GRIGORY SOKOLOV KULTURA TV DOCUMENTARY - 2002, INTRODUCTION Welcome to St.Petersburg. You are about to meet a musician who has earned the right to be called one of the world's greatest pianists. St.Petersburg and Russia are fortunate indeed to have produced such a musician, and we are very proud of him. Music critics often say that the spirits of Richter, Gould and Horowitz continue to live on, in Grigory Sokolov. INTERVIEW You seem to go further and further back through the centuries with your choice of music. How do you create your repertoire? In a very simple way. I play only the pieces I want to play at any particular time. But that's not all. A pianist should have a strong desire to play certain pieces in any particular season. That's why it's agonising to be asked to predict what I will be playing in two or sometimes three years from now. Sometimes I'm not only asked which composers will be in the programme but precisely which pieces. With me it's quite impossible to do this kind of thing. It can create difficulties for impresarios, but I don’t play to anyone's orders. Returning to the 1960s, a great event happened in your life, and in our lives too, when you won the Tchaikovsky Competition, which everybody was talking about at the time. What was it like for you? Winning the competition started my concert career. At the age of 16? Yes. Were you expecting to win first prize, or did you expect nothing? Obviously I wasn't expecting to win; I could not possibly have expected to win. I had only just started to take part in competitions, and even at 16, Lalready disliked them. I don't like to be reminded of this period. 1 just don't like competitions, and I don't believe they are a truly musical undertaking. But in those days they were the only way to get onto a concert platform. I's well known that the deciding vote which made you the winner was that of Emil Gilels.Gilels is a great musician, a truly great pianist with a huge personality. I think that anyone who remembers Gilels does not necessarily do so in the context of any particular event. Among musicians he is number one. It should always be like this: you have to be a good musician and also a decent human being. Gilels exemplifies these two things. How hard was it to carry on your shoulders the burden of fame? It could not have been easy for a 16 year old. It's important for a musician to have a private, inner world in which to exist, where the only thing that matters is Art. When you have this, you are able to remain almost unconnected with the outside world. But surely our inner selves can only develop with influences from the outside world? Music, literature, art, meetings, events, even simple everyday existence. All of this makes us what we are. That's why I say that these two worlds are not completely separate. There is not much evolution in Art. Changes take place. For example, we must talk about the greatest people, because Art is created by them, and in much creative work there occurs perfection so there can be no natural progression from something that is already perfect. These great people often die young, and are wise even from childhood. You began to study music at a very early age. Your talent appeared when you were very young. Who recognised this talent? Your parents? Or someone else? My parents were not musicians. They were not? That's not quite true. My father played the violin a little. But in our home music existed of course. There was a reverence for it. So that was very important. When I was three my parents noticed that when I was outside, away from home, if I heard some music playing I would stand completely still and listen, and they could not persuade me to move from the spot until I'd heard enough. In our home we had many LP records. I remember this time very clearly, and I remember a small stool like a conductor's podium. I would stand on it and conduct all the music we had, including operas and ballet music. When I was four my parents invited a teacher round and asked “What shall we do with this boy?” She said "For the moment, nothing; but in another year you should buy or rent a piano, whatever you can afford, and arrange for him to have lessons.” When I was five the piano appeared in our home. My first dream had been to become a conductor, but when the piano came I started to practise and forgot about mydream. From that time, playing the piano was the only thing I ever wanted to do. There are so many musicians who start by studying piano or violin and then turn to conducting. With me it happened the opposite way round, and I experienced it all when I was four. It is understood from other children who played in your neighbourhood that you were not interested in anything except music; you were very serious, you spent all your time with adults and refused to play with other children. Is it true you wouldn't play with them? I don't really know. It's difficult for me to remember. But all those children certainly remember you! (GS smiles.) You studied at the School for Gifted Children which was part of St.Petersburg Conservatory, under Leah Zelikhman and later with Khalfin. You did your postgraduate diploma with the same professor, and you are considered to belong to - you know how musicologists say ~ the ‘Leningrad School’ of pianists. Don't you feel constricted, being associated with just one particular school? If we talk about music in particular, my view is that ‘school’ is a completely unacceptable category. But there is another conception of ‘school’. For example, the school of Rembrandt. This is a different kind of phenomenon. Back in history, if someone found a painting and didn't know who the artist was, they might attribute it to a certain school. A really good craftsman or artisan of high technical ability who was not sufficiently interesting to make his own name in art could only be ranked among those belonging to a certain school. In this kind of circumstance the term ‘school’ has its own meaning, but it's very far from what we call Art. ‘The most important thing is that teaching leads to the student becoming not an accumulator of other's ideas but a generator of new ones. I think there is no such thing as the Leningrad or Moscow School, but there are distinguished musicians with great personalities who come from both. The process of teaching is very individual. All these master classes which are so in fashion now and popular all over the world are in my opinion a form of self-advertising and more like a paid holiday. I don't think they can impart anything of value to students. You cannot teach in one particular way to a whole group of students. You should know each student individually to be able to teach them anything. Have you given up the idea of teaching completely, or is it just master classes you are against? No, I haven't given up altogether. I used to always have four students,then I had only three, then two, then just one, and now I have finished with them all and I'm on a kind of creative holiday. Why did you give it up this time? Because teaching and performing are so difficult to combine. Do you mean the touring activity and the teaching process? There is a well-known incident which is spoken of - about Neuhaus - who was going mad because a female student repeatedly played a particular wrong note. Some time later in concert he performed the same piece and played the same wrong note. It was in his sub- conscious It had been like receiving poison in small doses at each lesson. In a sense, the teacher/performer lives through his student's programme as well as his own, and he expends almost the same amount of energy and emotion on his student's pieces as he does on his own programme. For example, I remember sitting in an airport waiting for a flight to a venue where I was to play a new programme for the first time in public. As I sat there I suddenly realised that instead of thinking about my own programme I was going through that of my student, including a clumsy mistake where he failed to read da capo and moved straight on to the next part of the piece without repeating the first part. That experience was for me truly terrifying, 1 believe that everyone should do whatever they do to the very limit of their ability. If they do this, their ability will be stretched, becoming greater. But this can be very hard to do. I understand you prefer not to play with orchestras. We usually hear you playing only recitals in Russia. Yes, it's true that I prefer to give recitals. Why don't you like to play with orchestras? Or is it an exaggeration to say so? No, no, it's very close to the truth. I like it when everything depends on me alone, when everything is in my own hands. Even the smallest outside interference can affect the result. In terms of playing with an orchestra, there are usually something like a hundred musicians and a conductor. I can divide conductors into three categories: those who are a real pleasure to work with (this is a very small category); the second category are those who interfere very little, and the third category are those who are always in the way, interfering deliberately.I've heard that you have expressed the view that there are some conductors who don't actually like music. It's a very rare thing, but there are a few conductors who do not truly love music. The conductor should actually be a good accompanist to the soloist. When I meet a conductor I expect him to accept my interpretation of the piece from the very beginning even if he doesn't agree with it. He has two choices: either to follow my interpretation or to work with me to reach an agreement. But there are some very good conductors who try to learn every rubato, to become ‘glued’ to the soloist. You give the impression when you are playing that you are in such a world of your own that you are unaware of the audience being there. You seem to forget about everything else. Sometimes it does happen that there are negative influences coming from the audience, but they do not reach me or affect the performance. All those noises that come from an audience and cause problems for recording technicians don't bother me. On the other hand, you cannot go too deeply into the music itself. It's essential to convey the emotion of the piece, but not necessary to actually feel it, otherwise you would be weeping at the piano and unable to get through to the end of the performance. There are stories of famous actors playing great dramatic roles, who became so convincingly tragic or frightening that they caused other actors to forget their lines. When you first start working on a piece, how do you go about understanding the meaning of the music? If I have a strong desire to play a piece, then I already understand it. The next stage of the process is long and hard, and lasts right up until the first performance. The longer I spend on this stage, the better. It's the most difficult part of the process because I never have the opportunity to work on just one piece at a time. After experiencing the first performance I then understand the piece perfectly and know what changes need to be made. Only then can I begin to create real music. After the first performance another process begins, and I want to play that piece as frequently as possible for as long a period as possible. In your life, the piano must be almost like your child, like a human being with a soul. Yes. For the tuner, and possibly for the audience, the grand piano might be like a child, but for me it's a companion; it's my partner, and we make music together. The piano has its own life, its own character, and we have to learn to speak the same language.Is it true that the piano does not begin to convey its true sound until three to five years after it is built? It is said that there are prodigies even among grand pianos. It's difficult, to generalise, but I agree that after four or five years the piano starts sounding properly. But for those four or five years the piano must be used, and kept in proper conditions. Then after five years it will be possible to say whether it is a good piano or not. By proper conditions do you mean temperature and humidity? Lusually say that grand pianos are very similar to the human body. They can become ill, they age, and eventually they die, unlike the violin which can live for ever and improves with age. Some pianos die when they are twenty, some at forty or sixty. The age a piano lives until depends on its ‘genetics’. The difference between the piano and the violin is in the construction. The piano has soft materials inside, attached to the hammers. You can turn on the air conditioning in a hall for an hour and the piano will sound quite different. The humidity of the atmosphere is very important. In terms of attitude towards the piano, open air performaces are unprofessional. Pianos are like children, and it is very important to look after them. In their early years you cannot understand why they develop a cough or a temperature. There are some very healthy instruments which are robust, strong and athletic, but I don't like the nature of those pianos. They give you nothing. Which piano do you have at home? A small Weinbach. But I understood you liked only Steinways. Yes, on stage I prefer to play Steinways. Big concert Steinways. For concerts the piano should be -?- metres and -?- centimetres. There is no equal to a concert Steinway. The piano behind you is quite old. What do you think about it? It's not an ordinary Steinway. It's a museum item because it has a painting inside the lid. Imagine how many great musicians have rehearsed on this piano, how long it has been here and how many stories it could tell. What about friends?I don't consider it important to have many friends. Friendships through correspondence are more interesting than everyday relationships. The profession of a pianist is a very strange one. We are trying to understand things which theoretically cannot be understood, and really we are not given the gift of understanding these kinds of things. All these dead composers are still alive to us. You remind me of the famous quotation of George Bernard Shaw, whose answer to the question I just asked you was that he felt more comfortable in the company of dead people than those who were alive. It's true. I feel the same way. As we get older, every person has more friends who have already passed away than those who remain alive. When I talk about dead people I never use the past tense. I never say that Gilels “used to play” I say “he plays”. I never mention Schnabel or Rachmaninov in the past tense but always in the present, because I feel they are still very much alive. It's so good to have an intensive communication with all these people. How do you relax, if there is such a thing for you? I can never rest, because when I have some spare time this is when I work harder than at any other time. I am always working on a new programme. Are the days when you give concerts very different from the days when you don't? On the day of a performance there should be no distractions. Most important of all, there should be no ‘events' on the day of a concert. That is why I don't like having to travel anywhere on the day of a concert. The reason for this is that I like to have time to see the hall, to find out what the piano is like, to decide what I will say to the tuner. What do you feel after the concert? There is no such thing as “after the concert” for me because I give so many performances. --00000-- ‘A descendant of Paderewski remarks that listening to Sokolov reminded him of Richter. Sokolov reminded him of the great pianists of the past. He says how happy he is that his visit to St.Petersburg has coincided with Sokolov's recital.