CELLIST JANOS STARKER BATTLES DILETTANTISM

At 61, Janos Starker, a cellist and a pedagogue with few equals, seems to have a strong opinion on everything:

--On the current trend of musicians-turned-conductors, one he has steadfastly resisted: “I am not dissatisfied with my cello yet. Just because someone becomes famous as an instrumentalist, they think they know more than the conductor. They are dilettantes. My biggest enemy is dilettantism. It is very widespread and I am doing my darndest to combat it.”

--On musical competitions: “I suppose they are a necessary evil. I have always resented them. I don’t judge them, and I never did.”

--On contemporary music, especially works for the cello, such as Penderecki’s solo “Capriccio for Siegfried Palm”: “I find myself fascinated with the ‘Palm’ music--for about three or four minutes. Generally, I think substance is lacking in most recent works.”

And so it goes. As the Hungarian-born musician, who appears with the Orange County Pacific Symphony on Saturday, remarks during a telephone interview from his Bloomington, Ind., home, “People always say that I am mellowing because I’m a grandfather. But that is not true.”

Judging from a recent recording of the solo music of Bach (on Sefel, his third complete set), Starker’s playing certainly has not mellowed. “As you get older,” he says, “every minute becomes more precious, and every note becomes more important. It is the same with Haydn (whose D-major Concerto will serve as his solo vehicle on Saturday) as with Bach. You discover new details.”

Does he notice any unconscious changes in interpretation, for example in comparing this latest Bach set with previous ones? “Nothing I do is unconscious,” he answers with a slight chuckle.

Starker is equally forthright in his approach to teaching. Of his role as a member of the school of music at Indiana University, the cellist says simply, “I am a professional--and I teach professionalism. I try to guide these young players as much as I can. They must have a certain type of thinking process: They must use their brains. Another thing I insist is that they know all their possibilities.”

One valuable possibility, he says, is orchestral playing. Starker set aside his solo career upon arriving in America in 1948 and played with several orchestras, including the Chicago Symphony, “to learn the ropes,” as he puts it.

“I think being in an orchestra is an essential part of a player’s education,” he states, noting that Fritz Reiner, music director during his Chicago tenure, was one of his strongest influences.

Observing the current state of the cello, Starker points with pride to a recent and dramatic image change, due in part to an improvement in the quality of teaching: “For instance, look at the work of Gabor Rejto and Eleonore Schoenfeld right there in Los Angeles.

“In the past, all the great cellists were teachers. But now, their students are coming to the fore.”

During the last quarter-century, he says, “the improvement in playing has not been so dramatic in piano, because of standards set earlier by Rubinstein and the others, or in violin, because of Heifetz. Certainly, (Gregor) Piatigorsky and (Emanuel) Feuermann raised the level of the cello, but there is still a way to go.”

Quickly--and diplomatically--Starker interjects, “Not that today’s crop is better, they are just at another level. This doesn’t belittle the figures of the past.”

While the playing has improved, so too have the instruments themselves, he adds. Starker plays down his own technological contribution from the late ‘60s, the Starker Bridge, which utilizes cone-shaped holes in the bridge’s two feet. Recalling how Time magazine had described the bridge as perhaps “the most significant tonal innovation in string instruments in 300 years,” the cellist says without a trace of false modesty, “It is not as great as Time said. It just makes the instrument easier to play.

“Of course, some people feel that if they don’t fight to get a sound, they’re not doing their job.”