MAESTRO RAKHLIN OF KYIV
The municipal authorities have finally honored the memory of Natan Rakhlin, an outstanding musician of our time with a simple memorial plaque, it is a tribute to sparkling talent, a lasting memento. We tend to forget things so quickly, including names.. Without exaggeration Natan Rakhlin was the best orchestra conductor in Soviet Ukraine. Largely due to his concert endeavors the younger generation, especially college and university students received a unique opportunity to step into the wonderful world of classical music, to enter and graduate from the "Rakhlin Academy."
Kyiv students of the 1950s-1960s frequented the Philharmonic to listen to its orchestra which was then a major cultural attraction. Most of the student audiences were from the University and Polytechnic Institute, (Conservatory students were also in attendance but they lacked enthusiasm). I remember that every time before the concert the square in front of the Philharmonic was packed with students hoping to get a ticket, with mounted militiamen looking on. Sometimes a mass "breakthrough" was attempted, often successful because carefully planned and rehearsed in a back yard. Once there was a loud bang. Everyone thought it was an explosion and so did the militia rushing to the scene, followed by the ushers. A minute of general confusion was enough for several dozen students to steal inside the building. They hid behind columns, by the wall, back of the last raw of seats throughout the concert, and music was the only sound. Not a word spoken, not a shoe scraping on the floor. Just Beethoven's Ninth, rolling like a tidal wave, sweeping up everyone's heart and mind.
In the fall and spring a crowd of students would gather under the Philharmonic's open windows looking onto the park and stay there through the first and second part of the concert. Smart ones managed to get inside during intermission. The chic thing was to walk in the lobby nodding and smiling to fellow "infiltrators." In fact, the "illegals" were the ones to clap their hands blue encoring the Maestro. After the concert and well into the night one could hear parts of the symphony hummed, sung, whistled, played on the guitar, often off key or in a most fantastic interpretation. After the end of the concert season all these people would move to the park where the symphony orchestra played on an open air stage, performing light but beautifully arranged music (mostly without the Chief Conductor as the Maestro seldom put in an appearance).
Natan Rakhlin often went on concert tours and directed regional philharmonic orchestras. I listened to him at the Donetsk Philharmonic Society, at a period when the local orchestra was in a very poor shape, with most musicians either gone or packing. And then Rakhlin appeared. I don't know how many rehearsals it took and what he did to or with the musicians, but he worked a miracle. The orchestra's performance was excellent and the audience delighted. One became suddenly aware that the coal miner's town had many good music lovers. At times Kyiv students followed Rakhlin on his concert tours of the province, hitchhiking or by train, traveling economy class (actually on top baggage berths).
Natan Rakhlin never had what is commonly known as stage presence, even less so when middle-aged. Meeting this plump man on the street one could take him for anybody but who he really was, a brilliant conductor. However, standing in front of the orchestra, his hands moving, as though conjuring music out of the air, he was magically transformed into an inimitable magnetic personality.
In today's half-empty Philharmonic audiences I see mostly elderly people. I don't know any of them. But then the music starts and their time-embittered features soften and suddenly I see them as they were once, young men and women from the University and Polytechnic Institute, prepared to spend their meager monthly stipend on a season's concert ticket, shouting themselves hoarse: "Bravo Rakhlin!" Are they the last of the Mohicans?
Natan Rakhlin
