BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE
JULY 2000

MUSIC THAT CHANGED ME
Interview by Matthew Rye

The town where I was born had no symphony orchestra, no musical life in which I could take part, which meant I had other kinds of early musical experiences. My elder sisters sang folksongs as we went to sleep at night and from the beginning of my childhood it was wonderful to feel people could come together without saying words and just sing.

I was quite often alone as a child - my mother had to work very hard - but we had a piano, and when my eldest sister started piano lessons, I decided to try to play the same works as she did - little children's songs. From the age of five, I found that this piano could be a partner for me. When I was ten years old, my piano teacher, who was also organist at our church, played BACH'S The Art of Fugue on its wonderful Baroque organ. I remember being deeply moved. I couldn't, of course, comprehend the dimensions of this piece, but I felt music had caught me.

My first experience of hearing a symphony orchestra was not until I was 16. It was in Breslau (Wroclaw) with its Philharmonic and it was BEETHOVEN'S Ninth Symphony. From that point I wanted to be a professional musician. At the same time, a doctor diagnosed a problem with the little finger of my right hand and said I could never be a pianist or an organist. At first I was desperate, but when I heard that concert I realised music can also mean conducting. Nobody, not even my mother, believed I could be a conductor: such a shy young man who was unable to talk to other people. It made me learn to overcome this shyness as well as I could.

When I came back from the end of the Second World War aged 18 - I had been a soldier since the age of 17 - I resumed my studies. I went to Leipzig and I remember the first time I went into the Thomaskirche and heard BACHs Christmas Oratorio. It left such a deep impression, of how this music could heal the wounds of the world, how people were full of hope listening to it.

In 1948 I first met Klaus Tennstedt. He was in charge of the Halle theatre when I starred as a young coach. It was the start of a friendship that never diminished to the end of his life. My first experience as a young music director of an opera house was at Schwerin, and then at the Komische Oper in Berlin, run by the great director Walter Felsenstein. Here I heard Vaclav Neumann conduct Felsenstein's staging of JANÁCEK's The Cunning Little Vixen, which was one of the most exciting opera performances I ever saw - very touching.

Then I started working with Felsenstein myself; it was one of the most influential associations I ever had with anyone. It was not only that he knew exactly what to do, but that he insisted in going so deep into the work that you were forced to approach with far more knowledge of the piece than you could do anywhere else. The constant refreshment of those performances was stunning. From that time on, I tried to bring into the concert area the same ideal: to make performances believable, not just to play for beauty.

I was with the Gewandhaus Orchestra for 26 years. It was one of the deepest experiences I've ever had with an orchestra. We did more than 2,000 concerts together, recordings and nearly 1,000 concerts alone on tour. We had a very deep connection during this wonderful time.

John Drummond invited me to the Proms to step in for Klaus Tennstedt, who was ill. I took over a concert of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. I was already due to conduct it there a year later, so John offered me BRITTEN'S War Requiem instead. It's one of the deepest pieces of the last century and for me has the same musical message as the St Matthew Passion or Beethoven's Missa solemnis.

I started my first 'prom'-style concerts at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York with the War Requiem. There was a feeling from a lot of people at the Philharmonic that choosing it for War Memorial Day would mean an empty church. But I was convinced there would be enough serious people in New York on that day who had lost someone and I was sure they would come. I was right: 8,000 came and many had to be turned away. This was one of the greatest experiences of my life. I discovered that there are more people than you think who need music if you give them the opportunity to listen.

CHOICE OF MUSIC

BACH
DIE KUNST DER FUGE
Wolfgang Rübsam (organ)
Naxos 8.550703, 8.550704


BEETHOVEN
SYMPHONY NO. 9 (CHORAL)
Soloists; choirs, Leipzig Gewandhaus
Orchestra/Kurt Masur
Philips 454 038-2 (2 discs)

BACH
CHRISTMAS ORATORIO (EXCERPTS)
Soloists; St Thomas Choir Leipzig,
Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra/Kurt Thomas
Berlin Classics 0021462 BC

JANÁCEK
THE CUNNING LITTLE VIXEN
Soloists; Kühn Children's Chorus,
Czech PO & Chorus/Václav Neumann
Suprophon 10 3471-2 (2 discs)

BRITTEN
WAR REQUIEM
Soloists; choirs, New York PO/Kurt Masur, Samuel Wong
Teldec 0630-17115-2 (2 discs)