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Joshua Bell: "I regard London as a second home and there's more happening here musically than anywhere else in the world"

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Saturday night, Moscow. The streets around the Kremlin are cordoned off. Red Square bristles with police and security guards. It's the Russian capital's 860th anniversary and the climax of the celebrations - an open-air concert given by the world's elite violinists - is about to begin. Even the heavy clouds of earlier have vanished, dispersed by planes spraying chemicals to ensure a clear, pewter twilight - no urban myth, but something the obliging authorities last organised when Paul McCartney played Red Square four years ago.

Russia has a legendary tradition of violinists, from Heifetz, Elman and Milstein past to Maxim Vengerov present. Subtle aspects of technique, such as the way the bow is held and the weight with which it attacks the string, sets these players apart as members of the unique Russian school.

But here's the surprise. Top of the bill tonight is Joshua Bell, the all-American floppy haired boy from Indiana who has shared a stage with Sting and Josh Groban, brushed with Hollywood and, attracting worldwide headlines, recently busked in a Washington subway only to find the swinish crowds couldn't give a toss for his rush-hour pearls.

As it happens, through his Russian Jewish teacher Josef Gingold, Bell qualifies as an honorary member of that Russian tradition and regards those players as his idols. Above all, though, he is a classical superstar of the utmost seriousness who plays with explosive energy, technical ease and golden-toned grace.

This Saturday, Bell will play Ravel's virtuosic gypsy showpiece, the Tzigane, in the Last Night of the Proms, the closing moments of Nicholas Kenyon's tenure. Bell's fellow soloist is a friend and collaborator, the electrifying Russian diva Anna Netrebko.

"It's amazing to do these two events, Moscow and the Proms, within seven days," he grins, rubbing his eyes not so much from astonishment as from lack of sleep. He has been toasting Moscow's birthday until 6am, his exhaustion compounded by a topsy-turvy body clock inevitable for someone who gives 120 concerts worldwide each year.

"I've done so many Proms since my first season in 1990 but never the Last Night. The Albert Hall and, at the other end of the spectrum, the Wigmore Hall, are my two favourite venues in the world. I regard London as a second home and there's more happening here musically every night than anywhere else in the world. Maybe in the past that might have been said of Vienna or Paris but now there's no contest."

The Albert Hall acoustic is hardly ideal for a solo violin but that doesn't deter him. "There's something about the Proms that makes you feel very connected to the audience. Maybe it's all those people standing, and the knowledge that they've queued for hours to be there. The Proms are the best way of reaching a wide audience but without any degradation to the music."

Even with all the flag-waving hysteria of the Last Night? "I have no problem with any of that Land of Hope and Glory stuff. And as an American, I can honestly say I love it!"

Now 39, the son of psychologists, Bell made his professional debut when he was 14 years old, playing a Mozart concerto with the Philadelphia Orchestra under the baton of Riccardo Muti. "From that event I gained a manager who has stayed with me and some more concerts, including a Carnegie Hall debut. But I certainly wasn't an overnight success, as people tend to say was the case."

He had shown musical ability as a small child, and his mother - whom he has described as "a typical Jewish mother" - invested huge energy into nurturing her son's talent.

"There's no question that with musicians you have to start early and that probably means having a parent who's putting time in, too. My mother's not a musician but she practised with me and helped build up the discipline of practice.

"At the same time I went to regular school and played lots of sport competitively so in that sense I was living normally at home. I wasn't removed from the system."

At 18, he signed a recording contract with Decca, who launched him in Europe with a media blitz that he now has reservations about. "Everything had been going slowly and steadily up to that point. No one knew anything about me. But suddenly the London critics were talking about me being an overnight sensation and I had to prove to myself, as much as to the public, that I could live up to all the hype."

HE HAS also had to prove that good looks and a girl-mob following - who else could play the Brahms Violin Concerto at the Barbican and get a screaming pop-style reception from a bevy of bare-midriff teens? - can coexist happily with uncompromising musicianship. A highlight of his concert calendar for nearly two decades has been playing chamber music, with his close friend, British cellist Steven Isserlis. An all-Russian mini-fest at Wigmore Hall is scheduled for the spring.

"Steven has been one of my biggest musical influences. He's a phenomenal musician. And the Wigmore audience-is the most knowledgeable in the world. You can be more daring, mixing old and new, challenging expectations, knowing people will still come and listen. That's astonishing to me."

Unusually, Bell composes his own cadenzas, a common habit in the past but one which few performers today have either the skill or chutzpah to attempt. He also arranges a non-violin repertoire to play, as found on recent Sony CDs, The Voice of the Violin and The Romance of the Violin.

Chasing the new has always been part of his philosophy: he has commissioned several works including a new concerto by the 15-year-old prodigy, Jay Greenberg, whom Bell has compared favourably with the young Mozart.

"Far harder for me is to tackle a work I've played a hundred times - Mendelssohn's concerto, for example - and really rethink what I'm doing, and make it fresh. That's where you really need discipline."

Bell has never settled for routine, admitting a penchant for adventure, change, fast cars (he drives a Porsche) and gambling, a habit he picked up from his mother. Family get-togethers (he has two sisters) are as likely to happen around a Las Vegas gaming table as in New York, where he has been converting a two-floor loft near Gramercy Park complete with its own small concert hall.

He is single, prompting an appearance in the American version of Dennis the Menace in a picture showing a young girl violinist and two boys. The caption reads: "Margaret can't decide if she wants to be Joshua Bell, or be Mrs Joshua Bell".

But recently he surprised friends by announcing that he has just become a father, having planned a child with an exg-irlfriend, also a violinist. They have named their son Josef after Bell's teacher. "It's so hard being away from him right now. I hope it will be the best of both worlds: parenthood, which I've always wanted, and remaining single, which I rather like, too."

Throughout our conversation, Bell has kept his violin - a 1713 Stradivarius stolen twice from its former owner, the great Polish violinist Bronislaw Huberman - close by, even though in this police-guarded hotel escaping with it would be a challenge.

Out in the square, the roads have been blocked off again. President Putin is about to arrive for more Moscow celebrations. But the clouds are gathering and rain threatens. Not everyone can make the sky move. Or, as Joshua Bell's mobbing fans might have it, the earth, too, come to that.

• Joshua Bell performs at the Last Night of the Proms at the Albert Hall on Saturday. Broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and BBC2 television. www.bbc.co.uk/proms/2007.

 

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