Pépin and Perlman

I NEVER THOUGHT THERE'D BE MUCH about Itzhak Perlman that would inspire me beyond a respect for virtuosity. Tonight, though, after a day of the usual (e-mail, gym, arrange for next week's trip, discuss flights for June, a little chipping/shredding after fixing the chipper/shredder, a little weeding, and so on) it was time for the Saturday night Martini and the television news. After a few minutes of polygamy from Texas I went out on the patio to listen to the birds. Then I came back in and switched channel to find Itzhak Perlman and Jacques Pépin cooking up striped bass, roast duck, noodles, and blood orange ice cream. What an interesting conversation they had in the meanwhile! I think you can hear it online; give it a try.

Music, I mean the performance of it, and food, that is, the cooking of it, have a few things in common. I really do think they both exhibit the ineffable quality of the human: our species is blest with a special relationship to the natural. We can fixate on aspects of Nature which seem to have no other purpose, to put a teleological point on it, than to delight. Sound and Taste: we could (and some of us do) live without them, live perfectly healthy and productive lives: but who would want to?

Pépin is such an engaging man, so seamlessly grown out of his French boyhood, so alert still to the pleasures of la vie quotidienne, everyday life. And be damned if Perlman didn't exhibit many of the same qualities. He actually says, at one point, something like the finest moments in performing come when the musician simply serves the music, which is a nice thing for a composer to hear. (We feel that's what we do, too.)

Toast and café au lait for breakfast; lentils and banana and pomegranate juice for lunch; toasted walnuts and almonds with the Martinis; broccoli and leftovers for dinner: an humble day's fare, and tasty, and nourishing.