To the memory of Mr. Elliott Carter
I have the most profound admiration for Mr. Carter’s extraordinary life and his visionary work, the importance of which will be even more evident with time. Only having had one very brief personal encounter with him in his late years, I nevertheless keep a strong and luminous memory of that precious moment, of his beautiful spirit and his radiant smile.
But most of all, I do know the richness of his works, and I constantly witness the enormous influence of his thinking and his music over the repertory of our time, in the ways music has been and still is created and composed by the generations after him. His musical thinking has challenged the composers, the performers and the listeners alike to reach another level, and I deeply admire the firm and consistent stance he held in the turbulent streams of the musical life of the 20th century, true to his own vision and to his own voice. What a gift, all these original works, which will sound just as fresh in the future as they do today!