David Oistrakh Interview with Wolf-Eberhard von Lewinsky (with English subtitles + musical excerpts)
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- Опубликовано: 16 окт 2024
- (Subtitles are a work in progress and will be available soon)
Excerpts of an Interview on the 21. of April 1974 in Wiesbaden (Germany) on the occasion of the artists first public appearance after long illness on his last tour around Germany.
Direct transfer from LP, no noise reduction or de-clicker used.
0:00 Mendelssohn Bartholdy Violin Concerto (I. movement)
2:03 Dialogue
3:28 Pergolesi Concertino B-flat major (Conductor, II. movement)
7:40 Dialogue
10:09 Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto (I. movement)
14:36 Dialogue
15:49 Prokofiev Sonata for Violin and Piano No.1 (II. movement)
18:00 Dialogue
20:02 Sarasate Spanish Dance Op.42
22:21 Dialogue
24:11 Mozart Violin Concerto No.3 (Conductor, III. movement)
26:51 Tchaikovsky Symphony 6 (Conductor, III. movement)
28:36 Dialogue
31:06 Tchaikovsky Symphony 6 (Conductor, IV. movement)
34:48 Dialogue
35:44 Mendelssohn Bartholdy Trio No.2 (III. movement)
37:40 Dialogue
43:55 Sibelius Violin Concerto (III. movement)
46:38 Dialogue
48:37 Khachaturian Violin Concerto (III. movement)
For further information please refer to the picture in the video.
Какая редкая удача - найти ваш канал. Благодарю! Ойстрах ❤
Ein fantastisches Dokument eines großen Künstlers! Ich wusste nicht, dass Oistrach so gut Deutsch sprach. "Ich glaube, ich spiele ganz normal....." einfach wunderbar!!!
Grazie!
Vielen Dank! ❤
Ich habe nicht gewusst, daß Oistrach ein Interview kurz vor seinem Tod gegeben hat...
Ein Musiker von ganzer Seele und eine unglaubliche Bescheidenheit im Umgang mit der Musik! Unvergesslich!!!!
Danke!
Sadly, the subtitle-function ist incredibly fiddly and time-consuming to use, so here is a transcript of the interview, I will make actual subtitles eventually.
(Mendelssohn Violin Concerto)
O: Music heals and thankfully, or sadly, I cannot live without music. And when I went back to music I felt better, day by day, and I was already hopeful that I was again going to perform, play, conduct and so on. And now, with this journey, I have begun just that, not really begun because I already gave two rehearsal-concerts in Moscow, only for university students, but I felt that I can do that and may do that. And not only that but there is also a certain freshness, a joy from making music because sometimes, well, not only sometimes but very frequently, when you work very hard, and I always worked very hard, as a violinist, as a conductor and as a teacher, I have a big class with very talented students, they aren't even students, it is a masterclass, they are real artists, but I have to work very much with them, especially when I am in Moscow, then I really have to devote myself to it.
(Pergolesi)
O: I had no day without music, even in my bad times I was with tapes, with tape-machines and with recordings, I have listened to very much music -
EvL: Did you listen to your own recordings
too?
O: No, no [laughs], not my own.
EvL: But may I ask, at this occasion, your own recordings, you have made so many records so that you have to ask: Is there, if you look back, a period which you, today, don't regard in the same way, would you, if you could, record everything again?
O: It is hard to say, because I listen to my recordings very rarely, I am afraid ofhearing them. When these recordings are not very good, I am not very happy, but when they are very good I think: "Can I still play as good?" It's best to just not listen to them [laughs].
EvL: Could it be, that your interpretations, because you get older and think about many things in a new way, especially as a teacher, that your interpretations change? That you today play perhaps a little more "classical", than ten years ago?
O: This is possible, but this process happens by itself and you don't even realize it. When I compare a record I made this year and one I made 15 years ago, I notice that change, but in this process, when I played and played in concerts, I never felt that: And this was not intentionally, I didn't change things intentionally or something like that, but in every concert there is something new, something unexpected. That's why very often, when I work with my students and I want to teach them the best possible, tell everything and explain everything and show and so on but then when I play at a concert I notice those details, which I never told my students about, because in every concert these details are different.
(Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto)
EvL: Then actually you would have to say, that the record only catches a glimpse.
O: Yes yes, and the audience forgets that. That's why I don't understand it when people write huge books about interpretations and masters and they write "How Casals plays,
for example, Bach or so on" on the basis of records. It is impossible, because these interpretations live only on the day they were played.
EvL: Do you still make records today?
O: Yes, yes.
EvL: And have you certain preferences, do you pick certain works that you want to record again?
O: You know, first of all, I also make recordings as a conductor. I have started an album, three records, with a chamber orchestra; Corelli twelve concerti grossi as a conductor. And recently I made two records with Richter, containing the Bartok-sonata, Brahms-sonata and Prokofiev-sonata.
(Prokofiev)
EvL: Do you prefer live-recordings or studio
recordings?
O: Sometimes live-recordings are much better than studio ones, because it is very hard to be as effusive in the studio and so free and so on. You always think about technical difficulties and you have contact with living people, with an audience. I have to imagine, that I don't play for the microphone but for thousands of people who will listen to the recording later, it is very hard.
EvL: Do you make recordings of entire movements or are they heavily cut in parts?
O: Very seldom. Very seldom. For example I have four or five recordings of the Brahms-concerto, three of the Beethoven and I have never played cadences twice, in these works, always only once - for now. And interestingly there are my recordings with Konvitshny with the Dresden Staatskapelle of the Tchaikovsky-concerto - The second and third movement we played only once. When I was young, back when you recorded in 78rpm, on wax, which was very hard, I played very hard pieces by Sarasate, by Paganini, the caprices, only once, that I was lucky enough for.
(Sarasate)
EvL: What's about further plans for the record, do you have anything in mind that could come next?
O: Its not yet entirely clear, because I want to start with my concerts first, now I have in may harder journeys than this one-
EvL: Where to?
O: - this one I make with one programe - I conduct and play four concerts with the Berliner Philharmoniker in Berlin and then play and conduct at the Wiener Festwochen, which is a very tough programe. And later in July there is the Tchaikovsky-competition which I am the president of, then in the last months of the summer I rest a little. Then in autumn, if I'm going to be healthy and everything will be fine, I will work a lot. And we have some plans, I have plans for the four seasons by Vivaldi, another recording of the Beethoven-concerto with the Wiener Philharmoniker.
EvL: Your chamber-orchestra, is it a new one or is it that of...
O: No, it's a different one, one we already have made some recordings with. You can also get these recordings in Germany. It's the chamber-orchestra of members of the Moscow philharmonic orchestra. Yes, we have recorded Bach and Händel and Mozart, some concerti too.
(Mozart)
(Tchaikovsky)
EvL: How often do you perform in the Soviet Union? Is there a "rhythm" in which you perform certain concerts every year?
O: Before this break I played and conducted around 80-90 concerts in a year and out of these 90 concerts I played around 65 abroad.
EvL: Does, in a socialist country, every "star"
set his price himself?
O: No, there is an entirely different system.
EvL: What does it look like?
O: Its very hard to explain, very hard, because we have different categories, the best of our artists have the highest category, then there's the second and third category and so on, young artists typically earn less.
EvL: Are your earnings from abroad included into that or are they separate?
O: No, no, they are in there too.
EvL: Mister Oistrakh, we spoke about your career as a conductor, do you think that, someday, you will only conduct?
O: Hm, you would have to ask my wife! [laughs] Because she is the one with opinions about wether I should conduct more and play less, but I want to do both, for now.
EvL: Do you think, as a conductor who started as a violinist, that you can tell the orchestra more, than a conductor who started as a pianist?
O: Yes, I think that a conductor who first played string instruments is able to tell more.
EvL: Does the orchestra sound better because the violinist as a conductor is better in the phrasing?
O: People often told me, that an orchestra conducted by me sounds different, but I don't know if that's true [laughs], if it really is meant seriously or if its only a compliment.
(Tchaikovsky)
EvL: Chamber music is something that you are very good in playing, because when you play a Beethoven-sonatas-evening, because you don't play as the big virtuoso, but as a true chamber musician and that what makes your records very special.
O: You know what, I started my career in music as a chamber musician, because I was raised like that. From my childhood on my professors, my teachers
first and foremost raised me as a chamber musician. And I played so much chamber music as a 10, 11, 12 year old, I became a soloist only later, that's why I love chamber music and I have played chamber music all of my life. And that has also helped me conduct.
(Mendelssohn)
EvL: Is the school you grew up in more or less comparable to what you yourself have build? People talk about the big "Oistrakh-school", that today even has grandchildren performing. You see that this school brought us incredible artists, also because what you gave your students is now given along by them, so that there already is an "Oistrakh-tradition" today. Do you think that you also stand in a tradition or stood which you continued and evolved?
O: I can't talk about "my" school, because I belong to a big school, a Russian/Soviet one, and this Soviet school has borrowed its tradition from the old Russian one. From Auer, Grzymali (?) and Laub and many other big masters. And certainly, in the past 20, 30 years, the Soviet school has changed very much.
EvL: But we observe, with envy, that this, I think I may call it that, "Oistrakh-school", not only soviet school, that this school, influenced by you, has brought us a very characteristic style, without your students being mere Oitrakh-epigones, they are individual people, but nevertheless they are influenced by this school.
O:Most certainly I have an influence on my students, but I don't know whether it's a good or a bad one [laughs]. But I am not the only professor in the Soviet Union, who has teached great violinists. We had a great professor, professor Yankelevich, who sadly passed away recently, but he gave us so many good violinists.
EvL: Where do you see the difference between the Soviet-school and the American- or Israeli-school, like Galamian? Where is the difference?
O: I don't know the Israeli-school well, because I have visited Israel only once and the American-school is very close to the Russian one, because Galamian himself studied in Moscow, he studied with a big professor, professor Mostras, my older colleague, and he played in the orchestra of the Bolshoi-Theatre. So he brought this tradition with him to America and he is not the only one, Auer for example left the Soviet Union in 1917 where he had wonderful students, Zimbalist for example.I believe that the American-school is a continuation of the Russian-school.
EvL: But there have been other schools, think about Marteau or Flesch, have these schools stopped continuing, is the Russian one dominating?
O: There is a continuation of the Flesch-school, there is a very famous professor Rostal, an assistant to Flesch, who has had many students very good violinists, or professor Gertler who also teaches here in Germany, a student of Hubay. This Hungarian-school has also had a great influence, just like the Belgian and French one has had, but now I cannot say that the French-school is on a very high level, sadly, because back in the day it has given us wonderful violinists like Thibaud and Marteau and Belgian ones like Ysaye and Vieuxtemps and others and now the schools of these countries are not that high.
EvL: Is it, just to include a detail, a specialty of yours or is it part of the Russian-school to very often play in high ranges, even on lower strings?
O: I never notice that [laughs], I just play
normally.I don't look for these high ranges, you can also play beautifully in the first or second position. No, no, I don't do that intentionally.
EvL: So there is no Oistrakh-technique?
O: Hm, the only thing I have to say is that I have had my personal journey, surely, because I was 16 when I no longer had a professor and I had to find my own way, my way wasn't exactly straight and that's why I have developed a personal style and this personal style has a great influence not only on my students, but on all young violinists in the Soviet Union in the past 40 years.
(Sibelius)
EvL: You said you are a president of a great competition, do you believe these competitions to still be useful? Today you find artists who perform well in the competition but not in concerts.
O: Yes, there are these violinists who prepare, wholeheartedly, this one program for the competition and then they don't have anything else. And these people can win a prize, but these people are not prepared for a career as an artist
EvL: Are there too many competitions?
O: Yes, too many, I believe. And now there are so many young laureates, but it's not enough to be a laureate because every years there are 10, 20 more, its too much and the quality is not that high.
EvL: That means the extrem high quality is
still the exception?
O: Yes, but we now have many more great, young
violinists than back when I started.
EvL: You said that you re-recorded Shostakovich and different pieces, are there also more modern compositions you add to your program?
O: Well, I play Bartok, Prokofiev, back in the day I played everything I liked, because it was new, it was modern, it was unknown, because I played it for the first time but now its not like that anymore, for me to keep this huge repertoire is also not easy.
(Khachaturian)