Vladimir Horowitz in the News Part 2: White House recital and Nancy Reagan’s tumble (6 October 1986)

Horowitz visited the White House on three occasions in 1986: (1) on 20 March to meet with President Reagan prior to his trip to Moscow the following month (see ); (2) on 28 July to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Reagan (see ); and (3) on 5 October 1986 to perform a recital for President Reagan and assorted guests in the east Room of the White House (see for video excerpts, and to listen to the entire recital). At the conclusion of his recital on 5 October 1986, President and Mrs Reagan joined Horowitz and his wife Wanda on the makeshift stage. While the President delivered post-concert remarks from a lectern, Mrs Reagan shifted her chair and suddenly tumbled off the stage, instantly creating a visually compelling event for media. That evening and the following day, footage of Mrs Reagan toppling from her chair, as well as Horowitz’s shocked reaction, was widely broadcast. According to David Dubal in his book ’Evenings With Horowitz’, Mrs Horowitz was deeply disappointed that Mrs Reagan’s tumble was the focus of so much attention. “Who cared about Horowitz?!“ she fumed afterwards. Watching these news clips (like flipping channels), one can perhaps understand her perspective. = = = = = Classical musicians are rarely the topic of reporting on nightly national television newscasts. However, during the last 3½ years of his life, Vladimir Horowitz was so featured at least four times: (1) in April 1986 when he returned to Russia after an absence of 61 years - ; (2) in May 1986 when he performed a recital at the White House after which Nancy Reagan fell off a small stage in the East Room ; (3) in December 1986 when he performed at the re-opening concert at Carnegie Hall following its restoration - ; and (4) in November 1989 when he died - = = = = = Capturing fleeting and often brief reports that aired virtually simultaneously on various networks in Canada and the US required deft channel-surfing, so taping a complete report from the very start was a challenge I was unable to accomplish most of the time. Videotape quality also varied between network TV and pay TV, which seemed to have an aspect of copy-guard that rendered off-the-air video much darker than what was broadcast. Nevertheless, these fragments of reports from 1986 provide interesting contemporaneous glimpses of how Horowitz was perceived and reported.