IT’S the dumb blonde of the string section, the Rodney Dangerfield of the orchestra, the Polish joke of the music world.
We speak of the viola, that ungainly love child of the violin and cello. Don’t believe us? Google “viola jokes” (526,000 results).
David Aaron Carpenter isn’t laughing. In fact, he’s made it his mission to get a little more respect for the fiddle he loves.
“The viola used to be the default instrument for violinists,” says the lanky, Abercrombie-handsome 23-year-old, who plays tonight at Carnegie’s Zankel Hall.
“It’s a bit bigger and clumsier, so it’s more demanding in terms of what you have to bring to it to make it sing.”
Carpenter seems to have the right tools. The native of Great Neck, NY, started with Suzuki violin lessons before moving on to the Manhattan School of Music and Juilliard. By age 11, he’d fallen in love with the viola, studying with some of the most acclaimed players (Yuri Bashmet, Robert Mann, Pinchas Zukerman) in the business.
Last year, while finishing his poli-sci thesis at Princeton, he received The Call: Violin/violist great Maxim Vengerov had injured his shoulder. Could Carpenter come to Switzerland next month and sub?
Um, sure. Never mind he’d never played the piece — Benjamin Yusopov’s fiendish “Viola Tango Rock Concerto,” which requires its soloist to swing between viola, five-string electric violin and some “Dancing With the Stars” action.
“It was the first time I’d ever danced in front of anyone,” he says. “One night, the dancer slipped when I spun her around, and her elbow landed in my face . . . It was pretty passionate.”
Don’t expect any tangos tonight. But you can look forward to an eclectic program featuring Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet,” performed with his signature “seductively rich” sound. (Check his rendition of Elgar’s cello concerto, transcribed for viola, on YouTube.)
And yes, even Carpenter has a favorite viola joke:
“What’s the difference between a viola and Mike Tyson? The viola is harder on the ear!”
Not when Carpenter’s playing it.