A 63-year professional career

Hill orchestra conductor goes Bach to the basics

When Chestnut Hill resident Jonathan Sternberg, now in his 80s, was asked to be artistic director of the Bach Festival of Philadelphia, his first reaction was "This position belongs to a person half my age." So he presented a proposal that was "so outrageous I'd be off the hook." But, as the saying goes, "be careful what you wish for." The organization's board of directors enthusiastically accepted his ideas, which include competitions for children and amateur adults and other unique programming plans designed to bring Philadelphia audiences back to Bach.

For the second program of the festival's 29th season, Sternberg handpicked Solomiya Ivakhiv, a recent Curtis Institute graduate and concertmaster of The Curtis Symphony, to perform some of Bach's violin solo sonatas. The concert will take place on Nov. 21, 6 p.m., at the Chestnut Hill Baptist Church, Germantown Ave. and Bethlehem Pike. "It's a beautiful church and with its size and sound will provide an inspired environment in which to listen to Bach's music," he said.

Sternberg says that Chestnut Hill's reputation as a colorful tourist-shopping haven will help the community become an important music center, as well. He wants the crowds to come not only to shop and dine but to be involved in the rich artistic life that can be found in Chestnut Hill.

First, Sternberg is planning a Bach competition for young people next April. "I don't care what instrument they choose -- kazoo, ocarina or harmonica -- as long as they play Bach well. It will give kids a chance to become familiar with the composer, and it will also interest and attract their parents." For future seasons, he'd also like a competition where local amateur musicians can perform Bach's music on a piano, cello or violin.

In addition, there will be one concert at which only Bach's Chaconne would be played. The Chaconne is often considered the greatest piece ever written for solo violin. "The audience will get a good picture of the Chaconne and all of its possibilities. They'll hear Bach's original version played with a curved bow, if possible, plus versions by Busoni, Brahms for piano left hand only, and Segovia for the guitar."

To further involve the community, Sternberg invites the best singers from church choirs in Chestnut Hill and beyond to come together for Bach's Mass in B-minor. It will be performed first at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Chestnut Hill and then as part of a service at the Philadelphia Cathedral.

Another thought occurs to Sternberg. "I'd like to present concerts of Bach's solo violin and cello suites, each played by instrumentalists from different cultural backgrounds, thus we will see what an Asian, Russian and American conception of Bach would be. Let the public decide which appeals to them."

Sternberg, who is against celebrity culture, says, "The celebrity at the Bach Festival of Philadelphia will be Bach. Bach's score can be considered a roadmap with many interpretive possibilities or ways of traveling from one point to another. You can go via the mountains, the lakes, the fields. Or you can take a straight road."

Sternberg is often asked his opinion of whether Bach's music should be played on the piano. "I'm not against a 20th century conception. My feeling is that the music and the interpretation of the music must predominate, no matter what instrument you play. Bach would probably be delighted with the sounds contemporary instruments make!"

Jonathan Sternberg was born in New York and began to study violin as a child. In his early teens, he dislocated his finger while playing baseball. The doctors warned him that eventually he would have trouble bending it. That only increased his interest in the violin and he continued to play. He began studying at New York University, and everyone, including his parents, assumed he'd become a doctor like his father.

His parents thought he was registered in pre-med, but secretly he was studying harmony and music history. When his parents found out, they asked him to compromise. He agreed to study music education, with the thought that one day he'd become a high school music teacher.

As it turned out, Sternberg was saved by one of his professors, Philip James, who asked him to teach a music course for Professor Marion Bauer, who was on sabbatical. Bauer was also a music critic, and through her efforts, Sternberg began reviewing concerts. "I ended up going to 10 concerts a week, allowing me to become intimately familiar with a wide repertoire. That was my life at the time ... I listened and listened and listened.

Sternberg often attended rehearsals and was able to observe Toscannini, Walter and other great conductors. He also attended a one-semester course in conducting with Professor Philip James. After he graduated, Sternberg went to Harvard and majored in musicology. He began his professional career on Pearl Harbor Day, Dec. 7, 1941, conducting the National Youth Administration Orchestra of New York in Aaron Copland's An Outdoor Overture.

Shortly thereafter he went into the Army and was assigned to India, then China. In the fall of 1945, he went to Shanghai to prepare for repatriation and instead conducted the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra for a season. After briefly returning to the Untied States, Sternberg moved to Vienna.

He brought with him the newly published Bach-Stokowski transcriptions. They had never been played live in Europe. When Sternberg was asked to conduct in 1947 in Vienna, he put the Bach-Stokowski transcriptions on the program. "I had a full house. They came not for me; they came for Bach-Stokowski," he muses.

Sternberg remained in Europe for 22 years, conducting a variety of orchestras. He remembers what his mentor, Pierre Monteux, once told him. "You can't become a conductor until you're 50." After having conducted Beethoven's Eroica symphony for the 30th or 40th time, Sternberg began to understand.

"Each time, I'd find new things." Monteux also taught him that the function of a conductor is to inspire the orchestra, which in turn will inspire the public. "Conductors who inspire the audience by various motions and mannerisms are doing it the other way around," Sternberg says. He also believes that a common pulse exists in an auditorium at a given time. "If a conductor and the audience have the same pulse and it's divisible by two, it works well. If a conductor has a pulse of three and the audience has a pulse of two, it never works. You can say that about conductors and orchestras, too."

Sternberg is amused by the myth of conductor longevity. For every conductor who lives to be 100, he can find one who died at a young age. Even so, he says that research has shown that conducting for 15 minutes is equivalent to one hour of jogging. He attributes his own longevity to his insatiable curiosity about life and people. "If you stop, you rust," he affirms.

He gets up every morning at 6, watches the BBC news, then goes to the computer to see what else is happening in the world. He walks every morning in the woods, and he studies every single day. "I must keep up, I'm curious, I want to know." He appreciates, is comforted by and derives great pleasure from whatever he sees, touches and hears. "I'm happiest when I'm performing, when I'm making music, and when I'm sharing it with others." For 43 years, he shared his life and music with his wife, artist Ursula Steinberg, who died in 2000.

For information about the Bach Festival of Philadelphia and its upcoming programs, call 215-247-4020 or visit www.Bach-Fest.org.