Moscow Nights: The Van Cliburn Story-How One Man and His Piano Transformed the Cold War (71 page)

192
  
Faculty for History and Philology:
F.45, dm16No185/76, SHM.

192
  
Faculty of Soil Science:
F.45, dm16No185/39, SHM.

192
  
forestry engineer . . . geographer:
F.45, dm16No185/74, 93, SHM.

192
  
“Soviet telegraph operators”:
F.45, dm16No185/60, SHM.

192
  
“tearful verses”:
F.45, dm16No185/14, 72, SHM.

192
  
“Vanyusha my dear”:
“‘Vanya’ Cliburn: Popular Does Not Mean Good.”

192
  
“You set our hearts on fire”:
F.45, dm16No185/28, SHM.

192
  
“How hard it is going to be to say good-bye”:
F.45, dm16No185/88, SHM.

192
  
“to all honest Americans”:
F.45, dm16No185/86, SHM.

193
  
“living in this nasty place”:
F.45, dm16No185/37, SHM.

193
  
“I would like to express”:
F.45, dm16No185/41, SHM.

193
  
“Look at it in your bad moments”:
VCL
, 143.

193
  
“I tell you”:
“All-American Virtuoso.”

193
  
“Oh sure,” Van thought:
VC
, 147.

193
  
Central Music School:
Olesya Larchenko and Lena Varvarova to Van Cliburn, Moscow, October 1959, Folder 23, Box 9, RLP.

194
  
half past five in the morning:
VC
, 143.

194
  
“We have something for you”:
Ibid., 144–45.

194
  
message in Russian:
Mikhailov, “I’m Going to Miss Russia.”

194
  
perform in America:
VCL
, 127.

194
  
“Today,” he ended:
Shtilman, “In That Memorable April.”

195
  
next day they talked:
VC
, 146.

195
  
reporter for
Sovetskaya Kultura
:
Okov, “It’s a Pity to Leave Russia . . .”

195
  
fourteen extra suitcases, and one six-foot lilac shrub:
“People,”
Time
, May 28, 1958. See also “Cliburn Leaves Soviet” (AP),
NYT
, May 16, 1958.

195
  
4,800 rubles:
Sound Recording 306-EN-G-T-5781, “Van Cliburn Washington Press Conference,” May 23, 1958, RG 306, NACP.

196
  
Khrushchev allegedly ordered his death:
David Pryce-Jones, “What the Hungarians Wrought: The Meaning of October 1956,”
National Review
, October 23, 2006.

196
  
tit-for-tat revenge:
Harry Schwartz, “Why Soviet Is Taking Tougher Line,”
NYT
, June 22, 1958.

12: “HE PLAYED THE PIANO AND THE WORLD WAS HIS”

197
  
“He Played the Piano and the World Was His”:
New York Post
, May 16, 1958.

197
  
missed his connection to New York:
Ibid. Van had been due to connect with SAS Flight 921 from Copenhagen, arriving New York 5:55, May 16. See Davis to secretary of state, telegram, May 13, 1958, Box 2182, RG 59, NACP.

197
  
telephone interview:
TASS, “Van Cliburn in New York,”
SK
, May 17, 1958.

198
  
“Oh . . . you’re the one:
VC
, 148.

199
  
photographers came running:
Video Recording 200-UN-31–40, “Universal Newsreel” 31, no. 40, May 19, 1958; MCA/Universal Pictures Collection, 1929–1967; NACP.

199
  
shouting questions:
For the press conference, see Milton Bracker, “Jubilant Cliburn Arrives Here After Piano Triumph in Soviet,”
NYT
, May 17, 1958; “Hero’s Return,”
Time
; Robert E. Baskin, “Interlude at Idlewild: A Happy Cliburn Returns as Concert, Parade Await,”
DMN
, May 17, 1958.

200
  
twenty-five hundred items:
Daily Courier
(Connellsville, PA), June 24, 1958.

200
  
“gold and white satin evening bag”:
VCL
, 123.

200
  
Elizabeth Winston:
Ibid., 148.

200
  
Life
photographer:
Van’s second
Life
spread ran in the June 2, 1958, issue.

201
  
“He hasn’t had one bite to eat”:
Bracker, “Jubilant Cliburn Arrives Here.”

201
  
back at Idlewild:
Milton Bracker, “Cliburn Greets Soviet Conductor,”
NYT
, May 18, 1958.

201
  
“SOLD OUT”:
“Hero’s Return.”

202
  
“Are you Harvey Kilgore”:
“Kilgore Friend of Van’s Shares New York Reception,”
KNH
, May 25, 1958, quoted in
VC
, 152.

202
  
Abram Chasins . . . dropped by:
Chasins describes the scene in
VCL
, 140–41.

202
  
notorious kleptomaniac:
John Giordano, interview with the author, August 16, 2014.

202
  
Liberty Music Store:
Betty Milburn, “Fall Fabrics Drape Loosely over ‘Suggested’ Figures,”
Tucson Daily Citizen
, July 18, 1958.

202
  
Time
sign:
VCL
, 142.

203
  
manner of dress:
Martin Bookspan described the scene in an interview with Peter Rosen: Reel 37,
Van Cliburn—Concert Pianist
elements, VCA.

203
  
2,760 seats:
“Hero’s Return.” Before Van played, Kirill Kondrashin conducted the Symphony of the Air in Prokofiev’s Symphony no. 1 in D Major.

203
  
Smiling Mike:
See “Pair of Soviet Charmers on U.S. Scene,”
Life
, March 31, 1958, 46–53.

203
  
fastened it with a rubber band:
Gilbert Millstein, “Great Moments at Carnegie Hall,”
NYT Magazine
, May 22, 1960.

203
  
old Benny:
Bernard Mulryan was the artists’ attendant for over thirty years, both at Carnegie Hall and Lewisohn Stadium.

204
  
“She really is bursting”:
Milton Bracker, “Cliburn Cheered in Packed House,”
NYT
, May 20, 1958.

204
  
“I’m so happy to be home again”:
“Biggest in Carnegie Hall History: Cliburn Wows ’Em at Home; Given Thunderous Ovation,”
KNH
, May 20, 1958.

204
  
“What do you play”:
VCL
, 144.

204
  
“Van Cliburn at Home”:
Ogonyok
24 (1958), 29.

204
  
“Jeepers . . . mudder-in-law”:
VCL
, 145.

204
  
“We can all breathe easily now”:
Louis Biancolli,
World-Telegram
, May 20, 1958. He added that Van had “exceeded all expectations.” In the
NYT
, Ross Parmenter more soberly declared that Van had “lived up to expectations.”

205
  
“Over and over again”:
Howard Taubman, “A Winner on His Merits,”
NYT
, April 20, 1958.

205
  
letter to
Time
:
From Henri Temianka of Los Angeles; published June 2, 1958.

206
  
powerhouse of the world:
The theme is developed in Amy Chua and Jed Rubenfeld
, The Triple Package: How Three Unlikely Traits Explain the Rise and Fall of Cultural Groups in America
(New York: Penguin Press, 2014).

206
  
Van Cliburn Day:
Detailed arrangements for the parade were recorded in minutes of meetings of the Department of Commerce and Public Events held on May 5 and 13, 1958, headed “Van Cliburn—Planning Meeting,” Folder 16, Box 2, JAP. The parade was slated for May 14 but was moved back because of Van’s Soviet commitments.

206
  
with Harvey and Rildia Bee:
Rildia Bee to Bill Schuman, Hotel Pierre, June 6, 1958, Box 2, Folder 16, JAP.

207
  
“He’s cuter than Tony Perkins”:
“Hero’s Return.”

207
  
“You showed them Russians”:
VCL
, 131.

207
  
“How does it feel”:
Milton Bracker, “Van Cliburn Gets a Hero’s Parade,”
NYT
, May 21, 1958.

207
  
his mind still a blank:
VCG.

208
  
“It was a wonderful thing”:
AP,
Times Record
(Troy, NY), May 21, 1958.

208
  
halibut flakes “Antoine”:
Philip Hamburger, “Tribute,”
The New Yorker
, May 31, 1958.

208
  
“this young, this very old diplomat”:
VCL
, 136.

208
  
Reported
The New Yorker
:
Hamburger, “Tribute.”

209
  
“He’s the Eggheads’ Elvis Presley”:
VC
, 159.