15 Questions to Patricia Kopatchinskaja

She has all the qualities of a great one, yet you will have to discover Patricia on your own. Roaming your local record store is no good. Googling her won't help. At first, it might seem as though she has somehow slipped through the net of modernism, but nothing could be less true - One of the most intriguing players at present, she has earned a dedicated audience and tons of respect almost entirely without the help of the media and completely without the support of a big record company. While it remains highly unlikely that her name will ever pop up on any billboards or the cover of a famous news paper, her influence can be felt far across the borders of her circle of friends: Composers are dedicating pieces to her, her live concerts are hitting people right in the heart and her Chamber Music festival has turned a tiny Swiss place (Rüttihubelbad) into a mekka of great music. Maybe it can all be attributed to her consequential stance: From her point of view, an interpretation is a highly personal process, a musical meeting between a composer, a piece and a perfomer - and definitely not an area, where she would tolerate dogmas of any kind. Interestingly enough, the external influences she does appreciate hardly ever come from fellow violinists - she mentions conductor Philippe Herreweghe, singer Cecilia Bartoli and her live-partners in crime (among them some of the finest instrumentalists around) instead. All those unafraid of taking the initiative: This is the artist for you!

Hi! How are you? Where are you?
I am now at home with my husband and daughter Alice-Linda, and thank you we all are fine.

What’s on your schedule right now?
Next three concerts are a recital with Henri Sigfridsson in Belgium, Kurtag’s Kafka-Fragments with Anna-Maria Pammer in Linz and Hartmanns concerto funebre in Strasbourg, France.

If you hadn’t chosen for music, what do you think you would do right now?
I often would prefer to be a farmer, making vegetables and other really useful things.

What or who was your biggest influence as an artist?
My chambermusic partners (Sol Gabetta, Mihaela Ursuleasa), the conductor
Philippe Herreweghe and for music in general Cecilia Bartoli

What’s the hardest part about being a musician and what’s the best?
Best part is flying off on stage, worst the anxiety before the performance
and living in hotels.

What’s your view on the classical music scene at present? Is there a crisis?
I am lucky not to feel a crisis personally. But some old-fashioned concert
forms and some self-repetitive performers may feel a crisis.

Some feel there is no need to record classical music any more, that it’s all
been done before. What do you tell them?
We are really happy have recordings of Ysaye, Busch, Hubermann, Kreisler,
Casals, Arthur Schnabel, Glenn Gould etc. They needed to be recorded and we
need their records. If someone has something of similar quality to say he
should record.

What constitutes a good live performance in your opinion? What’s your
approach to performing on stage?
Well its really the public who has to judge. My mother always said to me,
that I should play as if it was the first and the last time in my life.

What does the word “interpretation” mean to you?
Interpretation is the encounter of a musician with a work of art. Its very
personal, nobody else can tell you how to do it.

True or false: It is the duty of an artist to put his personal emotions into
the music he plays.
True.

True or false: “Music is my first love”
Don’t know

True or false: People need to be educated about classical music, before they
can really appreciate it.
False.

You are given the position of artistic director of a concert hall. What
would be on your program for this season?
The incredibly virtuoso and charming Indian singer Kaushiki Chakrabarty and
her band, Taraf de Haidouks, the Japanese Otomo Yoshihide’s New Jazz
Ensemble, the singing Pigmies.

What’s your favourite classical CD at the moment?
Cecilia Bartoli, any CD.

Have you ever tried playing a different instrument? If yes, how good were
you at it?
Piano, - well, sufficient to play not too difficult pieces.

Discography:
Nikolai Korndorf (Megadisc)
Dmitri Smirnov (Megadisc)
Boris Yoffe 32 Gedichte aus dem Quartettbuch (Bella Music Edition)

Homepage:
Patricia Kopatchinskaja

Picture by Pia Zanetti