A musician long before she became an academic and then a world-famous diplomat, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice took to the Kennedy Center concert stage Saturday to accompany a young soprano battling an often-fatal disease.
Rice's rare and unpublicized appearance at the piano marked a striking departure from her routine as America's No. 1 diplomat. A pianist from the age of 3 she played a half-dozen selections to accompany Charity Sunshine, a 21-year-old singer who was diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension a little more than a year ago.
The soprano is a granddaughter of Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., and his wife Annette, who Rice has known for years. The Pulmonary Hypertension Association, formed in 1990, presented the concert to draw attention to the disease from which more than 100,000 people are known to suffer.
Hey, it's tempting to be cynical and look for some catch in all this. It's also tempting, in my hard-wired anti-hippie way, to take a run at a name like "Charity Sunshine".
But for once, we resist temptation, and just say that it was a damned nice thing to do.
1 comment:
Uh-oh. I feel a virtual group hug coming on.
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