NEW YORK — When Marta Casals Istomin married her teacher, Pablo Casals, she was 20 and the fabled cellist was 80. They became a "power" couple in music and remained soul mates until his death 17 years later.
With the passing of Casals and her second husband, pianist Eugene Istomin, she jokes that she's known as the "grandmother" of the musicians who flock to Kronberg, Germany, for an annual gathering of cellists, which this year runs September 11–18.
The village, dubbed "the Cello Capital of the World" by the great Mstislav Rostropovich, has held the festival since 1993.
Sponsored by the Kronberg Academy, the privately funded festival offers 16 concerts this year, plus master classes with cellists including Lynn Harrell, Anner Bylsma, Natalia Gutman, Ralph Kirshbaum, Mischa Maisky and Heinrich Schiff. There are non-cellists, too, including violinist Gidon Kremer and violist Yuri Bashmet.
Casals Istomin, who is retiring as president of the Manhattan School of Music this spring, is artistic patron of the festival that has hosted an international cello competition named after her first husband, perhaps the greatest modern master of the instrument.
At a news conference Tuesday [June 7] announcing the festival program, the 68-year-old Casals Istomin said that when she strolls through Kronberg, she's greeted by the musicians with great matriarchal affection.
"I'm honored to be the grandmother," she said.
In the future, organizers of the Kronberg Festival are planning cello master classes in New York taught by festival participants. Details are yet to be announced.
The goal of the festival is to spread "high values in music and high values in humanism," said Raimund Trenkler, artistic director.
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