Haydn and Prokofiev in Wellington, New Zealand
The infamous Haydn D Major - how come this piece scares every single cellist? It ain't fair, because it doesn't sound difficult, not even remotely so, doesn't look anything, but still we pee our pants before having to play it. This morning in the dress rehearsal I felt as incapable as I hadn't felt in a long time (maybe I shouldn't have watched the Tour de France until 4 am) and lucky enough the saying of "bad dress rehearsal, good concert" worked once again, but still I wasn't completely fulfilled with myself. What to do with this piece of music? Lovely, springlike, fresh, yes, but at the same time so delicate and dangerous, that you just have to watch out and concentrate so much for just playing in tune.
Long live Wifi!
While Sitting here in my dressing room at the Philharmonie in Luxembourg (gorgeous hall) and listening to the second half of the concert through the speakers, I am able to check e-mail, write a blog, follow the Yankees loosing to the Red Sox (well, the bases are loaded in the 7th inning, ARod is up next...) and pay two bills - thanks to the Wifi in this entire space here! Where would we be without it? It really makes my life so much easier; already to be able to not having to talk on the phone constantly but instead do all the necessary communication via e-mail. The older I get the less I like talking on the phone, I find it so impersonal and tiring, and on top of it my memory has become so poorly that I don't remember anything I am saying on the phone. Since I can type almost as fast as I speak (and I am a fast speaker!) it gives me much more time at hand to do important things, like checking the sports results for example (oops, ARod just grounded out, inning over) :)
Presidents and Brahms in Ludwigsburg
The other day I was asked by a journalist in a live radio interview about my open and direct writing in my blog. Wasn't I aware that complete strangers would be able to read my deeper thoughts and feelings, and how did that feel? I must admit this question shut me up for more than a month now - maybe it felt a bit like criticism for saying too much, showing too much of myself. My beloved wife herself doesn't agree with me being so indiscreet about myself. Well, let's face it: another cheap excuse for not having written in a long time! :) Even though I did experience many quite wonderful things since my last entry, so maybe there is a bit of truth in me having become a bit insecure about sharing everything. My problem is that I don't have this "privace filter" in my brain. I don't feel the need of privace, I don't really know what it is. I am slowly learning, because it seems women need a lot of that. But for myself I found out that either I write openly, no taboos or secrets, or I don't write at all. Took me a month to figure that one out, and now I am back on (the writing) track.
Elgar With The Hallé Orchestra - Run-Out Concerts
Last time I played the Elgar it was two months ago in the concert which I used as a personal requiem for my mother who had passed away that same day, and in doing that I kind of discovered another intimacy and inwardness in that so often-played piece which made me fall in love with it even more. For me it is now a rather fragile piece, obviously highly emotional, but in a very personal way, not too obvious and "juicy".
Teaching and playing in Madrid and Washington
Time flies, it is unbelievable - I had to get up this morning at 5:30 am in order to catch my flight back to the US at 6:50 (this is only possible in Berlin, since we have this lovely little city airport Tegel) which just has been cancelled, and it was already getting light when I was leaving my apartment at 5:50 am. Yes, it's spring, and lazy me hasn't written anything in here since a while. No, I wasn't that busy, but I took a very welcome little break, skiing with my little family in Switzerland.
Dealing With The Loss
After I wrote my last blog shortly after my mother died, I wasn't sure if so much unfiltered writing is appropriate. But as the rather impulsive person I can be, I decided to stick with what felt right in that moment. When I observe all these very touching comments to this last entry, I realize that it was maybe not appropriate, but for me extremely helpful - it really helped me to go on after this loss which probably can only be "topped" by the loss of your own child. The quintessence what people seemed to aim at and which was not obvious to me, was the fact that my mother lives on in my music.
Memorable Concert (at least for me...)
When I woke up this morning at around 7:25 am in order to practise a bit before my dress rehearsal with the Elgar Concerto here in Spokane, my first act was to turn the cellphone on. I am not a big cellphone guy, which means I also don't get much calls, since I don't answer my phone very often. I don't like the phone, turn it off as often as possible, so when I saw that there was a message I immediately checked it since I don't actually receive many calls (people learn pretty quickly that it's worthless to call and they rather send me mails). It was the message of my father telling me that my mother had managed to finally leave this world after a three-year-long struggle with ALS (Lou-Gehrig disease).
New York, New York
Actually I should be practising, but somehow since I have nothing else to do today, I am postponing the start of my urgently needed practise session until the afternoon and rather have a superlate breakfeast at Starbucks together with my favorite toy, the Macbook, looking onto Broadway and 63rd Street. The last 9 days have been rather exciting, and I am in need of a little breather.
The much-anticipated Carnegie-Hall concert went well, at least the people who attended it seemed content, and even the almighty New York Times had something nice to say. But what made me really happy was the fact that I had managed to convince myself that this was just another concert, and so I actually very much enjoyed my time on stage playing the Brahms Double and this new, very touching and melodic piece by Osvaldo Golijov. Only after the concert I found out that it was a live-radio-broadcast - good, because knowing that beforehand might have spoilt the fun...
Happy New Year to Everybody :)
Well, time passes far too quickly - I thought I had two long, beautiful weeks off after this recording session in London (that's when I wrote the last blog), and yes, it has been two weeks, but they weren't long at all, passed so quickly with all that celebrating, family gathering, playing games and putting order in the apartment. Being the member of a huge family also brings so much diversion that time is flying by; I have four siblings, two of them have their own family with two respectively three children and rather wonderful partners - it's a joy spending time with them, but sometimes I wished I would be bored more often in order for time to stand still and not rush forward constantly. But the days are just too full. Anyway, Happy New Year to everybody who stops by and reads this!
Conducting Composer No.2 - Matthias Pintscher
Since I am have not really played that many contemporary concertos in my life (from living composers I mean, and that would be six or seven, I guess) it was quite an experience to work with two of the most famous ones within two weeks. After John Adams 10 days ago with the Brittencellosymphony in London I now got my first concerto written in this millenium under my belt, conducted by the composer himself, Matthias Pintscher. I must admit I was rather stressed out the last three weeks leading towards this collaboration because I remembered him as very picky from the time when I premiered his "Janusgesicht" for viola and cello a couple of years ago.
Working with a legend - John Adams
After trying to learn and memorize these two awfully difficult concerti by Benjamin Britten and Matthias Pintscher last week in Sweden while trying to spend some quality time with my parents, my sister and our children (well, her daughters and my son!), I am finally in action again, trying to prove that my brain is still as capable as I want it to be - well, dream on, the rehearsals for the Britten weren't exactly brilliant from my part...
Open Your Eyes...
Even though I should be in bed since about one hour, I suddenly felt the urge of starting this silly computer of mine (which I have avoided in the past 10 days!) to take care of some serious business like answering e-mails, paying bills, checking reviews and reading the new blog entries - thanks for them, by the way! Before turning this addiction underneath my fingertips off I decided to write a quick conclusion after these rather exhausting past two weeks with 8 concerts in four cities and two continents, playing a solorecital, Shostakovich 2nd concerto as well as Rococo, Dvorakconcerto and Dvoraks Silent woods while practising as much as possible new stuff.
Adrenalin junky
It is 3 am, I just finished packing my suitcase and can't even think about sleeping since the performance a couple of hours ago of the Second Shostakovich Concerto was rather disturbing for me. My 8-year old son Janos said of the second movement, that it was scary - and so was more or less the whole concerto. I felt incredibly sad while playing - don't know if it was the music itself, my pitiful playing or the presence of my poor ailing mother in the first row (must have been the first time she ever sat so close).
German Interview before concert in Reutlingen
Sorry, I really liked these questions of a young journalist in Reutlingen, a little city South of Stuttgart. He sent them to me by e-mail and I answered them - I thought he was going to edit them or something, but no, he just printed the entire answers like that without changing a word; I was quite impressed, but too lazy to translate them. By the way: in spite of the jet-lag I played rather good Rococo Variations after 18 hours of travelling straight from Texas to Reutlingen. Yes, sometimes it works, but one has to be careful. Voila, the interview:
Discipline
While sitting in the lounge of the Chicago O'Hare airport I have some time to think about the past few days in Fort Worth. I was playing three times the Brahms Double Concerto together with Augustin Hadelich, the Fort Worth Symphony and their chief conductor Miguel Hardt-Bedoya. And except the last performance which took place this afternoon I was not really happy with myself, which was even more regrettable since the orchestra and especially Augustin played real well.
Thoughts about Shostakovich and interpretation in Mauritius...
What is a good interpretation? I made some conflicting statements in the past few years in this direction: on the one hand I demand to understand what the composer had in mind when he wrote the music down. I am on the other hand not at all satisfied when I only play what is written in the music, especially since I know from living composers that they expect us musicians to do something more personal than that with their works. This doesn’t mean one should ignore the composers instructions in general, but we have to make them our own so that at the end we can make our own statement with it. But there is a third, more serious problem: listening habits and traditions of interpretation which developed by the consumation of recordings, especially so-called reference recordings.
Lazy Cellist?
Yes, I am very sorry (for not writing in such a long time), and no, I have not been lazy, rather the opposite. Since my last blog entry about a month ago I have been so incredibly busy trying to cope with all the tasks that there was absolutely no time to take care of anything else. What did I do?
Too Many Different Repertoires
For me the most difficult task is to be constantly playing different repertoires. As a musician I believe it is rather healthy not to be playing always the same pieces - it keeps you fresh, keeps you on your toes and keeps you working. But the situation I am experiencing these days isn’t ideal either. Concertos aren’t even the problem, they are rather short (Shostakovich No.1 yesterday took about 25 minutes, I guess), I have played most of them often enough, so this isn’t my main concern.
Compromise - Negotiating: Collaboration in Music
How do you negotiate the tricky subject of “your” versus “the conductors” interpretation of a piece? Do you find you “give in” to some views and then wished you hadn’t?
Last Second Kind of Guy in Seoul
I am a last second kind of guy. Do you know people like that? Always late, not out of arrogance, but because there is always so much to do in the last seconds before one has to leave. And when do I plan to leave? Always so that I don’t have to wait; be it for meetings, concerts, trains, airplanes; check-in two hours before? Not with me! Security lines? I don’t care, I don’t want to arrive at the airport earlier than 1h10 min, with a maximum of 5 minutes extra time for disaster (flat tire, accident, traffic jam, missed train etc.).