Fresh Air - Yo-Yo Ma Says He's Living His Best Childhood Now

Episode Date: May 29, 2024

About 25 years ago, the acclaimed cellist asked a high school student to help him name his instrument. Yo-Yo Ma brings his cello — aka "Petunia" — to his conversation with Terry Gross. He talks about being a child prodigy, his rebel years, and straddling three cultures: American, French, and Chinese. For sponsor-free episodes of Fresh Air — and exclusive weekly bonus episodes, too — subscribe to Fresh Air+ via Apple Podcasts or at here.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

This is Fresh Air. I'm Terry Gross. My guest is Yo-Yo Ma, along with his cello, which he'll be playing. He's the most famous contemporary cellist and perhaps the most revered in the U.S. His best-known recordings are of the Bach solo cello suites, which he's recorded three times in 1983, 1997, and 2018. He's performed with orchestras around the world, but lots of people who pay no attention to classical music know Yo-Yo Ma because he's performed in so many different settings. He's played American folk and bluegrass music, and he's played music from around the world with the Silk Road Ensemble, which he founded. He appeared on Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, Sesame Street, and The Simpsons. On the first anniversary of 9-11, at the ceremony held at Ground Zero, he performed one of the Bach's

cello suites. More recently, he played at the Memorial for the Seven Aid Workers from World Central Kitchen, who were feeding people trapped in Gaza. He started playing cello at age four, and by the time he was seven, he performed at an event attended by President Kennedy and former President Dwight Eisenhower, where Yo-Yo Ma was introduced by Leonard Bernstein. In 2011, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Obama. That's one of the many honors he's received, including 19 Grammys. His latest album is called Beethoven for Three. I spoke with Yo-Yo Ma earlier this month at an event held at WHYY, where Fresh Air is produced,

when he received WHYY's annual Lifelong Learning Award. The only honor greater than having Yo-Yo Ma here tonight is having Yo-Yo Ma with his cello here tonight. So I'm absolutely thrilled about this. So I want you to introduce your cello to us, because it's from the 1700s. This cello is older than the United States of America. Well, Terry, the first thing I want to tell you

is that the cello's name is Petunia. It has a name? Yeah. And the reason it's named Petunia is because I was playing in Salt Lake City in Utah, probably about 25 years ago, and a high school student whose name I still remember as Brittany asked me, does your cello have a name? I said, no, but I'll play you a piece of music and if you can think of a name, maybe I'll keep it. And so I played a piece of music. She said, Petunia.

I said, that's it. And the name has stuck. One of the things you're famous for is one of the most famous series of compositions for cello and it's the Bach's Cello Suites Unaccompanied. You recorded them three times. I did it once in my 20s, I did it once in my 40s, I did it once in my 60s.

So every 20 years or so, I figured I might get it better. It was 1983 was the first time. 1983 was the first time. 2018 was the last time. So the Bach cello suites are the music that really first forefronted the cello, as opposed to it being more of a background instrument, right? Well, it was written for cello alone. Yeah, for cello alone. So there was no background or foreground.

Right, exactly. It had to be all ground, right? And they're beautiful pieces, but they were kind of discovered or rediscovered long after his death, I think. And some people thought, well, they're great exercises. They're like technical exercises. They're not beautiful music until Pablo Casals recorded it. So I would like you to demonstrate

the difference between playing Bach as a technical exercise and then investing your musicality in it and making it beautiful. Because it's easy to think, oh, it's a kind of bunch of like grand arpeggios, some of it. Sure. Well, I can play you one thing from Suzuki Book Five, which is great. Everybody who plays Suzuki Book 5 will play this piece. And so, but bourree is a dance, right? So you're thinking dance and a dance, a particular dance with steps. And, you know, the dance master would create a dance every week for people to dance on the weekends. So people were really working hard at dances. So... You put a kind of lightness to your step.

It turns it into something that titillates someone else's imagination to say, oh yeah, I can dance to that. As Mark Morris Dance Group choreographed a whole suite to this music, two dancers who then created a dance for this bourree. Does that make sense? Yeah. So can you just play part of the most what is to you the most beautiful part

of the Bach cello suites just a short passage sure, well, I'll tell you something I know for one of them you'd have to retune let's avoid that I won't retune, but I'll play you this beginning, so this is the very first

piece of music I learned as a four-year-old. You know, you may have heard this before. And as a four-year-old, I learned it. And what was interesting for a beginning cellist, if you look at this, I just use one finger, and it's the same pattern twice over. So the first day of learning this piece was very easy because I just used my finger once,

the pattern repeats, and the second day was I used two fingers. Same kind of pattern with one change. Everything we have in life is about patterns. The same or different. We are constantly oscillating between the same and different. We are constantly oscillating between the same and different, right? And so it was easy for a child to learn things that had patterns to it. And when it was different, it was interesting.

Now, why is this beautiful? Well, as a four-year-old, I learned it fairly easily. Kids absorb things as a sponge absorbs water really easily. After nine years old, you don't pick up languages naturally. You actually start to analyze things, you use your mind, and it's a different process of assimilation. So by the time I got to my 20s or 30s, this piece became hard.

Because how do I play it? And what I discovered and what made it so beautiful for me is that whereas it was hard to start but if i thought of an image of water of a brook or a river and if i thought that the piece started before I began. And I just joined the water. You know what it is about a river? It's never the same river,

but you always call it the same river, but the water's never the same. So if I think of a water element, here's what it ends up sounding like. piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly piano plays softly You actually get to code

infinite variety. Right? In a world where we can measure everything, or we think we can measure everything, how wonderful it is that you could have the poetry of music,

or poetry, or music that actually makes you think you are touching infinity. You learned this when you were four. That's when you started learning. And I'm 68. That means I've been trying to get this right for 64 years you were quite the child prodigy you were performing for presidents current and former by the time you were seven right kennedy and eisenhower do i have that right i guess so yeah and you know leonard bernstein came and heard you right um? So I'm wondering,

when you're young and people are making such an amazing fuss over you, like you're so extraordinary, do you risk becoming a praise junkie? Do you know? Because you get so much of it. And that's maybe your measure

of your worth in the world. But music isn't always about getting praise. It's about finding your voice within the music. And I'm wondering, some people can't make the transition, I think. Some prodigies never find what's unique about their playing because what was unique was that they were young and gifted. Now, what's interesting about two-year-olds and three-year-olds, they are the center of their world.

Right. And if you get a lot of attention, of course you want more attention. But I think as I was growing up, my wife and I have friends that say, Yo-Yo, you and your wife, you aspire toward normalcy. Now, that's interesting because, you know, kids are really smart.

They know no matter what you say, you go to a class, they figure out whatever hierarchy there is, who's smart, who's athletic, who does this, and who's a bully, and who's on a fast track. And they figure all of this out. And I think we all have this aspiration to both belong and to feel special. Right. Very true. All of us. So I didn't feel that I was particularly special

because I didn't play with a lot of friends as a young person. And I never thought I was that special. A lot of people paid attention to me and said, you're this and you're that. And I wasn't sure that that meant anything or was true or whatever, but I was trying to figure things out. I was actually very confused. About what? About everything. I'm an immigrant. I was born in Paris. My parents were Chinese. And guess what?

When we moved from France to America, our French friends would say, Pourquoi? Why you go to America? This is the greatest country in the world. And once we arrived in America, Americans said, this is of course the greatest country in the world. you know. And once we arrived in America, you know, like Americans, this is,

of course, the greatest country in the world. You've arrived. And my parents would say, well, you know, there's Chinese culture, you know, ancient culture. This is so great. And I was wondering, you know, then why are we in America? So I was very confused because people would say choose you must be one or the other whatever and and I thought why why do I need to choose because you know I love croissant you know do I have to give up you know croissant for wonder bread you know and you know I don't mind rice either but I love potatoes too you know it's like what do we need to make a choice on everything so um when when you were young and performing were you nervous about it and did you ever feel like um don't take this the wrong way but did you ever feel like you were like a trained seal or do

you know i mean like here's the kid and he's going to perform for you. This is an amazing act because he's a kid. Because it's almost freakish to be that talented when you're that young and to be able to memorize and play such complicated music. Well, that's assuming that you're doing a comparative thing. I didn't particularly know what I was doing was, you know, good, bad, ugly, or whatever. I just did things.

Now, yes, there's the part of me from two, not one, but two tiger parents. You've all heard of tiger parents? You know, Asian household. that, you know, I had to do, well, I had

to listen to them there's not much dialogue it's a lot of monologue, right you do this, you're a good boy you can do this, and this is the right thing to do and I had a father who was an incredibly gifted

teacher and he was a professor and he was just a really brilliant teacher but irascible and i had a mother who was uh was very who loved music who was was a singer who actually loved to be moved by music so I had both the head and heart sort of thing from from either parent and I think there was a lot of emphasis on trying to get things right consistently so I had fantastic training I had fantastic ear training. But did I know why I was doing something or what it was about?

I think it was after I went away to summer camp and especially to college where whatever I was doing and that I was passionate about was matched easily by my peer group being interested in their passions.

And suddenly the world opened up. What was a kind of like a uni world, a sort of hothouse atmosphere kind of world, opened up to sort of my, gosh, all this stuff. Did you have a chance to be a child when you were a child? Because you must have spent so much time practicing. I am living my best childhood right now. One of the things I find really amazing about your life story is that you were so disciplined as a child, because you were learning so much stuff.

I'm still disciplined. But you went through this period of actually rebelling. I'm still rebelling. Are you? Yes, of course. I'm rebelling against people doing things and not knowing why they're doing it. I'm rebelling against people saying,

this is the only way to go. I'm rebelling against people saying, this is right and this is wrong without ever explaining why. Yes. But when you were rebelling in school, you were cutting classes. Yes.

In Juilliard, you were sneaking up between orchestra breaks to get alcohol. Absolutely, absolutely. And got really drunk and went to the emergency room once. Who wouldn't do that? To the emergency room once. Absolutely. And my father had to check me out of the hospital because I was 15 years old.

You had a fake ID. Yes. He could not have been very happy about that. No. He gave up drinking because, you know, like guilt, shame, all of that stuff. Your father gave up drinking because you were a bad example? Yes, because he thought, you know, because my mother said, you know, see, you shame, all of that stuff. Your father gave up drinking because you were a bad example? Yes, because he thought, you know,

because my mother said, you know, see, you're a bad example for your son. It was horrible. Were you punished? Well, the shame and guilt was like, you know, if that's not punishment enough, it's like, you know, my father's only joy, you know, was a glass of wine. He gave that up. right you see i see

everybody's so um was there a point where you weren't sure whether you really wanted to play music or whether that was just your father's idea well let's put it this way i loved music i think after i went and started playing chamber music with friends at the Alexander Schneider's sort of Christmas string seminar, which is now known as the string seminar, 10 days around the holidays where you just are playing chamber music and meeting 15, 16, 17-year-olds. That's my version of fun. I wanted to become a, you know, to join the Juilliard Quartet and play cello and be with friends. That was my goal. Did I want to be, you know, a cellist?

Eh. Did I want to do that? Yes. But you know what really inspired me most was when I was nine, I read a book by Pablo Casals. And he said in his book that I am a human being first, I'm a musician second, and I'm a cellist third. And now, coming from my third and now coming from my background

and reading this from my hero I thought that man I like how did that compare to the message you were getting from your father well it was the opposite it was the reverse but you're a cellist first

yeah and the right order for me always is you're a cellist first? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the right order for me always, always, is you're a human being first, and then you are a member of that sector of musicians second. And last, I'm a cellist. We're listening to the interview I recently recorded with cellist Yo-Yo Ma at an event held at WHYY where Fresh Air is produced. We'll hear more of the interview after a break, and I'll ask him to play what he likes to play for himself when he needs to get in touch with something larger than himself.

I'm Terry Gross, and this is Fresh Air. This message comes from WISE, the app for doing things in other currencies. Send, spend, or receive money internationally, and always get the real-time mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees. Download the WISE app today or visit WISE.com. T's and C's apply. The Mad Max Fury Road prequel, Furiosa, hit theaters this weekend. So on this week's Fresh Air Plus bonus episode, we listen back to Terry's interview with the original Furiosa, Charlize Theron. It's tremendous what my mother did. I would not be here today if it wasn't for her selfless decision to really push me out of that nest and say, go, you have to take advantage of this.

I'm Fresh Air's Anne-Marie Baldonado. This is just our latest Fresh Air Plus bonus episode. Get this one and all our regular Fresh Air episodes sponsor free by joining for yourself at plus.npr.org. Was there a piece where you felt like you really found your voice as an individual? You know, as Yo-Yo Ma, as opposed to just like, you know, somebody who's incredibly talented, but this was your voice, your unique voice. That's a very interesting question. It implies that we all have a consistent one voice. And I dare say that all of us of a certain age have multiple voices. I think that's really literally true.

You think that's true? Yeah, I think it's literally true. Because we were talking earlier about what you, Terry, and I, Yo-Yo, try to do is to make sure that at every stage in life that we acknowledge that stage and not try and pretend we're another stage. Except for me, I'm still living my childhood. But that's different. That's an exception. But I would say that this music... This is a sonata by Schubert. When I was 10, I was mesmerized by Schubert. And one of the things about Schubert that was amazing to me, and I think it appealed to me as a 10-year-old,

was that in the happiest moments, there's sadness, and in the saddest moments, there's a glimmer of light. And I think it's the gray right but it's not constant gray and uh and i think that's a lot of life and i think as an immigrant you're always aware of being able to be on the inside and the outside sure multiple times how does the piece you just played relate to that it has that you know poignancy it has that wistful quality and you know you're you're yearning for something and it's it could be towards one way or another and whatever. But I can tell you something else. When I was 19, in college, they had an orchestra, and I was asked to learn a piece of music

that at first I was terrified or didn't even like, but I was incredibly attracted to it. And this piece of music, I'll play a little bit of this. Thank you. Oh, I love that. You love that, huh? Yeah. I love the turmoil of it. Yeah. So this was sort of, in a way, going to the dark side.

And it's a piece that was written at the height of the Cold War. Shostakovich, you know, social realism depicting literally that very thing in society. And it's funny how we get so naturally into certain music like that. Schubert I loved as a 10, 12-year-old. But for the Shostakovich, I wasn't born in the Soviet Union I did eventually visit the Berlin Wall and saw all what people went through to cross the Berlin Wall with all the flowers placed every 50 yards

for somebody who tried it and didn't make it but it was through reading a book about Shostakovich who I think devoted his life to advocating for the voices of people that were part of that system. And what is interesting is code. Everybody knew in Russia, in the Soviet Union,

knew what that music was about. And it's harder to censor notes than words. But the messages were absolutely clear. Once I understood that that was the kind of advocacy, it's no longer about my voice, but it's about my advocacy for the voices of people that didn't have the voices anymore. We're listening to the interview I recorded earlier this month with cellist Yo-Yo Ma at an event held at WHYY where Fresh Air is produced. We'll hear more of the interview after a break. This is Fresh Air. You've performed at several very important commemorative events. You performed at the first anniversary of 9-11 at Ground Zero. You performed at an anniversary for the Boston Marathon bombing.

You performed in France by the Arc de Triomphe in commemoration of the end of World War I. And very recently, you performed for José Andrés' World Kitchen, which provides food for people in natural disasters and in war. And seven of his people were killed in Gaza.

And you performed at the ceremony, the commemorative ceremony for them. I would like you to talk a little bit about choosing appropriate music for such grave occasions and how you figure out what to play that will give people, that will enable them to fully and deeply feel their grief while also providing some kind of consolation and community. And maybe you can play an excerpt of one of those pieces that you think speaks to

that kind of need. Playing at the National Cathedral is always a special thing because it's that sort of like the national place for commemoration, for mourning, for celebration. And, you know, it's more than the Episcopal Church. It is it is, it's a national place. Right? And I think they did an incredible job

of acknowledging an unbelievably complex situation. This was the Jose Andres commemoration? So there were seven people that were killed, and Jose Andres spoke, I thought, in such a way that threaded the needle,

acknowledging the 200 aid workers that have been killed, you know, the 34,000 people, the 1,200 people, and he spoke individually for each of the people from the World Central Kitchen that died. So I started with this. Ernest Bloch's From Jewish Life, followed by this piece from Adnan Saigun, who was the first national Turkish composer, Adnan Saigunun that Ataturk appointed. Followed by... ¶¶ Bach's Sarabande that actually originated in Africa,

moved to Spain, was banned in Spain, moved to France, moved to South America, all as a dance, and then taken by Bach in what was not yet Germany at that time that crossed all these boundaries, but a dance that started out that was danced by Bedouin women. And through music, you're crossing all those lines, place, of time, of just having been. Is there a piece that you like to play for yourself when you're alone and you need some

kind of consolation or you need to feel something larger than yourself, to connect to something larger than yourself that gives you what you need. You know what's funny? Music goes on in my head all the time. So you don't even need to play it? Is that what you're saying? I don't need to play it.

It's like my wife thinks I hate music because often she will have the radio on or something and I'll say, can you turn it off? And she says, thinks I hate music because I you know often she will have the radio on or something and I'll say can you turn it off and she says you know you obviously you hate music and I said no I don't hate music but I actually you know it's like and or she thinks that when I'm when I'm uh I'm listening to a conversation I'm bored she'll say oh yeah you're thinking of fingerings and bowings you know it's it's just like, you're matching, you're doing that. Because part of thinking is you think

with, you know, you do analytical thinking, you do empathetic thinking, but you also do tactile thinking. You know, some of you may be working on your golf game, you know, when you're at a meeting, or you're thinking of how you can do a better serve.

I mean, I don't know, but I think we are much more than what we think we are at any moment. Is there a piece that goes through your mind, since we can't get into your mind, that you could play for us to give you what you need when you need either consolation or to just get out of yourself and feel connected

to something larger. I will go off and are you asking me to play something? Yes, I am. Why didn't you just say that? I thought I did. You wanted some action. Yes, exactly.

So fine. you wanted some action yes exactly so fine all right ¦ ¶¶ © transcript Emily Beynon Okay. Whoa. Okay. That was beautiful. And we started with Tis a Gift to be Simple, went to Amazing Grace. I don't know what the third piece was. Well, that was actually the Going Home from Dvorak,

which is from his New World Symphony. That was so beautiful. It also turned into a spiritual, Going Home. It has a number of iterations. Oh, that was just beautiful. So can you talk a little bit about why those pieces are significant to you? Well, I mean, I think we are all more than who we think we are. Right?

Because there's always unexplored parts. And I think with music, with anything that's created, you know, if you look deeply enough into anything, I think you actually see the world. Simple Gifts,

Shaker's song. Then Aaron Copland turned into Appalachian Spring. Suddenly, had a different life. And we may know that song partly because of Appalachian Spring and then went back to saying, oh, yeah, that's a Shaker song, right? You know, Amazing Grace, it's a song that's been spiritual, adapted

from actually not a very religious person who wrote this, but he was in a storm and he survived and then became very religious. And, you know, there's a long story to that. And, of course, today Amazing Grace has so many places where it is, you know, core music for many social human occasions. Dvorak, had he not come to America, had he not met Harry Burleigh, who introduced him to spirituals, and Dvorak, upon hearing Harry Burleigh's voice and became friends with him, just showed him all of this music and said,

you know, this African-American music, the spirituals, is as great as any music I've ever heard. This is the soul of America. So Dvorak was hired by Mrs. Thurber to come to the United States to be the head of the American, the National Conservatory of Music in New York City for a number of years.

He stayed only about three years. And during this time, he taught. He taught Harry Burley. He taught many students. And he told the students what? He said to them, don't teach like me. Don't compose like me. Don't imitate me. But listen to what's around you. Listen to the music of immigrants. Listen to African American music and the Native American music. He traveled to find all of this. he said, this is where you're going to find the soul of America.

And his students taught their students that way. And they became George Gershwin, Aaron Copland, and Duke Ellington. We're listening to the interview I recently recorded with cellist Yo-Yo Ma at an event held at WHYY where Fresh Air is produced. We'll hear more of the interview after a break. This is Fresh Air. I want to end by paraphrasing something that you've said, and I think this was in reference to recording the Bach cello solo pieces three separate times. And you said that your approach was, this might not be perfect, it might not be the best performance, but it's the best I can do in this moment of my life.

And I find something really beautiful in that because it expresses the commitment of doing your best in that moment. But it also has a kind of forgiving attitude that like, it's not going to be perfect, but it's the best I can do right now. And that that's going to be good enough. I think that's a beautiful approach to things, to the, that's been my experience of your approach over the last 40 years. Oh, please. Thank you.

No, seriously. Because, you know, I was going to ask you, how do you deal with burnout? How does anybody who does things for four decades avoid the trap of saying, okay, I'm caught in a rut. How do you rejuvenate, regenerate, and constantly be curious and active and do your best? I try and forgive myself because I don't want to be neurotic. I also don't want to fall under the spell of what I call an industrial aesthetic, which is your way of saying perfection, right? What do we do in in industry you make a million copies of something with the least amount of error so here's a million copies maybe it's six out of a million

bad right i can't play a million concerts and make have six bum concerts you know know, that's an unreasonable thing to ask of a human being. What allows me to not be paralyzed is to just say, I'm doing my best. And if it doesn't work, you know, you know my intention

is to do the best. You were so wonderful tonight. You are so wonderful. to do the best. You were so wonderful tonight. You are so wonderful. Thank you, Ian. I love you, Terry Gross. I love you. You're our hero. Thank you, Ian.

My conversation with Yo-Yo Ma was recorded on stage at WHYY earlier this month when he was presented with WHYY's annual Lifelong Learning Award. Special thanks to Yvette Murray and our other colleagues at WHYY who produced the event, and to Ben Mandelkern at Yo-Yo Ma's production company, Sound Postings. And of course, our thanks to Yo-Yo Ma. Tomorrow on Fresh Air, our guest will be the creator of this year's winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Audio. Johans LaCour's podcast, You Didn't See Nothin', is about a tragic event that occurred in 1997 when a 13-year-old black boy from Chicago was beaten into a coma after riding his bike into a predominantly white neighborhood.

I hope you'll join us. To keep up with what's on the show and get highlights of our interviews, follow us on Instagram at NPR Fresh Air's executive producer is Danny Miller. Thank you. Our digital media producer is Molly C.V. Nesper. Roberta Shorrock directs the show. Our co-host is Tanya Mosley. I'm Terry Gross. ¦ © transcript Emily Beynon