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Now eighty, he shares thoughts about a possible resurgence of the disease with Sunday Morning's doctor John Lapouc.
So I had volume when I was Four, around four.
So 1949. Yeah.
So the first vaccine was given in 1955. You missed it by about six years. Yeah.
Yeah.
So I'm here to tell you that that's what happens when you are not vaccinated. Describe the emotion that you're feeling when you're talking to me about this right now.
Well, the emotion is that, you know, I mean, I am a product. Yeah.
the pre-polio vaccine.
So now I've done pretty well with my life. But Why, you know, you know. Uh Why fool around with that? You know, there's a saying, if it's not broken, why fix it? All right.
So I'm a perfect example of somebody that that has spend all of his life to basically Um adjust. to my disability. I have to think all the time. As to what is accessible. I just went right now to a place I had to take some photos.
and there was a step that high. And I couldn't get in.
So they said, oh, we can do it. And so they bring a very short. Ramp. to put on the stair when I had to go with my scooter. And you know, I I was almost killed, you know, because the amount of anger and so on.
I have to think about that all the time. When I travel, to play my concerts. I have to think about What kind of room? Would be okay for me. You know, so they usually what I do is I always ask for photographs.
Of the bathroom, of the height of the bed, and so on and so forth. This is a life of somebody who cannot walk.
Now I've adjusted. I'm a very happy person. I've adjusted. You've learned to deal with all these obstacles. Absolutely.
And you're Yitzkak Promen, but even you have to deal with all of all the difficulties. And about the axis, the interpretation of access varies. You know, people think that a lot of the architects, you know, when they design these, so to speak, ADA rooms, you know, they look at a code book. And the code said you have to put some grab bars.
So they put the grab bars and It's accessible. It's not. You know, right now, some hotels I go into, and it's amazing. the toilet seat is like three feet, like two feet from the ground. And the bed is nine feet from the ground.
So, to go to Turley to Bulbar Leib, then you have to go out, and then you have to climb onto the bed. They don't think. that you know With somebody in a wheelchair, you know, for example, I have a scooter where I actually have a hydraulic system so I can go up a little bit. But if you're sitting in a wheelchair and you have a bed that is like, I don't know, four feet high or whatever it is. It's impossible.
So to interpret what is accessible and what's is by itself an art. And I don't think that designers really No. For example, also, if you sit in a a fa a walk-in shower.
So they usually give you a seat there, yes. But sometimes they put the faucet immediately across so you can't reach the faucet. Who has thought about something like that? It's quite incredible. That's what I have to deal with.
So when you think about potentially somebody in the future getting paralyzed from polio because they didn't get vaccinated and having to go through all of the difficulties that you've had to manage. No, why? I mean, why do that? My parents were upset. They were...
Oh. They were so upset. They were, you know, I mean, there you go, your child, you know that. Running and and hav having a wonderful time and so on, and all of a sudden stop. Where were you at the time?
Israel. In Tel Aviv. Yes. Do you remember A moment where you finally said to yourself, I'm not going to walk again. No.
No, I didn't say that. I mean, what I said was. Um When am I going to start playing the violin? Oh. So had you already been playing violin before you got yes, I did.
And then and then it stopped. You know, we stopped because I didn't like the way it sounded because I couldn't play it. Because you were four years old. Exactly. No, at that time it was three, three and a half, three and a half.
I didn't didn't like the way it sounded. But after I had polio, Um Then My parents thought that it might be good for me to start again, and I thought so too. For whatever reasons, you know, maybe they thought that it would be nice because I can't walk that I should occupy myself with something else, although I was just very, very. very much uh Yeah. Uh Incredibly, I wanted to sound, I loved the sound of the violin.
So I was affected by the sign that I wanted to do that. Yeah.
So between the visits to the to the orthopaedics, the people with the leg casts and all of that stuff. I had a teacher come to the house. And I started to play. In an odd way, you getting polio was part of the formula that led to you.
Well, I don't know. You know, people ask me if you didn't get polio, would you still play the violin? And I think probably yes. You still would have played the best. I personally don't feel that one is connected to the other.
Now, I would have done other stuff, I would have done sports. Or something like that. Of course, my parents would never let me. For example, we had in a class in Israel. We had a One of the classes was called Uh uh you know, carpentry or something like that.
I was not allowed. to do carpentry because I might cut myself, I might hit myself in a hammer or whatever it is, and that would interfere with the violin. You know, I had to practice. You know, I had a lot of friends when I was living in Tel Aviv, you know, and they thought that I was weird. Not because that I was on crutches, it's because I practiced three hours a day.
That's what they thought was very unusual. Nata because I was actually At that time, the streets were not parked so much, so they were playing from one side of the street to the other, playing soccer. And I was goalie because I had my crutches and my feet.
So every time a ball would come, I could stop it with that. You know, that was fun. There is Footage of you on the Ed Sullivan show when you are quite young. Right, 13. And Tell me what that was like.
First of all, I'd never heard of the guy. You know, in Israel they mentioned Sullivan, Sullivan, no, actually in Israel they said Suleivan. No, that's Sulevan, oh it was fantastic, wonderful, you know, great, great, fantastic. One thing I got in the translation of Sullivan is that it meant a trip to the United States, which is So it was so exciting, you know. You know, in a small country, After a while, you always need to go abroad.
And there's a word called ishtalmut. That means to basically complete yourself, you know, Istanbud.
So it was either Europe. or the states. And so sullivan was the opportunity to go to the States, to go to America, and to. Go to the Juilliard School, which we are here, and so on.
Now at 80, have you completed yourself? Are you completing yourself? Never complete yourself. If you complete yourself, then there's nothing left. You know, there's always something.
And the thing about people when people ask me what is Uh What do you feel you you have to do? What's your goal? What's your challenge still? And my challenge is never to continue not to be bored by what I do.
So at 80 you have still not completed yourself. I don't think so. I think and I'm continuing. to be fascinated by music. which is something that's for me is a blessing.
Because it's very easy when you play something. I mean, this just a couple of hours ago I had a rehearsal and played a Mozart sonata. And I was still saying, ah. Fantastic piece. You know, I played that Mozart Sonata many, many, many times.
And it's not like, oh yeah, I have to play another Mozart sonata. It's a basic piece. What a phenomenal composer he was So for me that is a blessing and that's a challenge and that's a goal to continue to be fascinated by what I do for a living. We'll have more from our Sunday morning extended interview after this break. Why have I asked my HVAC guy I found on Angie.com to change my grandpa's trachea tube?
Because I was so amazed by how quickly he replaced our air ducts. I knew I could trust him to change pop-pops too while I was on vacation. Make it quick, young man. Aw, see? Papa trusts you.
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Price and Coverage Match Limited by State Law. I know it's not what we're talking about, but I have to ask you because I'm so interested. There's a whole literature. on music and the brain. And how it affects the brain.
People with dementia suddenly can sit up and sing a song. Yes. Do you have any kind of gestalt about what's going on there with music in the brain? Why does a minor key make you tear up? Exactly.
That's what I was about to say. It's it's quite or why does a phrase gives you goosebumps. And my fascination, my question is: does a phrase If you play that phrase for, let's say, ten people. Will it give everybody the goosebumps or would they need a different phrase to give them goosebumps?
So not so bad to be in a profession and have a life where at 80 What you are doing And what you are hearing can still give you goosebumps, it can still make you tear up. Absolutely. Absolutely. And that's the way, you know, we have, my wife Toby started this wonderful school called the Pearlman Music Program. And every year we have uh a period of time where we have to choose Kids to come because we have sometimes we have opening, it's a small program, but so this year, for example, we had.
opening for three violinists out of a hundred Applicants.
So, and out of the hundred applicants, there were at least 60 that were. Phenomenal.
So how do you choose? And sometimes what we do is we say, If I hear somebody that says to you, oh my God. That's really something that moves you. That's how we choose, you know, because that, because the level. the level of playing these days is very high.
Everybody can play fantastically.
So, that little something that somebody does. You can't even put your thumb on it. No, no. You just know it's not. That little something there that.
puts you to a different area in your brain. And that's something that the brain does, and that's inexplicable. And It's nice to have something you can't explain. Isn't it? Yes.
It's very nice. It's the same thing. Another example is like if you take. four conductors standing at the podium, all very, very good. And every time somebody gives a downbeat, you'll get a different sound from the orchestra just on the chord.
What is it? I mean, is it You know, where it's some sort of a current, electrical current, that goes between your hand and what the player sees. Not I can't explain it. Have you ever heard of a gentleman by the name of Moshe Feldenkrais? Fine.
Feldenkrais, you know, I mean He was very famous in Israel and a lot of people here, and he was talking about the brain. And he was saying how the brain how you can do stuff with your brain without actually doing it. That you can actually do that. And these are the days.
Sometimes, you know, when I want to practice a particular phrase. I actually imagine it. As to where the notes are going and so on. But you see, I didn't like to practice. And my parents were not musicians.
But for example, my mother would always make sure that I practiced.
So if I didn't practice, she would complain, you're not practicing.
So after seeing this doctor, and he said to me, you know, he says, you can actually practice with your brain. And And And I said, really? He said, yes, really.
So whenever she didn't hear me practicing, I said, I'm doing the Feldenkrais method. And she didn't buy it. But it's really true that you could do a lot of stuff without actually doing this. Because a lot of the stuff is, you know, what goes next, you know, as far as the technical passages and so on. You can do a lot of it with your brain.
You know, sometimes the kids come to me and they say, you know, I'm practicing a lot, but then when it comes, when I get nervous, I think about What comes next? And that's the, you know, like there's a phrase and all of a sudden you think, Oh, what's next? And so I have said to them: trust your practicing, because a lot of the stuff about practicing is repetition. Muscle memory. Yeah, and if you trust your repetition stuff, you're not going to have any problems.
As a matter of fact, I said to them, look out the window and see the traffic and then just play it. And you can always play it. You talk about memory slips. You can always play it if you don't pay any attention, because the brain has told you that over and over repeated over again, it's right there. But if you start thinking about it, That's when you get into trouble.
So oh my god, what's next? But if you don't think about that, boom, right there. Brain is fascinating. I say to the kids, When you practice slowly, You will forget slowly. In other words, when you practice slowly, it'll stay with you.
It's like a sponge. If you put a sponge in water, and you take it right out. There's not that much water there, you know. It's a little water, but if you put it in water and it stays in water and it soaks the water, then you take it out, it's full of water. The same thing with the brain.
If we practice slowly. What do you mean by slowly? Like literally playing the notes slower than it's written? Yes. Especially passages and playing it, sometimes you play it in rhythm.
Your rhythms is very, very good, you know. You know, dotted rhythms to it.
So you do one dotted rhythm, and then you do the opposite dotted rhythm, and that really is helpful. It's absolutely fantastic. It's like aspirin for the hand. It really works. If your parents were alive right now and they saw what's going on with the vaccine hesitancy and people saying, well, maybe don't take the polio vaccine, what do you think they would say?
They would be incensed. They would be, because, you know, they were so. Deeply, deeply upset. with what happened to me. Deeply upset, And the the thing about it is though What made them such good parents?
was is that they never When it came to my music, They never say, oh, well, yeah, it's all right, you know, whatever. I had to do the maximum, I had to do the best. They never, you know, and they were always like that, you know, and they. They believed in me. They believed in me.
They never said, oh, well, it's very, very nice, the music, but it's very nice, but you know, he has polyonic and they believed in me and they believed in what I could do musically. They really did.
So I give a lot of credit to what they did for me. A lot of credit. I forgot, actually, I forgot the original question that you just asked me. What would they have said if they had seen everything that's going on right now with people saying, well, maybe don't take the polio vaccine? Yeah, no, they would.
They would be shocked. they would be incensed.
So they were huge for you in your life. Oh yeah, they really believed in me. They did everything. We went to the States that was very difficult for them and so on and so forth. My child is going to the Juilliard School.
Yeah.
And there it is. He's going to be on the Ed Sullivan show. It was very exciting. How do you want to be remembered? That I did.
The best I could. as a musician. and and uh and as just as a human being. that I did the best I could, that it that was good enough. I'm Jane Pauley.
Thank you for listening. And for more of our extended interviews, follow and listen to Sunday Morning on the free Odyssey app. or wherever you get your podcasts. I want to know what's going on in the world. You can't do that if you're just sitting in a chair reading about what other people have found.
You have to get out there and listen. By telling people about each other, You actually bring this country together. There are big questions that all of us are asking. I want to get you the answers. I'm Tony DeCoppol.
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