The White House: An Evening with Casals

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After the guests had taken their chairs, Casals bent over his 250-year-old Goffriller violoncello and, with a characteristic grimace, began to draw out the golden notes of Mendelssohn's Trio in D Minor. Then there were Schumann's fluid Adagio and Allegro and five Concert Pieces by Couperin. As an encore, Casals played his own arrangement—virtually his theme song—of the Catalan melody, Chant of the Birds.

The musicale was a wondrous success. With ears turned intently to the aged master, the critics and music lovers agreed that Casals had never made better music, and that his octogenarian bow arm was as firm as ever. At concert's end, the audience arose in a standing ovation. The President gave Casals an abrazo and summoned Alice Longworth to the front of the room for a bow. She had heard the great cellist in his last White House performance, 57 years before, when he played for her President father Theodore Roosevelt.

Emotional Flood. The eminent musicians in the audience were staggered by the emotion of it all. Said Composer Gian Carlo Menotti: "Nowhere in Europe could you have an evening like this. English royalty entertains movie stars. Our President entertains artists." Obbligatoed Eugene Ormandy: "An inspiration to all of us." Leonard Bernstein, who sat with his head buried in his hands during most of the recital, was nearly overcome. "I was deeply moved by the entire occasion," he admitted, "not merely by the music of Casals but by the company in which it was played." Maestro Casals was the calmest of all. His laconic comment: "It went well."