven or hell that, you know, Bach and Beethoven and Brahms would be, you know, he didn't know what they would do to him. So he he did not want people to see his scores. But somehow, I mean, are they still are they in the University of Pennsylvania?

SPEAKER_02 41:32

They are. They are, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:35

By there.

SPEAKER_02 41:36

Yeah. Uh well, it's a story that it's a sad story in a way. I was on the staff of the Curtis Institute of Music, as you mentioned, and uh just around the time, well, when he died, I was working there. And the exe I knew the executor of Sttukovsky's will, lovely guy. And I had actually gone out to to visit Sttukovsky once, and he we went together, and and he called me and he said, How would you feel about the the Sttuchovsky library, all the scores and parts, going to the Curtis Institute? And here I was working there. And there were reasons why I was in favor for it, there were reasons why I would have chosen another place, but basically it was okay, let them go there. Here I was on the library staff of the Curtis Institute. The director at that time, who was uh an o fabulous, beautiful oboeist, was not a very nice person to me. And he did not like me. He was the only one in the orchestra who just there there was no bond, but that's how he was with most people or with many people. So I said yes. The library, enormous number of um of conductor scores and all the parts for all the players in the orchestra to many, many works, uh, was delivered to Curtis and I was fired. Why? I still don't I know I know that I probably threatened this guy. His name was John Delancey. And again, a magnificent musician, but he ruffled a lot of feathers in those days. So here, if I had not been working at the Curtis and they got this incredible gift, part of the reason that I said yes, it should go there, he should have found me out and and hired me to be on the staff of the Curtis. Here he had me, and he he didn't want me near the library. Um, but it went to Curtis. I forget for how many years, and then Curtis felt that it was too much work for them to maintain that collection. And it and it was, it was a lot. So they sent it at that time. You know, I'm getting my head of myself. There was one other place where it went before Curtis, and that was Manhattan School of Music. Then it went to Curtis. Then it went to the University of Pennsylvania where it is now.

SPEAKER_00 44:13

Well, I'm glad that they're taking care of it.

Archives, Firings, And Custody

SPEAKER_02 44:15

Well, and everything I have here, I wish I could swing the camera around and show you my studio because it's like a little museum. Everything I have will go to the University of Pennsylvania when I die or or before. And I have been assured by the Philadelphia Orchestra that if University of Pennsylvania gets anything and they don't want to keep it, they will give it back to they will give it to the orchestra. So I don't have to be crazy that anything I have here will end up in a dumpster, either here or in Philadelphia.

SPEAKER_00 44:51

Do you have the scissors close? Yes.

SPEAKER_02 44:56

The scissors are in my home apartment, and they still have the Harvey's Bristol Cream Cork stuck in the points of the scissors. Yeah. Brilliant. Yeah.

unknown 45:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 45:09

Yeah. Should we let the audience in on the scissors that uh I was packing to leave Stukovski's place in England? And um he was not happy that I was leaving. I wasn't particularly happy, but I I needed to get back to my own life. And he appeared in the doorway while I was packing, holding this pair of scissors, which he knew I loved those scissors because they with the work that I was doing, they cut so cleanly. And he said, I want you to have these. And I said, He said, No, I'm not gonna take your scissors. No, no, I want you to and he looked very upset. He said, No, I want you to have these. Um I said, I'll use them when I'm here. And he insisted that I take the scissors, which I still have. And as I said, I've learned more about psychology, but apparently it was it was an object from him that would serve as a bond between us. It was, you know, a concrete item. Um and he wanted he wanted it wanted to have that close relationship. So he he gave me his beloved scissors with the with the Harvey's Bristol Cream Cork that protected the the points of the city.

SPEAKER_00 46:22

I'm so glad you have those. I did. It's yeah. You know, you said goodbye to him, and then like you said, just about two weeks later he was gone. I mean, can you talk about that moment when you found out that he was gone?

SPEAKER_02 46:37

I didn't know how to deal with it because he was so important in my life in so many ways that when Stakovsky died, I I I just couldn't imagine navigating life without him being a presence in it. And of course, the the worst thing of anything was not just my personal feelings, but that the music stopped. Yeah. He would no longer be making music. And that that how many years later he died in 77? 48, 49 years? It's a long time. Uh yeah. It's it still hurts that I I will never hear those sounds again. I will hear other wonderful sounds, but I will never hear that kind of music making again. Those colors are gone.

SPEAKER_00 47:31

Yeah, you did mention classical music isn't what it was. You were afraid that it it you had been you always needed to be moved by music so deeply.

SPEAKER_01 47:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:42

But you were afraid that it wasn't ever going to be the same. What is classical music in the future?

The Scissors And The Bond

SPEAKER_02 47:50

We don't know what's going to happen. Do do I know for a fact that someone won't, male or female, climb up on that podium and make music that is astonishingly beautiful. Uh n nobody knows. But again, do do I miss his particular brand of music making on a daily basis? And I listen a lot to his recordings. I listen to a lot of recordings. That's my reward for going through what I go what we all go through in life, which is disappointment, trouble, pain, it's all there. So usually on a Sunday when I have a little more quiet time, I'll I'll put his recordings on. But as I write in the book, and and it's true, the last paragraph is that I no longer know what I'm really hearing. Because when I listen to a recording, especially if someone like Stakowski, I know those the memories of those vibrations are mixing with the actual vibrations. So I don't I don't know any longer what I'm really hearing or where the vibrations stop and the memories begin. And I've got those memories. I've got that.

SPEAKER_00 49:13

Memories. I'm so glad that he is recorded, you know, and that though you have those items, because that, you know, that will hold you through times where you're feeling that, you know, maybe the music isn't what it was back then, but you can turn on, you know, that recording of him, and that's just it's such a gift, which by the way, you you did not go to his funeral, and you weren't able to do that. But it was really touching what your last gift to him was. Do you want to share that?

SPEAKER_02 49:50

Sure. Uh that's um I went to Vienna a year or two later, I think it was the following year, and I went to Beethoven's grave, and I got a little bit of soil from Beethoven's grave, and then I went to Mahler's grave in Grinzing, and I have and I had I I also took the soil from that. And a year or two later, which was my first first time I saw the name Stachovsky on a headstone, you know. Just terrible. Um, but I sat down on the on on the ground, on the earth, and um and I talked to Stykovsky as if we were as if we were chatting for about 45 minutes. And and then I had I had the the dirt from Beethoven and Mahler's graves. And and I put that I I used my finger and I I went deep into the the soil near Stu right under Stychovsky's headstone. And so to this day, you know, the earth mixes and uh so Stykovsky is now buried beneath um not just the English earth but that of Beethoven and Gustav Mahler, whose music he conducted so magnificently. And I have been to to where Bach is buried. It's not outside, but I got a little bit of dust. And um someday, someday I and all I need now, and which will probably never happen because of the political situation, is Tchaikovsky's something from Tchaikovsky's grave. Okay. But if I could ever get that somehow, I would go back to visit my maestro, and uh and then it would be complete.

Grief, Memory, And Recordings

SPEAKER_00 51:47

Nancy, I want to thank you truly. I am sitting here thinking about how rare it is to meet someone who didn't just admire a world from a distance, but walked straight into it and stayed. Your book is full of history. It's full of legendary names and unforgettable moments. But what moved me most was you, the girl who knew where she belonged before anyone said that she was allowed to belong there. You were dropping these names, you know, you have these big names of people all throughout your book, but your name meant the most to me. You didn't wait for comfort, you didn't wait for certainty, you didn't wait for the perfect invitation. You kept showing up, and not in a loud, attention-seeking way, but in the steady, persistent, almost sacred way. You showed up with curiosity and courage, and you let your love of music become your education and your drive for what you wanted to lead where it did. What I appreciate about your story is that it holds both the wonder and the complexity, the magic of being close to the greatness and the cost of navigating powerful personalities, the beauty of mentorship, and the reality of being a young woman in rooms where power did not always behave appropriately. You didn't sugarcoat it, you told the truth. And you did it with clarity, intelligence, and a deep respect for the music itself. I also keep thinking about that 15-year-old version of you sitting on those steps, hoping to be noticed, hoping to be let in, and how the story didn't end with you getting in, it ended with you building a life inside that world. And you didn't just enter the orchestra, you became part of what made it run. And you held the music, you protected it, you helped shape it for each space, each performance, each moment. That is a kind of artistry that people don't always see, but it matters. So, Nancy, thank you for writing this book. I knew a man who knew Brahms. Thank you for giving us a front row seat, not only to musical giants, but to making, but to the making of your own life. And thank you for reminding us of something that we all need to hear. Belonging isn't always granted. Sometimes it's claimed, sometimes it's earned, and sometimes it starts with simply refusing to lead the steps. To everyone listening, if you have ever felt like an outsider looking in, I hope you take this with you. The door does not always open quickly, but persistence has a way of becoming destiny. Keep showing up, keep learning, keep asking, keep walking toward what feels like home. Nancy, I really would like you to share with everybody your website or any resources that people can access your book.

SPEAKER_02 54:58

First of all, before that, I just want to thank you for what you said. It means more to me than you may know, and I am deeply grateful for that. So thank you.

SPEAKER_01 55:09

You are so welcome.

SPEAKER_02 55:11

I believe my website is um www.nancyar.com.

SPEAKER_01 55:17

Okay.

Soil For A Maestro

SPEAKER_02 55:18

I am not the real estate agent because there is somebody who with my name, or I have hers, uh, nor am I a uh an art gallery. Just Google my name and and the book I hope would appear.

SPEAKER_00 55:33

What would you hope that readers carry with them after they close the last page?

SPEAKER_02 55:40

What we've been discussing, which is especially with young women and probably young women of color, that you don't always get permission. And you don't always get permission from people who either legitimately or not are in the position of giving you permission. And you have to do what what you have to do in life and do it in a way that uh that makes the door easier to open. But sometimes you have to break it down. You know, it was it's it's important, you know, about getting into good trouble. Good trouble.

SPEAKER_00 56:22

You know, you got to witness just, you know, as a side note, you did get to witness the times change of it just being uh dominated by white men to you know, shifting. So that's that's also another story in this.

SPEAKER_02 56:39

Yeah. John Lewis, that was that was the name I was I I couldn't think of at first of about good trouble and um yeah, yeah, we have to you know, if if you can do humanity some good, uh that's important, but um it's it's up to us. You know, Eleanor Roosevelt used to say, it's the small changes and in small places close to home. So it it doesn't always have to be on the world stage and on the highest levels. But what we can do right here, day to day, in our own neighborhoods, in our own block, our own apartment buildings, that it's it's important.

SPEAKER_00 57:18

Well, to all of you listening, thank you for being here. And if this conversation meant something to you, I mean, get this book. I mean, this is an amazing book, and it takes you into her life, into the lives of these people, and into the classical music world. Share it with someone who loves music, loves history, or just needs a reminder that their path is still possible. And as usual, there is purpose in the pain, and there is hope in the journey. And we will see you next time.