sideNotes:
International careers often come at a very high price for the artists: endless hours of travelling around the world; getting up in the middle of the night to catch the first flight out; waiting for missed connections at sweltering airports or unheated train stations; practising day and night in uncomfortable hotel rooms; and neglecting family and children in order to manage more performances and longer tours. In the worst case, the body fails and the artist is forced to stop and rest.
Cancelled performances can be disastrous for a concert organiser; however, they can also turn into magical moments for an audience when a younger or lesser-known artist stands in and delivers an amazing performance. At times, shock and disappointment in the audience turn into the opposite: excitement and fascination.
There are countless examples: Yuja Wang reached her first international breakthrough when she jumped in for the indisposed Martha Argerich; Seon-Jin Cho got to play with the Berlin Philharmonic when Lang Lang, 12 years his senior, had to stop playing because of a serious case
of tendonitis.
But cancellations can also be a huge shock and a highly stressful affair for the promoter. Following the initial paralysis after the bad news, a nerve-racking fight against the clock begins. Depending on the situation, the concert may be a few days or weeks away; in the worst case, only a few hours, and a suitable replacement has to be found.
During the past 20 years, I have had to deal with a fair number of cancellations—most notably the Salzburg Mozarteum Orchestra, who were scheduled to perform at the opening of the Tongyeong International Music Festival in South Korea, in March 2011. Two weeks before the concert, an earthquake struck Japan, leading to the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear power plant. Even though Fukushima is about 1,000 kilometres away from the South Korean coast, the Mozarteum musicians decided to invoke their force majeure clause and cancelled their trip. What followed was a frantic but ultimately successful search for musicians.
In 2019, the festival title in Tongyeong happened to be “Destiny”. Various programmes were related to this theme, but in the end, fate intervened in a much more dramatic way: Celin Romero, 82, older brother of Pepe Romero and part of the “Royal family” of the guitar, suffered a stroke just after arriving at our concert hall. It was 10 a.m., and 1,300 children were already waiting to hear a performance of Las Romeros. Thanks to the presence of mind and fast reaction of his wife and our staff, Celin was quickly resuscitated, and an ambulance arrived at the hall a few minutes later. Despite all this weighing heavily on his mind, Pepe, the younger brother, went on stage shortly afterwards and played the entire school concert—alone. I have rarely heard a more intense and overwhelming performance!
When it was time for the main performance that night, Celin Romero was at the hospital, awaiting news from his doctors. His brother, son and nephew went on stage and played the concert without him. They managed to put aside their worries and instead focussed on the music, playing what was supposed to be a quartet with only three guitars, and earning thunderous applause in the process.
If it had been up to Celin, he would have played that night, no questions asked. But the doctors told him to stay in bed for two weeks, which must have seemed like an eternity for him. In the end, he left both the hospital and the country with a smile on his face. The only thing worse than the stroke itself, so he said, was the Korean hospital food, which he had to endure for a full two weeks.
Florian Riem
