Today, when losing your house means losing your dad … again.
So far on Notes from the Fires, we’ve heard from adult fire victims. But this time, host John Rabe talks with Sasha Schoettler, the 21-year-old daughter of Hollywood session violinist Nina Evtuhov, who we featured a few weeks ago.
Sasha’s dad (Nina’s husband Pete Schoettler) died of cancer in 2010, when she was too little to really know him. Now, at 21, she was starting to understand who her dad was by going through the things he left behind … which are now ashes.
The music in the piece comes from Sasha’s suggestions, including the jaunty scherzo from Borodin’s Second String Quartet - used later for “Baubles, Bangles, and Beads.”
"Baubles, bangles and beads" by Frank Sinatra & Tom Jobim
We we close the piece with John Corigliano's “Lullaby for Natalie," which he wrote for the daughter of violinist Anne Akiko Myers. Corigliano says, “After Natalie’s birth, Anne sent me a video of her playing it for her baby in a crib. The baby, awake at first, was asleep at the end, so either the five-minute lullaby had bored her to sleep or I had lived up to the promise of my title. I will never know.” We’re hearing Anne Akiko Myers on violin with Akira Eguchi on piano.
