 One day my parents brought home a piano. It was the finest day I could have made. The piano from the moment I touched it, I knew there were things in it that would thrill me. I didn't know the literature yet, but so slowly that happened. And as I started playing little pieces, I just said, what about other things? I didn't know of Beethoven or Scarlatti or anything else. So I said, maybe I'll start reading. And that was interesting because that reading was the beginning of my writing as well. So I would get these little Schurmer editions of Chopin Nocturne's or whatever, or Walses, I remember I was given Walses first. And I read these incredible prose. You know, the power of writing is your great power because it is our synthesis of knowledge instantaneously. Everything we know by instinct is put into words. And I'm reading this man by the name of James Honaker. Now this is the greatest of all American critics, not of just music, but of the seven arts as they say. Somehow all of this meshed together, I just loved, loved the wholeness of it, the playing, the writing about it, my own playing, and so forth. Certainly the most comprehensive virtuoso that ever lived, with a repertoire from Scarlatti to Samuel Barber, the American composer. And when I say that through radio, I got to interview him. And I went to his home, and I put together six programs, which were really quite wonderfully listened to, sponsored by the great firm of Steinway & Sons. And these programs, six one-hour talks with him, they were the first time he had spoken on radio in New York in 40 years. And so I was very pleased that he liked me a lot, I felt that. And we did the programs, and they won the Peabody Award. And I got this award, and I called him at home. This was maybe seven, nine, eight, ten months later. And I said, Mr. Horowitz, our shows won a very important award in America called the Peabody Award. I know what that is, yes. And I said, well, would you like to come to the Hotel Pierre and receive the award with me? What time is it? I said it will be at 12 noon. Oh, no, no, no, I don't get up until four. So, you know, he didn't come to get his award, and he couldn't care less about any award. The only award, and I had so many awards from many countries, you know, from Italy, from the Presidential Medal, you name it. And the only award that he cared about, which is written well in my book, about it is the Bowtie Award from England. That was the big award for him, and that's the award that I love. My bowties, you know how many I have, you know, hundreds. And they're all silk. And I said, well, you know, this is terrific. I mean, that Bowtie Award looks good. And out of nine, we didn't speak to each other for maybe five, six, eight months after that. And Tom Frost, his producer at Sony, and then Deutsche Grammophon, said, he said to Tom, he said, I know David Dubalino is teaching piano literature. Actually, why doesn't he come and talk to me about Beethoven and Chopin? So Tom calls and says, you know, why don't you go see him? You know, every night he has a different person a week that dines with him. And my day is Tuesday. And he would just love to have you as part of this small little entourage. And I said, well, I'll certainly go see him. You know, I would love to see him again. I never afterwards tried to get in his good graces once the, what do you call it, the programs were done. I wasn't going to bother him. And I wasn't going to say, oh, I'd like to know you. So I went to see him. And then comes three and a half years, Rob, of every Wednesday. I don't think I ever missed one. Sometimes in the summer, when other people were gone, I would do two or three times a week. And I must say that he was the most wonderful man. And after that, I did write a book about him called Evenings with Horowitz. And then another book, which is being published in China, very soon called, as well as here, of course, is called Remembering Horowitz with 125 great virtuosity writing about him. And it's just, it's an amazing cultural history in this book. So I got to know him. And I want to tell you the great thing about it, because it was very, not easy to be with either of them. They were, you know, can we use the word neurotic? I don't know, I'm neurotic. But I can say that Mr. Horowitz, I called him that. He said, oh, you know, in the beginning, call me Volodia. No, Maestro, I will never call you Volodia. I will only call you Mr. Horowitz or Maestro. And those are the two words I called him. And he said, okay. And that was that. He always called me Mr. Dubal. And you always had to, you know, be dressed up, for they were dressed up. You didn't walk in as I'm looking now. There was one thing. I didn't wear a tie. I always wore a scarf. And he let that pass. There is no one that I ever learned more from. I learned how that he touched the piano, how he made sonority, how he used the pedal. And from that I would say that I learned how to teach many people how to play the piano themselves, or to improve, or to make a miracle of something that was, you know, just mediocre. And in no time, because as he did, he believed all things were learned almost instantly. And I could learn from him because he wasn't teaching me. If he was actually teaching me, I would be blank.