Another incident has rocked the classical music world, this time one involving a mid-performance clash between a coughing child and a concert violinist. In a recital yesterday at London's Royal Festival Hall, South Korean violinist Kyung-Wha Chung, 66, issued from the stage a recommendation to the parents of a child who was coughing during the performance, according to multiple sources, including the BBC, The Times of London and MusicOMH. "Maybe you should bring her back when she's older," Chung reportedly said from the stage to the parents of the coughing child. In his review in MusicOMH, music writer Evan Dickerson noted that shortly after Chung's remark "a parent and two young children" left the hall. The recital marked Chung's comeback to the London stage after more than a decade in forced retirement brought about by a hand injury. Chung's performance with pianist Kevin Kenner received excellent reviews. Some comments that have appeared on social media sites thank Chung for bringing attention to the ongoing problem of coughing during concerts, which can be distracting for performers and concertgoers alike. Other comments, including some from people who attended yesterday's performance, note that many in the audience were coughing and that it wasn't appropriate for Chung to target a child with her remark. As a performer and concert-goer, I can honestly say I've visited both sides of the fence on this issue. Coughing can be extremely distracting, but on the other hand, sometimes it actually feels reassuring. Hearing a cough here or there in the audience while on stage can bring a bit of perspective back into what can easily become an all-consuming experience, reminding the performer that we are all flesh and blood, that the performance is really just a tiny drop in the river of life. And as annoying as it can be as a concert-goer to suffer through another concert-goer's coughing fit, I also know what it feels like to be an unwilling - and quite miserable - concert cougher. Such a thing happened to me at a performance of Bach's Goldberg Variations by a world-class pianist. I arrived at the prestigious hall and took my seat in the middle of a row in the middle section on the ground floor. The pianist walked onstage to healthy applause and took his seat at the keyboard. Sometime in the seconds before he began to play the Goldbergs' beautiful, quiet opening Aria, a tickle arose in my throat. I had no cough drops, no water, no way of leaving my mid-row seat without trampling on my already annoyed fellow concertgoers, so I stifled my cough as best I could. So desperate was I not to disrupt the performance that I even tried to scratch the itchy tickle with my fingernails through the front of my throat. The tickle went away fairly quickly. But the real point is, nothing the pianist might have said to me from the stage would have made it go away any faster, or would have made my throat never again develop a tickle (though now I never go to a concert without cough drops). And although British author and blogger Norman Lebrecht showed some empathy with Chung's plight as performer by writing, "she should not be demonised for unguarded remarks made at a moment of high tension," he also opined in the same post that Chung's comment has "massively reinforced" the public image of classical music as "forbidding, restrictive, ... uncomfortable" and "potentially embarrassing." Whatever you may think about the reports of Chung's remark, on the day after her comeback recital headlines about her perhaps misplaced comment may well be eclipsing those about the heroic beginning of this new phase in her career. Read more:
- Chung/Kenner @ Royal Festival Hall, London (MusicOMH)
- Renowned Violinist Berates Coughing Child (BBC)
- Kyung-Wha Chung: The damage (Slipped Disc)
