Heifetz As I Knew Him

Ayke Agus recalls the very afternoon he asked her to stay after class: "With that afternoon commenced my fifteen years of bittersweet association with Jascha Heifetz through hell and high water, from musical exultation to mundane daily care, a relationship in which sometimes I was the whipping post and at other times the spiritual counsellor of a superannuated, insecure, and immature child who often threw away what he wanted and wanted badly what he rejected. Through all these tribulations, music was the spiritual bond that kept us together and made it possible for me to put up with the paradox he represented." The aged Heifetz, violinist of the century, had much to tell, and Ayke, a young woman from Indonesia - Heifetz preferred "from the jungles of Java" - absorbed it all as they shared their stories about their lives and about music making.