Watch more exclusive interviews and concerts of the 2023 Verbier Festival at https://iiil.io/iRJj
Christian Thompson — Host
Interview recorded at medici.tv's Studio 30 (Verbier, Switzerland) in 2023.
© JBP Films
#VerbierFestival #Interview #MariaJoãoPires
Dive into the heart of classical music with medici.tv! Get closer than ever to the artists you love and have an unforgettable experience with 100+ live webcasts each year and 1,800+ videos.
A rare and exclusive selection of concerts, ballets, operas, documentaries, master classes, behind-the-scenes and interviews!
Christian Thompson — Host
Interview recorded at medici.tv's Studio 30 (Verbier, Switzerland) in 2023.
© JBP Films
#VerbierFestival #Interview #MariaJoãoPires
Dive into the heart of classical music with medici.tv! Get closer than ever to the artists you love and have an unforgettable experience with 100+ live webcasts each year and 1,800+ videos.
A rare and exclusive selection of concerts, ballets, operas, documentaries, master classes, behind-the-scenes and interviews!
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AmusantTranscription
00:00 Sometimes the best thing about this job is to meet real heroes.
00:05 Today is the ultimate. Maria João Pires.
00:09 You wrote that music is not a human creation.
00:13 What did you mean by that?
00:15 Do you believe it's a human creation?
00:17 It's also a human creation.
00:22 It goes through the human.
00:24 It's our universe.
00:26 It's the perception of the universe.
00:30 But in terms of your job,
00:34 it's to communicate what somebody else has written.
00:37 Yes, I'm an interpreter.
00:40 Being an interpreter is kind of difficult.
00:45 I think it's something special.
00:49 It's like actors.
00:50 We are exactly in the same position as actors.
00:54 Having to be 100% faithful to the work
00:58 and 100% free at the same time.
01:01 So it's kind of finding a balance where you are present in a way.
01:06 You are not absent,
01:08 but you have all the space open for the composer to be himself.
01:16 This is a difficult challenge for us interpreters.
01:23 But I like it. I always loved it.
01:28 What role does the audience play in that moment of your communication?
01:35 The audience has a very important role.
01:41 I think the audience plays with us. It's making it possible with us.
01:47 I'm not saying that we don't.
01:51 Of course we have to work a lot before the audience.
01:55 But the audience is always present.
01:58 Because the human kind is present.
02:02 Do you feel the audience? Do you like their support?
02:05 Do you like their encouragement?
02:06 Yes.
02:08 Is that the performing side?
02:10 It's the best moment of the performance.
02:13 I'm not a real good performer in the sense that I like to be on stage.
02:20 But the best of it is that we really share with people.
02:27 Something where we don't know anymore who is creating what.
02:32 Who is playing, who is listening.
02:34 It's a shared experience.
02:36 I think the listening is such a hard work.
02:42 At the moment when I feel people are ready to listen
02:49 I feel that the playing is not as difficult as we think.
02:55 It's very difficult to listen well to music.
03:01 It's really something to be ready to make a certain amount of silence that is alive.
03:12 It's communicating.
03:15 It's giving strength and energy to the performer.
03:21 It's a very special interaction.
03:27 Very special.
03:29 It can go very far.
03:34 It can go until it's real love.
03:38 It's like when you walk in the landscape you feel love for the landscape.
03:46 It's something that, because it interacts with you.
03:50 And when you play with people that really listen, you feel that love.
03:58 I think it's very nice.
04:00 It's interesting you talk about that.
04:03 I did an interview yesterday with a famous artist who said
04:07 that they play better up here than anywhere else
04:09 because they're so inspired by the nature and by the landscape.
04:12 It clears so many things even though you don't love the altitude.
04:16 You walked here because you love the scenery.
04:19 I always walk. I walk everywhere.
04:22 Half of my life is walking.
04:27 That's nice.
04:29 You discover so much about the places where you are.
04:34 About people.
04:36 Just before you were talking about silence.
04:39 I don't think anybody knows what silence is anymore.
04:42 Yes that's true.
04:44 But still I think we can discover it.
04:50 We always have an opportunity to discover things.
04:53 Even if the world around you is against the silence.
05:02 But the silence is also the moment where you find yourself.
05:08 Where you can have a perception of reality.
05:16 Without the silence you are always living in a kind of illusion.
05:21 So the silence brings you back to yourself and to the reality.
05:27 Like this interaction between inside and outside.
05:33 It's a very nice exercise.
05:45 To see that outside doesn't exist without the inside.
05:49 Because of the yin and yang?
05:53 Yes, you breathe in and out.
05:56 When you breathe out you touch other people that breathe also into you.
06:03 When we understand that it's very nice.
06:08 Also when you play you can feel that interaction.
06:13 You've talked several times about how music is so important for everyone.
06:21 Of course all musicians say that.
06:23 But you've actually done something about it.
06:25 You encourage people that wouldn't normally meet music to come and listen to music.
06:29 To use its power as a metaphor.
06:33 To use its power for themselves.
06:36 Yes, all situations where you are free to create and to accept other people's creation.
06:45 Also this relationship with freedom in the limit.
06:52 It's our destiny.
06:57 It's to have a limit and in the limit you create the freedom.
07:04 But not outside the limit.
07:07 So that's our life. We have a lifetime.
07:10 And already this time gives us a perception of limits.
07:14 But then instead of being scared about the limits,
07:19 it's creating the freedom inside.
07:22 So the limit is there but it's a good limit.
07:25 It's not a bad one.
07:27 But you feel your responsibility or you take a big responsibility on your shoulders to bring music to the unmusicked.
07:35 It could be called responsibility.
07:39 On the other hand I think it is very natural.
07:43 It's like when you have your children you don't abandon them.
07:48 You educate them.
07:50 With your children I'm sure you try to communicate what you think is right.
07:57 Or what you think at least would be good for them.
08:01 And this is very important.
08:03 You have generations coming up.
08:06 They will teach you a lot. That's for sure.
08:10 You will learn a lot with them.
08:13 But they also have to learn with you.
08:15 So this is the natural thing.
08:20 Talking about responsibility means then how you do it.
08:24 How you prepare yourself to do it.
08:27 It's a challenge. It's a difficult thing.
08:33 Because you can have a bad conscience about certain ways of doing it.
08:39 And sometimes you have the feeling you are interfering.
08:43 Interfering is not always good.
08:46 But it's also not always bad.
08:49 It's this balance you have to create.
08:52 You cannot damage it.
08:56 It's very fine, it's very sensitive work.
09:03 There you can talk about responsibility.
09:08 Maybe I could ask you one more question.
09:11 I know you want to go and play the piano.
09:13 I have to practice a bit.
09:15 You said to me this morning that you don't love everything that goes with the life that you lead.
09:21 Of travelling and everything.
09:23 How do you deal with that?
09:25 At this moment not very well.
09:28 There are moments where I feel more courage.
09:31 Our life is made of phases.
09:42 Moments where you are strong.
09:46 Moments where you are weaker.
09:48 Moments where you get older.
09:50 And you take distance with reality.
09:53 You want some things.
09:55 Habits become something very nasty to you.
10:03 So I think at this moment I'm not coping very well.
10:06 But decisions come sometimes a bit late.
10:13 But I'm happy anyway.
10:16 You know the world would be a much worse place if you stayed at home and you didn't come out.
10:22 I'm part of the public and you said you count on me.
10:26 So I have to say that.
10:28 Thank you very much Christian.
10:32 [BLANK_AUDIO]