Interview March 2018: 10 Questions with D. Curtis

David Curtis: Official Sites
David Curtis Site: David Curtis Official Site
David Curtis: David Curtis (Twitter)
David Curtis: David Curtis (LinkedIn)
David Curtis: Orchestra of the Swan Official Site
David Curtis: Orchestra of the Swan (YouTube)
David Curtis: Hungarian Symphony Orchestra Miskolc

David Curtis: CD Albums
David Curtis: Mendelssohn: Violin Concertos
David Curtis: Mozart: Piano Concertos K413-K414-K415

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1. You have recently conducted a Concerto with Tamsin Waley-Cohen playing Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 4 (21-22 November 2017). You both had already produced a marvellous CD with the Violin Concertos by Mendelssohn in 2013. What are your considerations on these two different series of Violin Concertos? Is there some sort of continuity or not? What has been your experience during the recording sessions of Mendelssohn and when preparing the Concertos by Mozart?

The set of 5 Mozart violin concertos composed from 1773 to 1776 form a core part of any violinist’s concerto repertoire, especially numbers 3, 4 and 5 though the first two are also worth exploring. As with all of Mozart’s repertoire they are deceptively difficult, extremely sophisticated and require playing and musical understanding of the very highest degree. I was recently invited to a semi-final of the Singapore International Violin Competition, the Mozart Concerto round, and it was indeed highly revealing.

The Mendelssohn early concertos for violin and violin & piano with string orchestra present their own challenges for the soloists. Unlike the Mozart concertos, probably composed for him to perform as concertmaster in Salzburg, the Mendelssohn concertos were first performed by violinist Eduard Rietz with Mendelssohn at the piano. They are clearly more juvenile and less sophisticated than the Mozart and, in some senses, are more reliant on the soloist having a sympathetic understanding of the composer’s intention.

The great conducting guru Jorma Panula is always insistent that «a conductor’s role is not to interpret but realise the composer’s intentions» and soloists of the calibre, sensitivity and understanding of Tamsin Waley-Cohen and pianist/composer Huw Watkins clearly distinguish between these two.

That said the Mendelssohn concertos are a genuine delight to perform and to listen to when played with such freshness and joy as on this disc with Huw and Tamsin. I believe they, and the strings of Orchestra of the Swan, absolutely capture the essence of the music and the composer’s intention. The music has, in my view, a certain youthful energy, charm, naivety and sheer exuberance, semi-quavers rushing around like a hormonal teenager. I don’t believe it is the most sophisticated music and to treat it as though it were somehow rather misses the point. Even a composer of Mendelssohn’s extraordinary gifts and genius must still have had youthful enthusiasm.

Trying to capture the music, as opposed to the notes, in any recording can be difficult and the challenge in recording the Mendelssohn concertos was to ensure that we kept alive to the youthfulness and charm of these two early gems and as the CD is the BBC Music Magazine’s Recommended Choice others seem to agree!

A live performance is very different and Tamsin and I have performed concertos by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Haydn, all 3 Mendelssohn, Mozart, Sibelius, Tchaikovsky, Vaughan Williams and Huw Watkins, in over 35 concerts in the UK, Istanbul and Mexico and I think this has develop a mutual respect and trust between us. Rehearsal are a continual exploration of the score, our approach is always collaborative and, perhaps reflecting my background as viola player in the Coull Quartet. for 30 years, and her chamber music experience, I think be both bring a chamber music approach to our performances, achieving both an intimacy and a directness. I never try to get in the way and one of my most memorable reviews was from Chris Morley, Senior Music Critic at the Birmingham Post who observed during a performance of The Lark Ascendingthat «Curtis is a conductor who clearly knows when not to!» I took that as a compliment to both me, Tasmin and the members of the orchestra.

Mendelssohn Violin Concerto with Tamsin Waley-Cohen

Pre-Concert Talk Mozart Concerto November 2017

2. You have produced also a beautiful CD Album with the piano concertos KV413-414-415 composed by Mozart. and you always have, in the repertoire of your various seasons, works by Mozart, Haydn and also Dittersdorf. What is your relationship with the music of the Classical Era and what attracts you most about the music of this period?

I think the answer to this question lies in my studies at the Royal Academy of Music with Stephen Shingles, former principal viola at the Academy of St. Martins, and Sidney Griller, professor of chamber music at the RAM and leader of the Griller String Quartet from 1931 – 1961. The Coull Quartet had chamber music coaching from Sidney pretty much every week for there and a half years before leaving the Academy to become Quartet in Residence at Warwick University in 1978, a 3 year contract that, 40 years later, still continues!

For the first year or so with Sidney my recollection is that we learned a new Haydn string quartet almost weekly, later complemented by Mozart, early, middle and finally late Beethoven! Although this may seem an unorthodox route to train as a conductor in retrospect I think it was absolutely invaluable. Those sessions with Sidney and my subsequent career in the Coull viola player really gave me an understanding of the roles of the various voices in a quartet and given my view that an orchestra is simply a larger quartet, the same holds true. My approach with chamber and symphony orchestras is very much a collaborative chamber music based ethos, if an orchestra really listens and play as an ensemble then the role of the conductor is transformed.

In answer then to the question What attracts you most about the music of this period? is that as all the great orchestral repertoire springs from the well of this period, an understanding of Haydn, Mozart et alii is essential to developing a sound orchestral technique on which to build.

On a personal note I’m often dismayed to hear performances of Haydn symphonies which lack charm, wit, humour and humanity, all too often these performances are given by major symphony orchestras with esteemed maestros… who have clearly never played a Haydn quartet. I’ve often been asked which composer I would most like to have as Resident Composer to which my answer is always Haydn. Mozart would be impossible to work with, Beethoven simply too terrifying but Haydn, here was a composer who wrote not for his patrons, not for his audiences but above all for his musicians.

I also mentioned Steve Shingles and the Academy of St. Martins and one of the earliest influences I had was hearing the Academy, with Steve as principal viola, on a recording of Mozart Divertimento K136 when I was about 10 years old. I had simply never heard playing like it and had no idea that an orchestra could sound like that. I still have the LP in my collection and the vitality of the early Academy recordings has been a huge inspiration and influence in what I have tried to achieve.

Steve Shingles used to play a Lavazza viola I later bought from him and played on in Coull Quartet for many years.

Julian Bliss presents Weber Clarinet Concerto with Orchestra of the Swan

3. You have conducted a series of concerto-events in collaboration with BBC for the recent celebration of the 400th Anniversary of Shakespeare. And also this year 2017 your Orchestra of the Swan has been involved into special Shakespeare oriented events in collaboration with the RSC, like Musical Transformations (October 2017). How do you see this synergy Shakespeare & music and are there other projects of this kind for the future?

Being based in Shakespeare’s Stratford-upon-Avon there are clearly potential major influences on Orchestra of the Swan’s programming, Shakespeare’s influence on composers from his own time to the present day is difficult to over-estimate and I have in my bookcase a four volume index and cross reference of music relating to Shakespeare whether it be major works such as the Romeo and Juliet overtures and ballet suites to far smaller songs and incidental music for the plays.

Much of the music composed has been for large scale symphony orchestra, Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky and Verdi immediately spring to mind which are obviously not practical for a chamber orchestra, however there are less well know works and of course, as a champion of new music we commissioned a series of new works for the 450th anniversary of the death of Shakespeare in 2014 and a major new work for choir and chamber orchestra from Dobrinka Tabakova, Immortal Shakespeare, which we performed in Holy Trinity Church Stratford-upon-Avon on Sunday 23 April 2016. The church is of course Shakespeare’s final resting place and the performance was the day after St Georges day so exactly 400 years and 1 day since the bard’s death. The performance was recorded for BBC Radio 3 and I hope to record Immortal Shakespeare at some future date, watch this space.

For the 450th anniversary I commissioned new work from Roger Steptoe, Huw Watkins, Roxanna Panufnik and Pete Wyer and I also ran an international composition competition won by Kristina Arakelyan and her setting of Sonnet 115.

We also performed repertoire by Finzi, the Love’s Labours Lost Suite, a much under-rated work, Korngold’s Much Ado About Nothing Suite and Howard Blake created a special version of his suite for A Midsummer Night’s Dream and of course, Mendelssohn’s complete incidental music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream with four narrators taking key roles.

We later performed the Mendelssohn in the Istanbul Festival with leading Turkish actress Tilbe Saran taking the role of narrator. For me this was an interesting experience to say the very least. Tilbe was reading the script in Turkish and I had on my stand my score for the orchestra, her script in Turkish and the original Shakespeare. Tilbe and I decided at a rehearsal with piano the previous day that we’d smile at each other and make it work. It certainly seemed to as after the performance I was congratulated on my clear understanding of Turkish as I’d been able to follow every nuance of Tilbe’s delivery. Smiles really go a very long way in delivering a great performance!

Our commission programme celebrating Shakespeare even extended to our tour to Mexico in November 2016 when Anglo Arts Mexico commissioned the young Mexican composer Alejandro Basulto to compose a new work for the tour. His Jig Variations, based on an original Elizabethan melody with nine variations each based on contemporary Mexican dance rhythms, celebrated Kemp’s jigfrom London to Norwich after he fell out with Shakespeare and devised this publicity stunt.

Shakespeare’s influence is very much alive and well!

Immortal Shakespeare – Dobrinka Tabakova (21 April 2016)

4. What’s the origin of the name of your Orchestra Orchestra of the Swanand what’s the story behind its foundation over twenty years ago? You have recently received your new position as Principal Guest Conductor of the Hungarian Symphony Orchestra (Miskolc) and the overseas touring of your Orchestra is increasing considerably in these two years: what are your projects in this wider scenario? When you work with these different orchestras in different countries and you are preparing a new series of concerts, what are your pieces of advice to the musicians on approaching Mozart and on approaching Haydn? What do you think fundamental for a marvellous performance?

The story behind Orchestra of the Swan is very simple and perhaps surprising…

… In 1995 I was approached by the then director of the Stratford Music Festivalwho asked if I could fix a small string orchestra for a concert in the festival that would also enable his very talented daughter to perform the Mathias clarinet concerto. On a whim I agreed and called various friends to see if they’d like to play in the concert, several agreed but also asked who would conduct, my reply simply being that as there was no budget for a conductor I’d take it on myself to wave my arms around. So, we had a date, a soloist, a programme, a conductor, players fixed… but no name for the orchestra. Several of us met some months before the event and threw around various names; Stratford Chamber Orchestra, Midland Chamber Orchestra, Shakespeare Players etc., finally someone, it may or may not have been me said, «there are swans everywhere in Stratford, how about Orchestra of the Swan?»…

… As it was by then getting late and we’d all had several glasses of wine we agreed that would do.

The concert seemed to go well, everyone had a good time and the following year we were back at the festival again when it occurred to me that perhaps Stratford could support a small chamber orchestra series so the following season I promoted series of 6 string orchestra programmes and I believe I persuaded pianist Alan Schiller, with whom I’d worked with in the Coull Quartet, to perform the 3 Mozart concertos K412, 413 and 414 with us; plus ca change plus ca la meme chose!

Since then OOTS has grown organically but in some ways I’ve tried to hold true to the original idea, find a group of players who want to enjoy making music together, nurture young and emerging talent, perform great repertoire from the classical canon and work with outstanding soloists.

As I leave OOTS to concentrate on my other projects and conducting I can reflect that 22 years later it seems to have done the trick!

My approach with other orchestras is fundamentally the same, though most of the repertoire with the Hungarian Symphony Orchestra (Miskolc) is rather larger scale, this season my programming has included Holst Planets Suite, Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition, Dvorak Symphony No. 8 and contemporary work by Roland Szentpali – concerto for 4 saxophones, Theo Verbey – Fractal Symphony, Frigyes Hidas – concerto for 2 trombones then in March the Oscar Navarro – clarinet concerto (www.mso.hu) and a new commission from American composer and colleague Peter Lieuwen, Heartland(www.mso.hu), which draws on American and Hungarian folk influence and will be premiered on April 27 in Miskolc with the composer present, do join us!

5. Your favourite work by Mozart and your favourite work by J. Haydn.

How on earth to choose single favourite work from these two great masters, these are the really difficult questions but for Mozart I would choose his opera The Magic Flute.

For me Mozart is at his greatest when writing for the voice but so often we hear this in other repertoire, particularly the piano concertos which perhaps come closest to his operas. For me this also determines my approach to conducting Mozart, my question is always «is the music singing, is the tempo right for the music to sing?»…

… Wagner is reputed to have said that 90% of conducting is finding the right tempo (Wagner: The whole duty of a conductor is comprised etc., 1869) and yes, I believe that’s probably pretty accurate and with Mozart if the performance is too fast to hear the voice or to slow to sustain the line then, it’s probably too fast or too slow!

Haydn is even harder to answer, there are so many great works, an obvious choice would be The Creation, perhaps one of the late great Paris or London series of symphonies or an earlier, quirkier symphony such as the Farewell, certainly a great favourite of mine, even if F# minor/F# major does pose some problems for the performers as well as probably taxing the ears of the court at Esterhazy!

So, I’m going to choose one of Haydn’s quartets that I performed on many occasions with the Coull Quartet, the Sunrise Opus 76 No. 4 (with the Coull Quartet I had also recorded Haydn’s quartets Op. 33 Nos. 1-6).

The Sunrise Quartet is such a great work, a joy to perform and to listen to and I love Haydn’s some typical self-deprecating comments, like «Ah, yes, but it still reminds me of great amount of work that remains to be, even by someone like myself».

6. Do you have in mind the name of some neglected composer of the 18th century you’d like to see re-evaluated?

I think that Christian Cannabich (1731 – 1798) is a composer and violinist who certainly deserves to be more widely recognised, not just as a composer of numerous operas, ballets, symphonies, concertos string quartets and piano trios, but even more importantly as the director of the Mannheim court orchestra, a role he assumed on the premature death of Johann Stamitz with whom he’d previously studied.

His role as Director of the Mannheim Orchestra from 1774-1798 saw a flowering of one of the finest orchestras of the period which perhaps laid the foundations of modern orchestral technique. The Mannheim orchestra was renowned for its excellent discipline, the individual skill of its players and their performance style which included new dynamic elements, crescendi and diminuendi which allowed of the full orchestra to accompany a soloist without covering them since the Mannheim orchestra members were all virtuosi, the composers who wrote for them could create new orchestral sounds by capitalizing on this new development.

It’s hardly surprising that from 1777, 3 years after Cannabich assumed his role as Director, that Mozart visited Mannheim several times beginning and became a good friend of Cannabich, indeed Mozart lived for a time in the Cannabich household and gave almost daily keyboard lessons to Cannabich’s daughter. Mozart greatly admired Cannabich, writing in his letters «Cannabich, who is the best director that I have ever seen, has the love and awe of those under him» (9 July 1778) and in a letter to his father he wrote; «I cannot tell you what a good friend Cannabich is to me».

For Mozart to speak so highly of Christian Cannabich speaks volumes to me and surely justifies re-evaluation of his music and place in the development of orchestra technique.

7. Name a neglected piece of music of the 18th century you’d like to see performed in concert with more frequency. 

I’d like to cheat a little here if I may and choose a work premiered on 7 April 1805, the Symphony in Eb by Anton Eberl.

Eberl (1765 –1807) studied piano and composition from Mozart and as well as being a prolific composer he was an outstanding pianist. Most of his works are now sadly lost but during his lifetime his work was so highly regarded that it was frequently passed off as being by… Mozart.

This so appalled Eberl that he finally published the following notice in a newspaper «However flattering it may be that even connoisseurs were capable of judging these works to be the products of Mozart, I can in no way allow the musical public to be left under this delusion».

Contemporary critics also wrote in the Berlin Musical Journal that; «Since the symphonies of Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven, nothing but this symphony has been written which could be placed alongside theirs».

The reason for my choice of Eberl’s E flat major Symphony lies in the significance of the date of its premiere and companion work in the same programme.

The Eberl symphony is indeed a charming work and, at the time was reviewed rather more favourably than the other symphony in Eb that was also performed in that same concert, the symphony in question being of course Beethoven’s Eroica…

… I choose this symphony not in any way to diminish Eberl’s reputation, his work deserves to be more widely played, but I’d invite readers to consider this. After hearing a very charming but essentially rather light-weight work by Eberl, consider hearing perhaps the world’s greatest symphony being premiered. Nothing demonstrates to me more strongly that this was a pivotal moment in music history.

8. Have you read a particular book on Mozart Era you consider important for the comprehension of the music of this period?

The book I’d choose is not specifically on the Mozart Era but a book primarily written with conductors in mind by the late, and very great conductor Erich Leinsdorf, The Composers Advocate, subtitled A Radical Orthodoxy for Musicians and published by Yale University Press.

In his preface he says «the musician is privileged to make a living while dwelling each day with genius». Genius is a description that is now banded around all too frequently but there is no doubt that if we are working with music of Mozart, Haydn, Schubert, Beethoven et alii we are indeed «dwelling each day with genius».

And with that lies a responsibility to the composer, our fellow musicians and of course our audiences and I refer back to Jorma Panula’s distinction between interpretation and realisation again springs to mind.

This is a book that demands that conductors real know and understand their craft, the titles of the 7 chapters almost biblical in their direct simplicity:
1. Knowing the Score
2. Knowing the Composer
3. Knowing What Composers Wanted
4. Knowing Musical Tradition
5. Knowing the Right Tempo: 1
6. Knowing the Right Tempo: 2
7. Knowing the Conductors Role

It couldn’t be much clearer, and I find it telling that he devotes not one, but two chapters to tempo, we’re back to Wagner’s assertion that 90% of conducting is finding the right tempo!

Needless to say, this is a book I strongly recommend to any conducting class I take.

9. Name a movie or a documentary that can improve the comprehension of the music of this period.

My answer here may be something of a surprise, a cliché and perhaps be considered too lightweight but I suggest Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus.

Now, I can almost sense the purists shuddering at this choice and the portrayal of Mozart as a vulgar, irritating buffoon and in some respects yes, I agree, the film is not historically accurate, especially in its portrayal of the relationship between Salieri and Mozart which, although the older composer was probably jealous of his rival’s genius, and who wouldn’t have been, was at the least mutually respectful.

However it’s frequently been said that you should never let facts get in the way of a good story and, in the same way that I find James Cameron’s telling of the Titanic story brings the actuality of what happened on that dreadful night to life far more vividly that an historically accurate narrative I think the film Amadeusdoes reveal a truth about Mozart’s life, his circle, friends and rivals…

… It has also had the effect of bringing Mozart’s music to a far wider audience and for that reason alone I consider it a valid choice.

10. Do you think there’s a special place to be visited that proved crucial to the evolution of the 18th century music?

I’m not sure there is any one place that is a single crucible, there are so many competitors for that accolade, Mannheim, crucible of the Mannheim School, Vienna, home of the Viennese school (both of them), Salzburg, Esterhazy – where Haydn is said to have had to find creativity within himself and which could perhaps be considered the birthplace of the symphony, Prague – where Mozart achieved such success, London and Paris which feted Haydn and Mozart.

However I think that more generally the broader culture and architecture of the towns and cities in Austria, the Czech Republic and Hungary can in some more subtle way inform our understanding of our deeper European cultural roots. All artists are a product of their environment and culture and the great canon of repertoire by Haydn, Mozart, Dittersdorf, Vanhal, Salieri, Stamitz, Danzi, Eberl, Pleyel and so many others must be influenced by their environment, in much the same way as it’s impossible to imagine Shostakovich creating his music world had he not been living in the Soviet Union at that particular time in history.

A very personal viewpoint is that I have a favourite café in Miskolc, Café Frei, and no apology for the free advertisement. One of my favourite ways of spending time between rehearsals in Miskolc is to find an outside table in the warm sun, sitting with a coffee and a score or book and listening to the sound of the trams, the piano accordion player on the next block and looking at the beautiful central European architecture…

… Perhaps I have a vivid imagination but in my minds eye I can almost see Haydn walking down the street, pulling up a chair and joining me for a coffee so we can discuss my latest commission from him!

Thank you very much for having taken the time to answer our questions!

Thank you!

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CD Spotlight March 2018: 3 Symphonies by a Pupil of Mozart

3 Symphonies by Eberl The Symphonies by Eberl deserve some attention because Eberl was one of the pupils of Mozart and because a few works by Eberl were often considered works written by Mozart himself. His Symphony E-flat premiered with Eroica by Beethoven. Concerto Köln Teldec Records

Interview January 2018: 10 Questions with I. Page

 

Ian Page: Official Sites
Ian Page Site: Ian Page & Classical Opera / The Mozartists
Ian Page: Ian Page (Twitter)
Ian Page: CO & The Mozartists (Twitter)
Ian Page: CO & The Mozartists (Facebook)
Ian Page: CO & The Mozartists (YouTube)
Ian Page: CO & The Mozartists (Season 2017/2018)

Ian Page: CD Albums
Ian Page: Mozart: Il Sogno di Scipione
Ian Page: Mozart: Haydn, Beethoven: Perfido!
Ian Page: Mozart: Zaide

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1. In 2017/2018 you are celebrating the 20th Anniversary of Classical Opera, that, with its period-instrument orchestra under your direction as conductor, has gained the status of one of the major international leading exponents not only of the music of Mozart but also of his many contemporaries (i.e. Gluck, J.C.Bach, T.Arne, N.Jommelli and many others), thanks to a series of highly critically acclaimed live concerts and CD recordings. In 1997 you have founded Classical Opera, then in 2017 you have launched The Mozartists… Can you tell us about the story behind the birth and the many years of activity of Classical Opera? When did you encounter the music of Mozart for the first time and when did you decide to found Classical Opera and why? What have been the major challenges and the major accomplishments, you experienced during these 20 years? And what about The Mozartists?

It’s been a wonderful journey, although in many ways I’m always too close to it to be able to see the growth and evolution from a proper perspective.

In my late teens the music of Mozart occupied an increasingly important place in my heart – the piano concertos were my initial way in – and when I was at University at York (my degree was actually in English Literature), Roger Norrington came to conduct Beethoven’s Eroica symphony with the chamber orchestra there. It was completely revelatory for me, and I soon started supplementing by listening habits with period-instrument recordings of Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven.

I was bowled over by how fresh, vibrant and surprising this core repertoire sounded with these instruments…

…The music suddenly seemed to make so much more sense; it was like scraping the veneer off an old painting by a great master and discovering that the original colours were so much brighter and more compelling.

By this stage I was in London studying as a postgraduate at the Royal Academy of Music, and there I met David Syrus, who was for many years Head of Music at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden (he only retired from the position last year). Like many other students before and since, I was fired by David’s musicianship, wisdom and supreme decency and generosity as a human being, and opera seemed to represent the ideal fusion of my twin loves of music and literature.

One thing led to another, and I naturally gravitated more and more towards Mozart’s operas…
…After the RAM I joined the music staff at Scottish Opera, where I worked with the Handel specialist Nick McGegan on a new production of La clemenza di Tito, and this again proved a revelatory experience. I was astonished by how wide the gulf generally was between a good and a bad performance of works like Tito or Idomeneo, and the following year Nick asked me to assist him at the uniquely beautiful and evocative rococo theatre in Drottningholm, Sweden. I was also now working at Glyndebourne, and specialising increasingly in Mozart. This was still limited to the big four or five operas, but I was becoming more and more interested in where Mozart’s operatic style and personality grew from. This was the seed for starting Classical Opera; I was struck by the dichotomy between Mozart being arguably the most highly regarded composer in the history of opera and yet only about a quarter of his operas holding a place in the repertoire of the world’s opera houses. There was no sudden light-bulb moment, but it gradually became important to me to try to set up a company that could do for Mozart what the Royal Shakespeare Company does for Shakespeare.

Over the years our brief, and my interests and ambitions for the company, have evolved, influenced partly by my growing fascination with placing Mozart’s music in context and partly by the feeling that there should be no limit to the repertoire we explore, having invested so much in assembling a wonderful team of musicians and establishing a shared philosophy and approach to performing the music of the 18th century. The name Classical Opera has increasingly felt limiting to this evolution, and earlier this year we launched The Mozartists as a vehicle for our expanding concert work.

Over our first 20 years our repertoire has already ranged from cantatas by Handel and Pergolesi to symphonies by Beethoven and Schubert, but Mozart – and his operas in particular – has always been our starting point. This new name allows us greater freedom and flexibility in our programming, while hopefully also causing less confusion among promoters and audiences. The important step for me was the recognition that we’re not exclusively an opera company, and so long as Mozart remains central to our repertoire and mission, there’s no reason why we can’t also explore Handel and Beethoven and even beyond.

20th Birthday Concert – 9 October 2017

2. In October 2017 you have released the CD recording Il Sogno di Scipione by Mozart, an opera composed in Salzburg in 1771, when Mozart was only 15 years old. You have studied and conducted Mozart’s early works, especially operas, for a long time: what’s your general impression on this incredible work by a young genius of 15 years old? Which parts of Il Sogno di Scipione impressed you most? In June 2018 you are going to conduct Mozart’s first full-length opera La finta semplice (1768), marking so another 250th anniversary. La finta semplice was written in 1768, in difficult conditions, and Il Sogno di Scipione in 1771, after Mozart’s formative experience in Italy: what’s the technical difference between the two works, in your opinion? Il Sogno di Scipione is part of your project The Complete Mozart Operas, which started in 2012: at which point of your Mozartian operatic parcours are you now and what for the future?

The parallel with Shakespeare is a significant one.

Both Mozart and Shakespeare wrote some works that are less good than others, but even in the least good ones they will suddenly do something – tap a depth of beauty, wisdom or truth – that no one else could have thought of.

Il sogno di Scipione is an interesting case in point. It’s not one of his most challenging or accomplished works – indeed it’s the first release in our ongoing complete Mozart Opera cycle that we recorded without having previously performed the work in the theatre or the concert hall – but it still has touches, details, sleights of hand, that none of his contemporaries could have thought of…

… There’s an accompanied recitative near the end in which Scipio awakens from his dream. As he stirs the sound-world suddenly changes and the strings play two bars that instantly transport the listener to a magical, elevated place.

Il sogno di Scipione

The more familiar I become with Mozart’s early operas the more aware I become that what he was extraordinary at is matching the scale and ambition of each work to the level and expectation of the commission. Works commissioned to celebrate royal weddings were virtuosic but emotionally shallow, and works written for young or amateur performers were charming but technically undemanding, while he was able to throw the kitchen sink at major commissions such as Mitridate and Lucio Silla, in the knowledge that he was writing for some of the top singers and players of the day.

Il sogno di Scipione was commissioned as a dutiful and obsequious act of homage to the Archbishop of Salzburg, so it had a specific function whose message would only be muddied by a complex plot. In truth, the piece has virtually no plot whatsoever, and this had been one of my reasons for not having performed it before. During rehearsals for the recording, though, the moment we accepted the lack of plot and started to explore the way the score underpins and enhances the philosophical nature of the libretto, we found that the music suddenly lifted off the page, and it was wonderful to see how much our singers and players started to appreciate and enjoy the piece.

La finta semplice was composed for Vienna’s leading opera buffa singers, although in the end it was never performed there, and Goldoni’s libretto is genuinely comic, so the twelve-year-old Mozart gave it his best shot. In keeping with the styles of the day, the arias are substantially shorter than opera seria ones, but the music is astonishingly skilful and successful, and the chain-finales already anticipate the celebrated Da Ponte operas…

La Finta Semplice Trailer – 6 & 8 June 2018

… At the conclusion there is even a poignant pre-echo of Le nozze di Figaro, as Giacinta begs forgiveness from her brothers for her impish trickery. With Rosina’s Senti l’eco and Amoretti, too, time suddenly seems to stand still and the comedy is briefly suspended in a vision of genuine sincerity, compassion and vulnerability.

The next release (the seventh) in our ongoing complete Mozart cycle will be of Bastien und Bastienne, which we are coupling with the early dramatic cantata Grabmusik. These two works, both completed before Mozart even reached his teens, will be released in autumn 2018, and again reflect Mozart’s skill at matching his music to the scale of the commission. Bastien und Bastienne was the only one of Mozart’s operas to be conceived for performance in a private house rather than a theatre or opera house, but its bucolic charm and simplicity are beguiling.

Grabmusik, meanwhile, was allegedly the result of a test set by the distrusting Archbishop of Salzburg, who had the young composer confined to solitary confinement while he set the text, to prove that he was not receiving help from his father or any other elders. The result is one of Mozart’s least known works, but it contains music of incredible emotional range, that must have quashed any doubters for good!

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Ian Page’s
THE COMPLETE MOZART’S OPERAS – CD Series (2011-2017)
& Other Albums
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• Mozart: Il sogno di Scipione
• Perfido! Vocal Works by Haydn, Mozart & Beethoven
• Mozart: Zaide

• Handel: Where’re You Walk
• Mozart: Il Re Pastore
• Mozart: Mitridate, re di Ponto

• Mozart: Die Schuldigkeit des Ersten Gebots
• Mozart: Apollo et Hyacinthus
• Gluck: Blessed Spirit

• Arne: Artaxerxes
• A-Z Mozart Opera

3. In 2015 with your Classical Opera you have launched another special type of concerts, synchronically featuring works by Mozart and by his major contemporaries during the same musical season: MOZART 250, which, through its concerts and its retrospective Series, chronologically follows an ideal 250th anniversary line in the annual footsteps of Mozart’s life from 1765/2015 (Mozart’s childhood visit to London) to 1791/2041. What led you to create such special annual series of musical events? Beside Mozart’s La finta semplice, in 2018 you’ll present Haydn’s Applausus, his Symphony No. 26 Lamentatione and other works by him and music by J.C.Bach, Jommelli, Hasse and Vanhal: what about your interest in the music by this group of composers and, in particular, in the music by Haydn?

Again, I can’t remember the exact moment I had the idea, but it seems to incorporate several of the things that are important to me. I’ve always been fascinated by what music Mozart heard and was influenced by, and which of his fellow composers he admired (he was famously dismissive of most of them!).

I also found myself being increasingly frustrated by reviewers and commentators judging Mozart’s early works in comparison with the masterpieces he was writing twenty years later rather than with the other music being written and performed at the same time.

Even when I first set up Classical Opera it seemed obvious that if we learnt to perform works like La finta semplice and Mitridate well then that would beneficially inform our performances of the great masterpieces of his maturity, and with MOZART 250 it’s proved really useful to be able to place Mozart’s works alongside works being written in the same year by other composers. Even those pieces which Mozart would almost certainly not have heard throw light on the gradual evolution of musical style during his lifetime, and of course the works that he did know are of even greater interest.

We’ve already featured over thirty composers in the first three years of MOZART 250, and our 2015 mini-festival exploring the music being performed in London during Mozart’s childhood stay there featured several composers that not even I had heard of before – people like Mattia Vento, Davide Perez, George Rush and William Bates.

We’ll be releasing a 2-CD set of highlights from these concerts in May 2018.

If everything goes according to plan MOZART 250 will generally form approximately half of our live projects each year between now and 2041.

Every January we present a retrospective concert offering an overview of the musical year 250 years previously. Our 1768 survey, which takes place at Wigmore Hall on 23 January, will include symphonies by Haydn and Vanhal, a flute concerto by Johann Christian Bach, played by our principal flautist Katy Bircher, and arias from Jommelli’s Fetonte, Hasse’s Piramo e Tisbe, Haydn’s Lo speziale and Mozart’s La finta semplice, all sung by the young Swiss-Belgian soprano Chiara Skerath, making her UK début. Devising these programmes is very labour-intensive but I really enjoy the process, and it always throws up some fascinating discoveries.

Of course there are some years when Mozart was extremely prolific and others when he wrote very little, but even the least productive years provide opportunities to dig a little deeper into other more obscure repertoire…

…  1766 (2016), for example, was a relatively thin year on paper, but it enabled us to present the UK première of Jommelli’s Il Vologeso, which proved to be a great success. As we enter the fourth year of MOZART 250 a consistent pattern is starting to take shape, with Haydn unsurprisingly emerging as the leading light alongside the young Mozart.

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And about Haydn,…

… just consider that, beside Applausus and his symphony No. 26 for this season, I’m on a mission to champion all the symphonies without a nickname, because they tend to be overlooked in favour of those with nicknames, and among those nos. 47, 80 and 99 are particular favourites.

Haydn 2009 Celebrations

__________________________________________________
Ian Page’s MOZART 250 – The Journey of a Lifetime
Complete Concerts Series (2015-2018)
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• Mozart 250: Year 1768-2018
• Mozart 250: Year 1767-2017
• Mozart 250: Year 1766-2016
• Mozart 250: Year 1765-2015

4. You have worked at Glyndebourne and Drottningholm, experiencing, in this way, peculiar conditions of opera performance, a few of them, certainly typical of the 18th century (the Drottningholm Theatre, for example): how such experiences enriched your vision of the 18th century music? You have worked also with Sir Charles Mackerras, Sir Alexander Gibson, Ivor Bolton, Nicholas McGegan, Mark Wigglesworth: how did they contribute to your growth as a musician, as a conductor and as an artist? You work with many marvellous, also young, artists and professionals year after year: do you want to remember someone in particular and some anecdotes? And as an entrepreneur, what have been your major challenges and what your advice and tips for those who’d like to launch their careers in the world of classical music as entrepreneurs?

When I assisted Nic McGegan at Drottningholm we were working on a production of Una cosa rara by Martin y Soler, and it was fascinating to work on such a typical 18th-century opera there.
After a few weeks in a rehearsal studio in Stockholm it seemed like a distinctly average piece with a fairly ordinary cast, but as soon as rehearsals moved into the Drottningholm theatre the piece, and the singers, suddenly sounded a million dollars!

That was a really formative experience for me; it made me realise that there are so many 18th-century works that need the right tender, loving care to flourish, and that they really start to make sense when you can recreate the conditions for which they were originally conceived.

Glyndebourne was also a wonderful place to work, and it was there that I first met and worked with Sir Charles Mackerras. I worked on all three of the Mozart/Da Ponte operas there, and as assistant conductor I had musical responsibility for luxuriously extensive understudy rehearsals, which provided me with the opportunity to work with some of the leading young singers in the country. I subsequently assisted Mackerras on his recording of Idomeneo, and he followed the development of Classical Opera with a keen interest, always generous with his advice and encouragement. Along with Stanley Sadie and Christopher Raeburn – two other great people, great minds and great Mozartians – he was the most influential mentor for me in the early years of the company.

I worked with the other three conductors you mention on rather different repertoire – Puccini, Britten and Stravinsky – but I learnt a huge amount from all of them. Sir Alex was particularly warm and inspirational, and I continue to hold Mark Wigglesworth up as a role model for his fierce musical intelligence and the depth of his thinking and preparation.

Then there are the conductors and other musicians from whom I’ve learnt so much from watching them perform or listening to their recordings. We should always retain an overriding sense of modesty and humility, but at the same time it’s really important in refining our own thoughts and interpretations to analyse what we particularly like or dislike about other performers and performances.

When I started Classical Opera we quickly gained a reputation for our work in identifying and nurturing top-quality young singers. This was partly due to the fact that we couldn’t afford more established artists, but it’s also true that this repertoire particularly suits young voices.

Young singers also tend to be more open to the style of detailed, explorative rehearsals that I prefer, and what I find particularly satisfying now is that when singers who worked with us at the start of their careers come back after a gap of several years, we already have a shared language which comes back in a matter of minutes, as with all good friendships.

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It took me rather longer to work out and identify the sort of players that I most enjoyed working with, but now that we have established such a strong and loyal sense of ensemble I’m continually inspired and fed by the players with whom I work.

It takes a certain type of open spirit, and intellectual rigour, to tame and master these wonderful old instruments, and building an ensemble isn’t just about finding the best players but also about instilling the right shared values, goals and reasons for doing what we do.

 

5. Your favourite work by Mozart and your favourite work by J. Haydn.

Oh dear, these answers will probably change on a daily basis!

For Mozart it would probably have to be one of the operas or one of the piano concertos.

The C minor Mass would also be a contender, probably more so than the Requiem, and a recent addition to the short-list would be the Sinfonia Concertante K.364, which I conducted for the first time three months ago. But how to whittle it down to one? The old cliché is probably right, that my favourite Mozart opera is the one I’m working on at the time, but this week, and off the top of my head because I know the question will get harder the more I think about it, my short-list would be Idomeneo, Così fan tutte, Die Zauberflöte and the Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor. And if I had to name one – today, and without questioning why on earth Figaro and Don Giovanni aren’t on my shortlist – I’ll say Così fan tutte. It’s such a profound, complex and modern score, and is still widely misunderstood and under-appreciated.

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Haydn is hardly any easier.

As I’ve already said previously, I’m on a mission to champion all the symphonies without a nickname, because they tend to be overlooked in favour of those with nicknames, and among those nos. 47, 80 and 99 are particular favourites. Today’s podium places, though, would be occupied by:
3. String Quartet in F major, Op. 77, no. 2.
2. Piano Sonata No. 52 in E flat major
1. Symphony No. 44 in E minor, Trauer

6. Do you have in mind the name of some neglected composer of the 18th century you’d like to see re-evaluated?

You mean apart from Mozart?…

… I’m only joking, but I do love the line of Peter Schickele, who, when asked which composer he considered to be the most underrated, replied: «Mozart – since the highest rave is a gross understatement».

Gluck CO’s Blessed Spirit at Gramophone Critics Choice December 2010

Apart from Mozart, there is still valuable work to be done in increasing appreciation of Gluck (especially his pre-Orfeo operas) and Johann Christian Bach, but of the more forgotten names there are five that stand out for me: Beck, Jommelli, Kraus, Traetta and Vanhal.

7. Name a neglected piece of music of the 18th century you’d like to see performed in concert with more frequency.

I have quite a lot of these, including several by the composers I’ve just mentioned.

They’re not confined to lesser known composers either; in March we’re performing Haydn’s Applausus cantata, which doesn’t seem to have been presented in London for many years. I’m in a very fortunate position, because when I do come across a neglected work that I really rate I can often incorporate it into our programming.

For this question, though, I’m actually going to choose a work by Mozart – his concert aria Ah, lo previdi, K.272…

Perfido!

… Mozart’s concert arias in general don’t get as much exposure as they deserve, and I’ve never understood why this should be…

… Maybe promoters just don’t think of singers to fill their concerto slot. Whatever the reasons for their relative neglect, Mozart’s concert arias contain some of his best music, and the more extended ones are like concentrated mini-operas in their own right.

Ah, lo previdi is certainly one of these, a scena lasting over twelve minutes and incorporating two fiercely dramatic recitatives – the second one in particular contains some astonishing harmonic shifts and moments of exquisite, tender vulnerability – and two arias, the second of which incorporates a beautiful oboe solo.

Mozart clearly held the work in high regard, subsequently urging his beloved Aloysia Weber to learn it and «to put yourself in all seriousness into Andromeda’s situation and position», and the celebrated Mozart biographer Alfred Einstein wrote that Mozart «almost never wrote anything more ambitious, or containing stronger dramatic feeling».

We are including this piece in Perfido!, our recent recording of Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven concert arias with Sophie Bevan, and I was delighted how many of the reviews singled it out for praise.

8. Have you read a particular book on Mozart Era you consider important for the comprehension of the music of this period?

I’m very grateful for the opportunity that this question gives me to acknowledge some of the books I couldn’t do without!

With Mozart of course we are lucky in that we have a very substantial series of Mozart family letters that have survived, and Otto Deutsch’s collection of Mozart documents is similarly indispensable, so these are the two bibles.

Too many modern biographies intercede with their author’s own attempts to formulate a particular theory or new angle, but a glorious exception is Stanley Sadie’s Mozart: the early years. This was intended as the first of a two-part biography, but Stanley sadly died before he could write the second book. For a clear, authoritative and insightful overview of Mozart’s life and works up until 1781, though, this is the book to have.

Scarcely a month goes past without me referring to two other fabulous books: The Compleat Mozart (don’t be put off by the title), edited by Neal Zaslaw, is a wonderful compendium of Mozart’s complete works, and Peter Clive’s Mozart and his Circle contains invaluable biographical entries on all the important people in Mozart’s life.

Zaslaw’s benchmark book on Mozart’s Symphonies is also outstanding, and for Mozart’s operas I still don’t think that anyone has rivalled William Mann’s The Operas of Mozart, first published in 1977, which has the huge advantage of devoting a whole chapter to each of the pre-Idomeneo operas, rather than merging them into a token single-chapter appraisal.

My final top recommendation would be John A. Rice’s Mozart on the Stage, which has fascinating information and insights on how Mozart’s operas would have been composed, rehearsed and staged.

9. Name a movie or a documentary that can improve the comprehension of the music of this period.

Like the play, the film of Amadeus has plenty of critics, but despite its faults it does recreate the spirit of Mozart’s Vienna (despite being filmed in Prague!), and the flights of fancy about how some of Mozart’s compositions came into being are captivating and imaginative, if spurious. I also find Farinelli exciting for its evocation of 18th-century theatres and opera performances.

In terms of documentaries, Phil Grabsky’s excellent In Search of… series has incorporated full length films devoted to Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven, but I have a hazy memory of a wonderful series of TV programmes on these composers (and Schubert) from the 1980s…

… It was presented by Bamber Gascoigne and had Stanley Sadie as musical consultant, and I think it was called Man and Music. I’ve no idea whether these programmes are available anywhere now, but I’d love to know if they are, if only to see if they’re as good as I remember…

10. Do you think there’s a special place to be visited that proved crucial to the evolution of the 18th century music?

I’m not sure I can think of anywhere about which I could make such an expansive claim, but the Drottningholm Slottsteater is my own personal First Choice.

I’m a big fan of Stockholm and its people, and the story behind the theatre’s preservation is such a fortuitous and romantic one. It’s an amazingly beautiful place and setting, too, but more than anything it’s the ambience inside the theatre itself which is truly magical. It feels as close to time travel as I’m ever likely to get!

Thank you very much for having taken the time to answer our questions!

Thank you!

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