The writer makes a pilgrimage to Kilgore, Texas, to explore the hometown and Baptist roots of the world-renowned pianist, who died Wednesday:
“After much deliberation, Richter and Gilels nervously took the prominent jury’s final vote to the politburo, the cultural minister, and finally the new premier, Khrushchev. The premier asked, ‘Is [Cliburn] the best?’ The cultural minister replied, ‘Yes, he is the best.’ So Khrushchev said, ‘In this case, give him the first prize.’ The ticker-tape parade in New York upon Van’s return to the U.S. remains the stuff of legends, and as almost every obituary published since his death yesterday at age 78 points out, his artistry was credited with helping to thaw the Cold War.
“But amid all that hoopla and Russian grandeur, Van was also a Texan, a Southerner, a Baptist, a patriot who began each concert with the ‘Star-Spangled Banner,’ a musical idealist, and a man who loved his parents, his childhood friends, and black-eyed peas as much as I do. We both grew up in East Texas behind the Pine Curtain—he in Kilgore and I in Texarkana—so I always knew that if we met, we’d have more to chat about than my own devotion to the piano, challenged though it is by my perpetual intermediate level.”
