My posts in English

Fears

I just watched No Fear, the documentary film by Regina Schilling featuring Igor Levit. It’s a feature-length documentary entirely focused on this pianist who, as we know, occupies a unique space in today’s musical landscape.

Levit plays very well and has a colossal repertoire, but his popularity isn’t based solely on musical merits. In reality, no career has ever been built solely on musical merits, neither today nor in the past. With Levit, however, this is especially evident. His handling of the COVID emergency was a clear example, with those 52 home concerts that garnered so much attention. But this feature film marks a leap forward in terms of public exposure.

It’s exactly two hours of film, with some footage of him performing live but mostly focused on showing him behind the scenes—not just rehearsing, recording, or preparing to take the stage, but also doing mundane activities like buying a pair of shoes or cooking rather unremarkably in his home while talking on a live video call (wearing, of course, a t-shirt emblazoned with the slogan “Love music, hate racism”).

And here lies much of the intent: to reveal the man behind the artist. With his good intentions, of course, but above all—and this is the new part—a man who is fragile, very fragile. The new masculinities embodied by one of today’s top piano figures, a celebrity who repeatedly speaks about his fears and insecurities. More than once, he even seems close to depression, a word he himself uses. It’s striking. And it all feels very sincere. Is it? I don’t know. It seems that way, but I don’t know Igor Levit personally to form a definitive opinion on the matter. I say this with the utmost respect: for him, of course, but also, and especially, for the many people who may find themselves in a similar situation. It’s also possible that this is his way of confronting those fears, which I completely understand, and I have no doubt that sharing them publicly can help many people feel less alone in such a profoundly human dimension.

On the other hand, however personal his reflections may be, the fact of presenting them in a documentary inevitably turns them into a spectacle, with all that entails. And it’s a spectacle designed to generate empathy. The entire documentary, in fact, shows the artist in everyday gestures we recognize as familiar—especially those tied to the use of a phone, like listening through its speaker to music he has just discovered (Muddy Waters, in this case, because it’s well known that no classical artist today can afford not to appreciate good popular music) or posting snippets of his daily life. And, of course, the unavoidable ecological commitment, presented through footage tied, unsurprisingly, to his presence on social media: a winter performance streamed for Greenpeace, among the trees of the Dannenröder Forest, about to be cut down.

Likewise, Igor Levit is not just any artist. He’s top, top, top, playing over a hundred concerts a year, chatting casually with Germany’s president, and being close friends with Marina Abramović. And he’s also very modern: just as he’s applauded with a standing ovation at the Concertgebouw, you might find him playing the Appassionata live on TikTok—with an unstoppable flood of reactions and comments, of course, because he’s also hugely popular on social media. In reality, the suspicion that this is all staged never quite goes away. But whether it is or not doesn’t really matter. The entire documentary is, in some way, a montage of moments crafted to present a certain image of the person—and that person makes a living from music. Ultimately, it’s about selling the musician by filming his daily life. The whole thing is, in essence, a performance.

But then again, isn’t everything we see on screen a performance? We’re always performing, posting our day-to-day lives, and this is especially true with music, with the narcissism that drives us to share the concert halls we play in and how wonderful our lives are on and off stage. At the same time, it’s a way to communicate, to inform, to make others a part of what we do. With this documentary, Levit does just that. He does so by offering a certain image of himself—an image that sells. It sells and it impacts.

It’s impactful to see him doubt so much, even during a recording session, with Roland Stevenson’s Passacaglia literally assembled phrase by phrase; it’s impactful to witness his absolute trust in his recording technician, dismissing the notion of the great artist who needs no one because his decisions stem solely from his genius; and it’s impactful to observe so explicitly his need for physical contact, for kisses and hugs, and his insistence on placing himself at the center of the narrative.

Of course, it’s a performance. That’s precisely why it resonates so much: because it turns someone else’s experience into emotions for you, the observer.

“No fear”

Freedom is not being afraid, says the great Nina Simone in this video. Hopefully research will soon return the freedom that fear is taking away from us. Because healthcare personnel are saving lives in the short term, and we will never thank them enough for their work. But only research will create the conditions to clear the fear that grips us today. Research and the resulting knowledge will make us freer. As it has always been, throughout the history of humankind.

Sowing

This is a very, very special photo for me. Emilia Fadini and Laia Martín, one next to another. You can not see me, because I was 600 km away, but at the same time I’m there, 100%. From Emilia Fadini, today still very bright at 89 years old, a thousand things emerged in my life. In those distant years 80, my passion for questioning about the music I did found in her and her courses a path that led from then, solidly, to look at the treaties (even more than the instruments) the answers to the questions that arose when observing the scores. Thanks to her I discovered the clavichord, I heard for the first time the names of Santa María, Diruta, and many others whose existence I know that many of my readers have discovered in my books, and I began to live in first person an intimate way of sharing music whose values had nothing to do with the ones that were being proposed to me, in those same years, in the conservatory classes.

This week, at 20th FIMTE – International Festival of Spanish Keyboard Music, so brilliantly organised by Luisa Morales, Emilia has shared the FIMTE Symposium with Laia Martin, who from that lineage is, in many ways, the continuation. Without me being seen, in this picture I am in the middle. As the current teacher of one and the old student of another, seeing them together gives me a wonderful feeling. Without what I saw in those Emilia classes, I doubt that Laia would even know who I am, nor would I be orienting her doctoral thesis at the University of Aveiro, nor would she, most likely, have been in Mojácar this week. And that is the meaning of that peculiar sowing that is teaching. Teaching and also writing, which allows you to share with many people what you consider important even away from your physical presence, in a process that often ends in a future whose trajectories move far, out of sight. But when these trajectories intersect, as has happened these days in the FIMTE, even without having been there, happiness is very deep.

Oblivious to the 9th

I have just emerged from the performance of Beethoven’s 9th by the OBC, the Barcelona Symphony and Catalonia National Orchestra, which programmed this week’s event to include a bold staging design in the hands of a company with a strange name, one I’d heard in glowing reports from other shows: the Agrupación Señor Serrano.

They probably are great at doing other things, but I found this 9th horrendous, to put it frankly. The orchestra fulfilled its role. The choir (the splendid Orfeó Català) was magnificent. Perhaps some of the soloists could have been better. But it is impossible to view a production of this kind as anything but a whole, and there was no way to make sense of that whole.

You know I don’t like to speak ill of what I haven’t liked, so in such cases I usually keep my mouth shut and let it go (yes, well, there are also times when I don’t respond because I haven’t got time, so don’t go thinking that if I haven’t written about a concert or a CD you’ve given me that it must be because I don’t like it!). In this case, though, I think voicing some thoughts is warranted.

The principal idea, which the project had already announced in writing, was not bad: read this very “European” work as a reflection on Europe. The idea of a garden as a metaphor for the common European project, collectively watered and tended (1st movement); the struggles and clouds that darken it (2nd movement); the nostalgia and consideration of the many things we’ve botched (3rd movement); and a road full of hope towards the future, one built on affection, caring, and hugs (4th movement). Fantastic up to this point.

But hang on: in this all you actually see is plenty of goodwill. The reality, minute by minute, bar after bar, is that there was no relation with the music’s unravelling. No dramatic crescendo (precisely in this work!), no relation between what we hear and what we see (an old and common problem in many operatic staging ideas too). Spectacular—in its absurdity— was the entrance of the theme of the fourth movement, following the recitative: an entrance that went completely unnoticed, lacking even a brushstroke in the staging direction. But this was the tip of the iceberg. In neither the entrance of the “Turkish” variation or the a cappella variation was there any attempt at all to capitalise on these moments by having them coincide with something. Huh?! As if there, in the music, nothing significant happens!

Then there’s the ideological drift. Europe is going bad because we have “let the weeds grow” and haven’t known how to put up the right “fences”. But exactly this, mind (and take note: as if weeds growing in a garden can be avoided by fencing; little do I know about gardening but I think I grasp this much)! Yep, boldly essentialist and ethnicist, straight up. So, there it is, something that can even be seen as a revealing metaphor of the kind of Europe that some really desire: a fenced-off garden, managed from above, and in which we are the plants at the mercy of our lords and masters.

And not one nod to the internal problems, to the hierarchies between states, to what happened in Greece, to the inability to manage Mediterranean conflicts. Not one wink! A few well-known faces (Merkel, Lagarde, y other local figures), all in a directionless succession in which you could find Napoleon, Hitler, Casals, Freud, or Delacroix’s La liberté guidant le peuple. One brief flash, indeed, of Putin, and in another a keyboard with Cyrillic letters. ¿What’s this about? Are we to blame Europe’s problems, then, on the Russians? Well I never would have guessed!

And so, the biggest booing I have ever heard at Barcelona’s L’Auditori. I imagine that what may have most upset many spectators will have been all the explicit phallic images and the salaciousness of the couple scenes in the final minutes. This struck me as nothing more than gratuitous. But for one reason or another, I know this entire spectacle, in all its parts, just did not make sense. I prefer not to know how much public money was spent on it.

The difficulty is that, given its fatuity, the only sensible response was to boo it, which is what many of us did (though clearly wanting to distinguish the music from the staging, because the former was worthy in all ways), and this booing lumps you in with those who would have joined in the catcalls out of distaste for anything that doesn’t conform to the “usual”. But honestly, this is NOT the reason here. And it makes me doubly uneasy because the one time money is invested in something different, programming such a horror show instead of something truly valid and sound makes it more difficult next time the chance arises to be daring.

What a great shame! Truly. And a magnificent reminder that we have to be very, very dexterous when we try something different. People who know me also know how open I am to innovation, and in recent times I actively engage in this as a creative artist. But not anything goes, because there are many different ways to get across ideas within music, especially when words and staging can be used. Yet so often it is banality that rules, and this makes life so much more difficult for those of us who have things to say that do not fit in traditional channels.

Perfection

I am often told that in today’s musical world everybody seeks perfection. Students, teachers, juries, producers, critics, and concert players; all would be apparently obsessed with perfection. This is not my perception at all. Many students certainly are preoccupied with it, often encouraged by their teachers. And this is sometimes (not always) the concern of members of juries. But my understanding is that many teachers, juries, and musicians are highly attracted to other very different dimensions of music. This, in any case, is not my point here. Nor is it the actual definition of what we call “perfection” that interests me. My focus is: why should we even need perfection?

Perfection is boring, in any aspect of life. It is practical, if we are referring to machines. But in people it is tiresome, and even suspicious. No, I quite definitely do not like perfection. But let’s go further. Perfection is fake. Always. It does not exist. We humans are not perfect. What we call perfection is just the closest possible approximation to an idea. That idea possibly is perfect. But the perfection of the most perfect of our products is not real, never will be. Making perfection the goal of our activity is an escape, a flight from reality. It is an attempt to surrender to something superior, something imagined, a chimera. In a certain sense, it is a religious yearning, a leap of faith. And its pursuance is the best possible way to end up frustrated and uncomfortable with our bodies, our daily life, and our immediate surroundings. If our goal is to remind ourselves that another more perfect world exists, and that it is not part of this life we live, then obsession for perfection is a splendid tool. But if we can think of our life in a radically different way, the quest for perfection is our worst enemy.

Sex, travel, and music books

I don’t know about you, but by far the three most exciting things in life for me are writing books, travelling to unknown places, and having good sex. And I’ve always thought that writing books is the only one of these three things whose successful outcome does not require the involvement of other people. You have to interact in the other two, and it is from that interaction that an important part of pleasure comes (these two can also be done alone, like writing books, but in my experience there’s no comparison). With books, this isn’t so. You start from what others have written, said, played or recorded (at least in my case, since I write about music), but writing them is up to you, and depends only on you.

Of course, this is what happens when you write in a language you know well. If not, then again you need interaction with other people. It seems to be a problem, but it is not. Above all it is an opportunity, a wonderful opportunity. We are on this planet to share, not to live in isolated bubbles, from which we only exit now and then, out of necessity or for fun. While sharing, we learn and grow.

And this is exactly where I am now, applying the final touches to the new version of my History of Piano Technique. 800 pages in English. Well, none of them would exist without the hand-to-hand work I’ve done with Peter Russell Wix over the past three years. I don’t know how to explain the gratitude I feel for this shared task, which will continue in the future, because I will continue to need someone like him—with his dedication, his love for language and his taste for detail—for a long, long time, especially now, when English is becoming essential in my life. Thanks, Peter.

Finally, our PhD call!

Finally, the call for our doctoral programme at the University of Aveiro was published! Applications until August 3.

On October 11, we will start classes. Any brave in the room willing to challenge? #Doctorate #Aveiro #SóloParaValientes

https://www.ua.pt/research/PageEdict.aspx?g=9&a=0
https://acesso.ua.pt/upload/editais/e_3955.pdf

40 questions

In December 2017 I answered the Musikeon version of the so-called Proust Questionnaire. It was a nice way to talk about very different things, from tigers and archeology to Borges and Star Wars. Here are the questions and my answers.

 

  1. An adjective that best defines your character? Enthusiastic. This, at least, is what they say about me.
  2. What quality do you most appreciate in a person? The passion they put into what they do is what I love.
  3. What do you expect from your friends? That they should want to get across the passion they feel for what they do.
  4. You couldn’t live without…Having projects ahead that no one else has conceived in the same way.
  5. Your main fault? Unpunctuality.
  6. Your ideal of happiness? That what I do for pleasure brings joy to others and helps make their lives richer.
  7. What would be your greatest tragedy? Losing one my children.
  8. As a boy, what did you want to be? As a very small boy, nothing in particular. Later, an archeologist.
  9. And now, if you weren’t a musician, what would you like to be? An archeologist, exactly, although today my interests would have a far more anthropological focus than what I imagined when I was young. And for a while now I can also see myself as an astrophysicist: looking at the sky, dreaming about outer space, and knowing what to ask it. I could give my life over to that.
  10. Your favourite colour? I tend to like the variants of more common colours when they verge towards others: vermillion, turquoise, lime green.
  11. Your favourite animal? Felines, in general, and the tiger in particular. But I like to look at animals, not touch them: I don’t need too much physical interaction with them, as opposed to how I feel about people.
  12. Your favourite city? One in which I don’t have to live my whole life and which will keep me surprised day after day. If I have to choose from those I know, and for widely different reasons, I would say New York, Singapore, Rio de Janeiro, Paris, Cairo, and Barcelona.
  13. Your ideal landscape? Waking up in the Dolomites, preferably in a spot I have never visited.
  14. What place do you dream of visiting one day? Outer space. Literally: to see the earth from outside and without gravity.
  15. What place would you always go back to if you could? A great many. To begin with, a certain unforgettable landscape: my beloved Dolomites, of course, but also Lake Pichola in Udaipur, the summit of Pão de Açúcar, the Yellowstone Park geysers, an infinite number of spots in Iceland, Elephantine Island with the desert just behind it looking from the shores of the Nile in Aswan. Then, always, the Library of Congress. And to the arms of Silvia, my partner (it sounds a bit corny but it’s a fact).
  16. Three musicians without whom the world would be worse off? ¿Three who are alive? Frederic Rzewski, Brad Mehldau, David Ortolá.
  17. A work of music you never tire of hearing? It depends on what era and, very much so, on the performance and recording. Over recent weeks, Schumann Violin Concerto as played by Patricia Kopatchinskaja.
  18. A special song for you (and don’t say why)? “Abendstern” by Schubert.
  19. A musical instrument (not your own)? Alto Flute.
  20. A writer and a book? Jorge Luis Borges. “Ocean Sea” by Alessandro Baricco.
  21. A painter and a painting? Claude Monet. “Study after Velazquez’s portrait of Pope Innocent X” by Francis Bacon.
  22. A film. “Moulin Rouge” by Baz Luhrmann.
  23. A sport. Hiking.
  24. Car, bike, or public transport? Car or public transport, depending on the place and the quality of the transport.
  25. Favourite food and drink? My mama’s home-made sweet tortellini, and fresh mango juice (and fresh fruit juices in general)…but separately, of course!
  26. Do you cook regularly? Yes.
  27. What name do you like the most? Gaia. If I’d had a daughter I’d like her to have been called this.
  28. What is the habit of others you most detest? Belittling someone, on a small or grand scale, especially when it is an expression of scorn based on difference.
  29. What defect do you most easily tolerate? Mine, firstly: unpunctuality.
  30. Your fictional hero or heroine? Yoda.
  31. Your real-life hero or heroine? People like Oscar Camps (the founder of the NGO Proactiva Open Arms) who sacrifices everything to do what he believes in. And his family, who support him.
  32. In which city do you imagine yourself living? Many. The important thing for me is with whom and doing what. If I have to choose one, then it’s New York. At least for a while.
  33. Would you have like to have lived in another era? No. I’d just like my era to better than it is.
  34. What musical event would you have liked to be present at? The December 22 concert in 1808 in the Theater an der Wien, the day Beethoven premiered his 5th and 6th Symphonies, improvised and played a version of his 4th Concerto that I believe was unthinkably different to how we imagine this work today. But I would like to be at that concert not as a Viennese person from 1808 but being what I am today, a musician and musicologist of the 21st century. To be able to compare those performances with all that we have done later with those scores, that would be quite amazing!
  35. Which musician from the past would you have liked to know? Those whose personal qualities fascinate me and at the same time leave me questioning before which I would like to have an idea of my own. Beatriz de Dia, for example, or Josquin Desprez. And also Barbara Strozzi, and no doubt Haydn, who seems to me the most sympathetic guy of all Western music. Maria Szymanowska and Louise Farrenc. Brahms, without a doubt. And then, already entering the twentieth century, Cowell and Hindemith.
  36. 24 hours with…? Many people, known to me and not. Among those I know, perhaps Krystian Zimerman. Among those I don’t, at this moment in time, Lita Cabellut.
  37. What musician of the past would you have liked to know? Many. But, above all, I would like to know people whose existence at this moment I am ignorant of. There are people whose names and music don’t even reach us. Silvia and I, for example, met Ustad Niyaz Khan in Jodhpur, India, in 2005; what we saw and experienced there, in the antithesis of the star system, is the type of experience I would like to repeat above all else.
  38. How would you like to die? With the feeling of having done everything I wanted to do. Something that undoubtedly will not occur because my projects grow with the years in both number and size.
  39. What is your current state of mind, right now? Determined and looking forward to the year that awaits me.
  40. ¿Do you have a motto or a favourite saying? “The more you know, the closer you are to magic”. The actor José Sacristán said that in one of the most beautiful scenes of a film I am infinitely fond of, “Un lugar en el mundo” (“A Place in the World”, 1992) directed by Adolfo Aristarain.