New York's Central Park has become an oasis the city's founders never imagined. The music in Central Park was never part of the original design, but slowly, gently, this grand green space has become a great place to hear great music.
This is, in large part, thanks to Susan Keser. This violin virtuoso stepped in front of the tulips three years ago and began playing world-class interpretations of Vivaldi, Bach and Beethoven to the passing crowd. Now she has regulars who line the benches on warm weekends to listen to this delicate, passionate master make concert-hall music sound like it belongs among the flowers and trees.
Playing Times
She plays in the same spot every Saturday and Sunday from nine to five. She announces each song, making sure her listeners know what they are hearing. Then she begins to play. You know immediately this is a serious effort, not a mere half-hearted attempt to imitate classical music for tips. Her focus is palpable. Her intensity drips like Bach's falling cascades in an impossible commentary on what it means to come to the park, to seek refuge, to search for purpose in a city that can assault your sense of well-being.
Here she is, assuring, calming, stirring hearts in Central Park.
She may nod at you as you drop fills into her violin case to purchase her CD. She bows when the bench patrons applaud. Then she resumes her graceful, serene stance, and feminine-muscled arms stretch the bowstring across the violin, and the children begin to dance.
The Audience
It's the children that instruct the listeners. These tots don't know that this is supposed to be important music. They dance because that of what Vivaldi knew about the human spirit: we respond to grace, pulse, rising and falling with inevitable appreciation. If he could see the children of Central Park dancing to his music, he would never allow it to be played in a concert hall again.
Regulars line the benches at nine a.m. Tourists wonder what kind of city is this that places a maestro along the path to Bethesda Fountain for their enjoyment. Surely this city has become great because of this spirit.
At dusk, as Ms. Keser lovingly wipes down her violin and places it to sleep in its case, it is as if she has played the park to life and now is putting it to rest. A city once known for its dollar-grubbing Squeegee Men and Times-Square Hookers is becoming known for this graceful, serene, passionate woman who serenades the tulips.
A City Institution
The city is heading into its third year of Ms. Keser's concerts. When the noise and the hustlers become too much, a moment of respite at Susan Keser’s open-air impromptu Central Park concert hall will remind you that we all love New York for its potential to make us great.
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