Man with Zal

Fifty-two years ago, a young pianist played his company best for the critical ears of a celebrated violinist. When he had finished, the violinist patted him on the shoulder, said: "You have talent. Work hard and you will go far." Pianist Artur Rubinstein was then six; his critic, Bronislaw Hubermann, was twelve.

The twelve-year-old was a wise prophet. In 40-odd years of concert touring, Artur Rubinstein has logged some 1 1/2 million miles, and played for more people than any concert pianist in history. Last week in San Francisco, Rubinstein reached the end of his longest U.S. tour. At 58, he had made go appearances in seven months, and to capacity audiences everywhere. After a few weeks' rest in his Hollywood home, he will set out again on a 34-concert tour of South America. Then will come a tour of Western Europe--except Germany, where Rubinstein has refused to play since World War I.

Name or Talent? To San Franciscans in their huge granite Opera House, as to most audiences, Rubinstein is a small, lumpy figure with a classic brow and a frizzy Harpo Marx-like mop, spotlighted on a distant stage. The impenetrable dignity Pianist Rubinstein manages to assume on stage conceals a talent for mimicry, a love of partying, and a quick-tongued wit.

At ten he was pushed toward famed Pianist Eugene d'Albert and introduced as "little Rubinstein." "In name or talent?" asked D'Albert. "Both," piped young Artur.* Once a gadabout bachelor ("My life is too naughty; I cannot write it"), he married at 43, now has two boys and two girls, youngest five months. Says Artur: "Boys are inclined to smile tolerantly and say 'Papa is a fine fellow--but a little mad.' But daughters--they understand--and adore! They know instinctively that an artist remains something of a child to the end of his days."

Pain & Revolt. No classical artist demands and so often gets Rubinstein's high minimum guarantee ($3,500 a concert), but he is a good investment. At one concert in Lincoln, Neb. last year, Rubinstein earned $5,400 as his share of the box-office receipts. His Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 was Victor's 1946 best-selling classical album. The $85,000 he collected for three days' piano playing for the movie I've Always Loved You is still a Hollywood record.

The pianists who rank with Rubinstein in the estimation of critics don't get around much any more (the great Josef Hofmann is 71, and in semiretirement; Artur Schnabel, 65, unexcelled at Beethoven, plays only a few concerts a year). And Vladimir Horowitz and Jose Iturbi, who ring the cash register as loudly as Rubinstein in individual concerts, don't make the long tours he does.

In a forthcoming movie, Brahms, Robert & Clara Schumann and Franz Liszt are shown at the piano. In each case it is Rubinstein being dubbed on the sound track, playing as he thinks each would have played. His own pianistic style is clearly definable. Rubinstein is at his best in Chopin, and vice versa. Chopin's elusive poetic shadings and magical fire are easy to overdo. As a Pole, Rubinstein seems to understand the zal in Chopin's works, which Music Critic James Huneker defined as "a baleful compound of pain, sadness, secret rancor and revolt."

Rubinstein made his U.S. debut in 1906, and was panned as "half-baked; not a prodigy, not an adult." Last winter a critic wrote: "About one pianist in 10,000 or more reaches a state of perfection when the critics can only sit back and admire. Artur Rubinstein has reached that sparsely populated state."

He is no kin to Russia's great Pianist Anton Rubinstein. Tired of being asked about it, Artur during his playboy days in Paris wore a sign in his cap: No.

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