An Excerpt From

Evenings with Horowitz: A Personal Portrait

By David Dubal

Horowitz—finicky as a cat, enigmatic, and neurotic—was always waiting for the exact moment to do anything, especially to play in public. He told me, "The tragedy of the performer is to have to be at your best at a certain day and time. What a horrible fate! Your best might have been two days before or after." And so Horowitz could be inert for years. Finding even hour of the day to practice the piano could be a monumental problem.

Horowitz would stick his foot gingerly into the river of life and scream it was too cold, while [Arthur] Rubinstein swam like a fish, living a lusty, triumphant existence. Rubinstein was fearless and lived "unconditionally," as he put it. He said, "I can be happy in prison." Horowitz's life was sterile in comparison.

Rubinstein, who lived "in the moment," was baffled by Horowitz, who lived almost totally for the piano—his very being and identity were linked to his instrument. If the humidity outdoors affected the piano badly, Horowitz might despair. Rubinstein, the pianist, painted alfresco and never quite understood Horowitz's endless obsession with a pianistic detail. It irritated Rubinstein when Horowitz would run to the piano saying, "Listen, I did something different to the Carmen Variations."

Horowitz was thrilled by his tactile contact with the keyboard. Of course, the importance of craft varies in degree with all accomplished pianists. But in Horowitz's case, technical wizardry was the attainment of a transcendent glory.