(from the April 2006 issue of The Chamber Musician)

As a small mark of our limitless love and esteem, the CMNC board is dedicating this issue of The Chamber Musician to Rheta. A retired teacher, computer programmer and businesswoman, and a mainstay of CMNC, she leaves behind her loving husband of 58 years, S. Morris Goldberg; four beloved children, Rae Ann Goldberg, Sara Feldman and her husband Yaakov, Ellie Fine, and William Goldberg and his wife Mary, and her twin sister, Joan Gans. Her grandchildren are Dorah, Bennie, Rafi, Nechama, Aryeh and Dina. Our heartfelt condolences to the family. Our thanks go to Joan for her story about growing up with Rheta; to Rheta’s daughter Rae Ann for her story of musical life in the Goldberg household, and to Bill Horne for the selections from his beautiful appreciation, which first was given as the eulogy at Rheta’s funeral. Thanks also to the Goldberg and Gans families for the wonderful pictures, and to the CMNC members who sent memories of Rheta, which appear in the boxes.

Rheta and Joan:
Growing up Together as the Dattner Twins

by Joan Gans

This is the story of Rheta Dattner Goldberg and her "other half", Joan Dattner Gans. Rheta was born in Philadelphia many years ago. Then eight minutes later an unexpected event occurred. I appeared, surprising the doctor, thrilling our mother and terrifying our father!  

As identical twins, we looked very much alike. We were dressed alike and did everything together. As a twin, you get used to being stared at and to having to answer a great many foolish questions from people.

 Here are some of them.
    "What is it like to be a twin?"
     "How do you know which one you are? 
     "How do you tell each other apart?
     "Do you think the same thoughts?"
     "Where is your other half?"

There are many advantages to being twins. You always have someone to do things with, always have someone to blame if things go wrong, and always have a helper if needed.  We attended a High school that was a 15-minute bus ride from our home.  We took a double-decker bus that had a circular staircase at the back of the bus. Rheta was in the orchestra where she played the viola. On days that we had music lessons right after school, she also needed her violin. In those days, it was cool to ride on the top of the bus. So, just imagine us with Rheta carrying her books and the viola and me carrying books and the violin, struggling to the back of the swaying bus and winding our way up the spiral stairs. Fortunately for her, I played the piano. Good that it wasn't a cello!

The reason that Rheta took up the viola was that the orchestra teacher needed a viola player. He pointed to her and said, "You're a big girl. Move to the viola section." Rheta took one look at the four good looking boys there and quickly joined them.  

We dressed alike all through high school, and occasionally wore identical outfits when we attended college at the University of Pennsylvania. Morrie tells the story of how he and Joe met us. He was attracted to a pretty girl on campus, but he didn't know her. However he kept seeing her often and in so many different places, and was curious how she could get around so fast. He told his roommate, Joe Gans, about her and they both decided to get the bottom of this. Finally, one day they saw the two of us together. Problem solved.

We slowly stopped dressing alike and discovered a great advantage. We could buy just as many outfits as we used to. However, we would have twice as many clothes—we could wear each other’s.

I could go on forever with my memories of Rheta. However, there are some disadvantages of being a twin. You rarely say "I," always "we," and you really do think alike about many things. Did you notice how many of the above sentences I began with the word "we"? You also tend to finish each other’s sentences. When I faced my first class as a teacher, I would begin to teach something, and pause mid-sentence waiting. The kids just sat listening for the end of the sentence. Appalled, I realized, "They want ME to keep talking!"  Note: You can say the same thing about spouses too.

We ceased being known as the Dattner Twins, until we attended a 40th High school class reunion together. All over the large room, people were saying, "The Dattner Twins are here, the Dattner Twins are here."  That was fun.  

Rheta and Morrie lived on the west coast all of their married life, and Joe and I were in the east. We were privileged to be able to move to California when Joe and I retired, and to have the pleasure of being together - two sisters, Joan and Rheta, and two best friends, Joe and Morrie.  

 

Musical Life in the Goldberg Family

by Rae Ann Goldberg

After being asked to write an article about the musical atmosphere I grew up in, and memories of my mother, I decided to get some input from my siblings, Sara, Ellie, and Bill. They did not go on to become professional musicians as I did, but music has had a profound influence and impact on us all, and the experiences we had of growing up in a musical family continue to have great meaning for all of us.

I can't remember a time in my life without music. We all have memories of hearing Mom practicing the violin and viola and Dad the clarinet (he didn't take up the viola until he was 47!), behind their bedroom doors when we were supposed to be asleep. In an e-mail sent from her home in Orlando, Florida, Ellie remembers: "I have this strong memory of how whenever I'd wake up to go to the bathroom, I'd hear her and Dad practicing behind their bedroom door. So cool how they'd have to wait for the kids to be in bed, and still, no matter how exhausted they must have been, they would be practicing. I've also always imagined that I would hear her playing and maybe faintly hear Dad's clarinet, when I was in her womb. Thus, all four of us came into this world already steeped in understandings of music. As if it was already a part of us".

Sara wrote me from Spring Valley N.Y. "I mostly remember when we were little, Mom and Dad going to orchestra rehearsals, going occasionally to hear them play. Mom practicing in her room, coming out of the bedroom carrying her violin propped on her hip, or tucked under her arm, to talk in the hallway—then going back in, shutting the door and returning to her  practicing".

Mom took violin lessons on and off throughout her life and she was always trying to be a better musician. When she discovered chamber music, there was no turning back! She started going to regular coaching sessions. I particularly remember when she worked with Colin Hampton, who I later had the privilege of having as a coach when I was an undergraduate at Mills College. She would come back from his house full of such inspiration and excitement about what she had learned. Sometimes, it seemed like she was consumed by her love of music and desire to play as much as possible.

Mom always encouraged us all to pursue music. Bill, who currently lives in Burlingame, remembers; "All four of us had to take music lessons of some kind. It was very important that we all had time to practice. We would all be in different corners of the house, usually after dinner. When we all practiced at the same time it was somehow easier to do it. I remember sitting with the drum pad in the far corner of the living room. Dad and Mom both took turns shuttling us all to various lessons. I took drum lessons from age 9 until 14 and played in the school orchestra and sang in the choir in high school".

When I was about 7 years old, I remember going to Mom and telling her that I wanted to learn the viola. She told me that I should start with the violin first and then switch later if I wanted to. (I never got around to switching!). Sara took up the oboe, and Ellie learned the cello. Dad got the three of us girls to learn guitar. In the summer we often went on family camping trips and we would sing in the car together and then around the campfire.

Mom never stopped playing the violin and viola, even through the worst pain and adversity. She had shoulders that would dislocate, and when she finally was able to have surgery on the left shoulder, the operation was botched and she wound up with a “frozen” shoulder. She couldn't get her left arm in far enough to get under her instrument and I was amazed that she could play at all. She did struggle in the higher positions, but she never gave up. After many years of frustration, she was able to have corrective surgery and I remember the joy she experienced when playing in the upper positions was no longer full of pain.

In high school I started playing in various orchestra groups in the area and was in an honor string quartet. Mom really encouraged (or should I say pushed?) me to pursue music as a major in college. She was very proud of my accomplishments, and supported me fully when I decided to go to New York to study for my M.A. after I had been working as a professional musician in Los Angeles for a few years. Though she initially had misgivings, when she heard that I would be having master classes with Itzhak Perlman, she became convinced that I should go ahead and do it. Whenever I came home for a visit, she would try to get me to play quartets with her and her friends. I have to admit that at the time, I was not as familiar with the chamber music repertoire as she was, so sometimes it could be a bit intimidating, even if I could play more notes!

From Sara: "I remember the New Year’s Eve parties with all the bedrooms and the living room and sunroom with different groups going, breaking for drinks and food, more often than not playing right through midnight. I remember Mom coming back from Chamber Music workshops, going over the assignments, how she could have planned it better...always how it could have been better. Until she finally was able to do it better. She was so pleased and happy about how the CMNC workshops turned out, stressful as it always was to plan them".

We all were amazed by the time, effort and care she put into all things CMNC. I would often come by for a visit and find her at the computer, immersed in assignments for workshops, and various other related activities. Bill, who shared Mom's love of computers writes of her involvement with CMNC: "She and a few other people maintained a scheduling program that is still used today to arrange assignments for music workshops for as many as 300 players."

Ellie remembers "We all would have to plan our visits with them according to the music workshops. It seemed like her whole life had to take second place to music. Yet, what a wonderful thing for all of us to defer to—music, after all, is part of the spiritual fabric that makes everything else in this world possible. And she was key in creating paths upon which musicians could walk, and thus bring more goodness into this world."

We are all having a hard time dealing with the sudden and unexpected loss of Mom. So, these memories are so precious to us. And perhaps, if I close my eyes for a moment, I can hear her in the next room, practicing a Dvorak or late Beethoven string quartet.

Memories of Rheta

by William Horne

I must have met Rheta about 15 years ago when I first attended a local chamber music workshop. I was a novice just discovering chamber music, but quickly picked up that Rheta was a mover and shaker, a very good violinist and knew her way around the chamber music literature. (Someone told me yesterday that they remembered Rheta from a workshop all the way back in 1979.) Anyway, at this first workshop, I finally got up the nerve to speak to her (or I thought it was she) while standing in line for dinner. That was when I discovered that she had a twin, Joan Gans, who also was an accomplished chamber musician. I spoke to the wrong twin, and it took me a few occasions to sort them out.

However when I really began to know Rheta was the day we were both invited to join the Board of Directors of the Chamber Musicians of Northern California. This was at a board meeting at Alex Zuckermann’s house in Oakland around 1990 or 1991. The board banished the two of us to a bedroom, so they could have a private election and discussion about us. Rheta and I giggled like schoolchildren and chatted nervously in that room, but we were both elected. I guess I always felt we were sort of twins, fraternal of course, on the board.

Rheta immediately made herself indispensable on the board, taking on multitudinous tasks. She was our treasurer for well over twelve years. Rheta patiently crunched numbers on finances for numerous workshops, a task that few of us were enthusiastic about spending time on, but that was absolutely crucial. She and Morrie worked out all the details to file for non-profit status and filed annually required reports. She figured out that we could also apply for grants from the Amateur Chamber Music Players Foundation, and did so for many years, saving us thousands of dollars annually. When our central office had a personnel crisis, Rheta stepped in, taking on far too many tasks for a while. Just three months ago, she again volunteered to take over the task of publishing the annual directory. The newly published directories just arrived at her home.

Here’s a story Morrie once told. Rheta found out she was allergic to cats. Of course they had a cat, and she was advised to get rid of it. But her cat was 13 years old and she didn't want to turn it out, so she thought, "How much longer could a 13 year old cat live?" Well—it lived 10 more years! So Rheta suffered for 10 years, rather than turn out her dear cat. This is just the way Rheta was. She always thought of others and hated turning anyone away. She was all feeling, all heart. It's unbelievable that a heart like that could ever stop beating.

I believe the melody of Rheta’s spirit will keep on playing and playing through the lives of all the people she shared her passion for music with. We’ll have an empty stand and chair that she leaves behind in our ensemble. However those of us who had the privilege of sharing the ecstasy of music with her, shall still have her with us in our hearts, as we play on.

 

It's hard to think of a "favorite" Rheta story because there are so many. I enjoyed several evenings at her home playing with Morrie and other friends, but my favorite memory is playing many times with Rheta, Susan Fowle and Muriel Haupt in the "Hayward String Quartet." This group became almost a freelance tradition at many of the Hayward workshops, and we hit our peak when we were assigned to play together one day by the workshop director. What a great time. Susan shared the first violin spot with Rheta, and coincidentally, Rheta was the workshop director! Funny how these things work out. I'll miss those sessions, big time.
        Jonathan Lehan, viola, Mendocino

The most honored memories I have of Rheta are those of her long-time devotion to CMNC and her (and Morrie's) hospitality in opening their home to me back in the days when I was on CMNCs board and needed a place to stay over board meeting weekends. I shall treasure her friendship always.   
        John Sonquist, piano, Santa Barbara
           
I was very grateful to Rheta for making the effort to drag her clan down to Fresno for the mini-workshop that I hosted here a few years ago. Despite some logistical issues, we had a great time, and Rheta's energy and enthusiasm made it all seem effortless. It was also Rheta's warm welcomes that made the Fresno contingent feel at home at CMNC workshops and become regulars.
          David Fox, cello, Fresno

Here’s a story about Rheta's phenomenal memory for people. When pulling together notes for an article on what helped me to improve my piano sightreading, one person who made a difference was a blind piano teacher who attended some of our workshops. I had no idea what her name was or what year she came. So I asked Bill Horne, who has coordinated with CMNC pianists for most workshops over the last decade or more. Bill remembered that there was such a person, but not her name or any additional info. So then I asked Rheta. Rheta wrote back immediately: “You are looking for Linda Baron. She's a member and you can find her in the directory. She lives in Sacramento and has been to many of our workshops.” Linda had not attended any workshops in years.
        Miriam Blatt, violin, viola and piano, Menlo Park

Here's my Rheta memory: I had been playing violin only a few years when I was introduced to Rheta. I asked if she thought I could participate in CMNC workshops. Her reply? "Go and learn to play viola. We need bad violists more than we need bad violinists." (Note: I took her remarks seriously and did learn to play viola.) 
        Ruth Cazden, violin and viola, El Cerrito

What I remember about Rheta was how concerned about others having a good experience at the CMNC workshops she was. She always asked if you had a good time with your assignment. And she followed up on suggestions for improvement quite conscientiously.
            Alan Copeland, cello, Livermore

Over the years, Rheta became not only my advocate for good assignments for CMNC workshops (which she did with a dedicated concern for my happy chamber music) but also a really good and dear friend. Along with several other people, my husband Dennis and I were houseguests in Morrie and Rheta's very warm and hospitable home after every CMNC weekend. We would stay with them over the weekend and commute to the workshop, then stay on for several more days where friends would be invited in and we would have this cloistered life of music, food and friendship. Then we expanded to the group coming up to the mountains where we live and we would have the same cloistered life of music, food and friendship all over again. What special friends - and Rheta was one of the best.
        Lucy Sloate, violin, Nevada City