Iris Green describes her daughter Jacqueline du Pré (b.1945) as having a childhood "like any other [middle-class Anglo-Celtic] English child," until the age of four, when she heard a cello on the radio and fell for its sound. As is often the case, music lessons are imposed on children; but not on Jacqueline du Pré, who, despite her prodigious talent, remained like any other middle-class Anglo-Celtic English child -- except when playing the cello.
Jacqueline du Pré in Portrait (BBC/Opus Arte/Allegro Films, 2004) is both a documentary of du Pré's short yet exuberant life (she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1973, and passed away in 1987) and a document of two of her most notable performances: first with the New Philharmonia Orchestra -- Elgar's Cello Concerto in E minor Op. 85 -- in 1967 (conducted by her prodigious and equally young husband, Daniel Barenboim); the second with Beethoven's Piano Trio No. 5 in D major Op. 70 No. 1 (The Ghost) in 1970 (with Barenboim on piano and Pinchas Zukerman on violin).
Watching du Pré and Barenboim together, at work and at play, is its own sweet music. Yes, Barenboim comes off as a man with some aggressively conservative ideas about gender relations, but he is quick to acknowledge du Pré's powers as an artist and a human being, and he appears to articulate these powers in a way that pleases her. As for du Pré, who has a good three inches on her short, barrel-chested husband, it occurred to me that in considering someone to share your life and music with, what could be a better fit than with someone shaped like the very instrument you fell for all those years ago?
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