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Who or what inspired you to take up the organ and pursue a career in music?

When I was ten years old, my best friend at school asked whether I wanted to come and join the local church choir. I said that I wasn’t interested until he said that I would be paid for my services! When I went along to my first choir practice he showed me the organ and from that moment on I was determined to learn. It was a real Eureka moment.

You’re also the CEO of Dubai Airports, how does your musical background influence your work life?

I believe that the ability to think through complex problems and break them down into small pieces, then reassemble them is the same process as learning a challenging piece of repertoire; having the patience to learn an instrument that demands the coordination of so many different events has so many applications in business. Running the world’s largest international airport is certainly demanding, so the application and discipline that I have learnt from music is very helpful.

Who or what have been the most important influences on your musical life and career?

When I was eighteen I was introduced to Malcolm Hicks, who has had a long and distinguished career as an organist and conductor. He took me under his wing and enabled me to appreciate a whole different level of musicianship. I had some notable successes in competitions and diplomas with him and have accompanied many choral performances under Malcolm’s baton.

What have been the greatest challenges of your career so far?

Undoubtedly taking eighteen months to learn and perform the three-movement Suite, Opus 5, by Maurice Duruflé. It is a tour de force of the organ repertoire and many professional organists shy away from it. Inspired by Alan Rusbridger’s book ‘Play it Again’ which a pianist friend gave me, the book describes how it was possible to learn Chopin’s fearsome Ballade No 1 in G minor whilst being the editor of a major international newspaper. I decided I could learn the Duruflé Suite whilst running the world’s largest international airport. The most heart-warming part of the whole experience was the willingness of many professional musicians to give their time to help me prepare for my first performance.

Which performance/recordings are you most proud of?

In 2004 I was the soloist in Poulenc’s Concerto for Organ and Strings at Birmingham Symphony Hall, under the baton of Lionel Friend. It’s a great piece and when I was in my teens I listened tirelessly to the recording made by Maurice Duruflé in 1961 in the presence of Poulenc himself, so being able to perform the work was a great thrill.

Which particular works do you think you play best?

As a student I used to tackle the standard repertoire of Bach and Buxtehude but then ventured into the world of Paul Hindemith, particularly enjoying his three Sonatas for organ. However, romantic music has always enabled me to really express my deepest emotions and latterly I became hooked on the French romantic output from the 19th and 20th centuries, such as Louis Vierne and Cesar Franck.

How do you make your repertoire choices from season to season?

I always set myself the goal of learning new repertoire to expand the possibilities and contrast of performance. I enjoy creating connections and setting strong context in my programming as the organ can be rather dull to those who don’t encounter its repertoire outside of a sacred context.

Do you have a favourite concert venue to perform in and why?

The organ loft at Westminster Abbey is a very special place. Late at night when you are alone in the building you are very aware of more than 1,000 years of history all around you and the magnificence of the architecture and grand acoustic add so much to the performance of any major work.

What is your most memorable concert experience?

I used to play for the Waverley Singers, an accomplished choral society based in Farnham, Surrey, which was conducted by Malcolm Hicks. We undertook several concert tours and accompanying the choir in the splendour of the Cathedral of St Bavo in Haarlem in Holland was a very memorable experience. Malcolm recently found a photograph of me at the organ during our tour in 1999 which he gave me.

As a musician, what is your definition of success?

I lead a very diverse life so I am not sure that I can give the answer purely from a musician’s perspective. However, the ability to express one’s inner soul and communicate on a completely different level through the power of music is unparalleled in any other form of human communication and having the ability and determination to achieve this is immensely rewarding.

What do you consider to be the most important ideas and concepts to impart to aspiring musicians?

The subtlety of artistic impression goes so deep that there can never be an end to the attention to interpretative detail; grasping this at a young age and applying it through hours of preparation can really set an artist on a whole different level of musical awareness and appreciation.

Where would you like to be in 10 years’ time?

At home in East Sussex, at the console of the three-manual Aubertin organ which was installed in 2015.

What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Having spent my whole life wondering whether I should have become a full-time musician, becoming a full-time musician when I decide to relinquish my role running Dubai Airports

What is your most treasured possession?

My battered black briefcase which has been around the world with me countless times

What do you enjoy doing most?

Trying to befriend one of my three cats, called Kitty. She loves attention but then snaps into a tiger. Knowing exactly when to quit can become a near-death experience

What is your present state of mind?

I currently have the complexity of Durufle’s Toccata coursing through my head whilst sleeping and awake. It’s amazing how the human brain can absorb an idea, develop it and then create a whole new level of understanding without any apparent intervention.

 

Paul Griffiths performs at Westminster Abbey on 13th August at 17.45. Details here

Paul Griffiths began playing the organ at the age of ten and won first prize in the London Musical Competition Festival at the age of 13.  Whilst studying with renowned organist and conductor Malcolm Hicks, he gained the ARCO, ARCM and LRAM within a six-month period and the FRCO two years later.  In 1981, he was placed second in the Trianon Organ Competition.

Having been Organist and Choirmaster at St Mary’s Welwyn from 1980, he moved to Hong Kong in 1986, where he became Assistant Organist at St John’s Cathedral and Head of Organ at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts.  He also featured in broadcasts with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra and has also given recitals at the English Cathedrals of Ely, Peterborough, Wells, St Paul’s and at Westminster Abbey.  Paul also features regularly as an organist and continuo player in concerts and recordings in the UK and overseas and in May 2002, made a guest appearance at Birmingham Symphony Hall with Dame Gillian Weir.  He has also given recitals at St Mary Redcliffe, Bristol, St John’s Smith Square and London’s Temple Church.  In 2003, Paul was appointed organist to the voluntary choir at Guildford Cathedral, where he studied the organ with Stephen Farr. In October 2004, Paul returned to Birmingham Symphony Hall to appear as the soloist in Poulenc’s Organ Concerto with the Birmingham Conservatoire Orchestra, conducted by Lionel Friend.
 
Outside of musical life, following 14 years as an Executive Director of Virgin Atlantic and the Virgin Rail Group, in January 2005 he was appointed Managing Director of London Gatwick Airport and, in 2007, moved to Dubai to become the first Chief Executive Officer of Dubai Airports, the owner and operator of the world’s largest international airport.  He is regularly requested for interviews on the BBC to contribute towards aviation-related issues, including the debate on Heathrow’s 3rd runway. 

Paul was appointed as a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in the Queen’s Birthday Honour List in 2015, for services to British prosperity overseas and to music.

 

 

 

 

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Best known for his BAFTA-winning comedy show, ‘Alistair McGowan’s Big Impression’, in which he delighted audiences nationwide with pinpoint-accurate impersonations of celebrities such as David Beckham, Gary Lineker and Jonathan Ross, Alistair McGowan is now preparing for his most demanding role of all – that of pianist – as he releases an album of solo piano works for Sony Classical.

This debut album features McGowan performing several short classical pieces, all chosen and learned by the actor/impressionist (who could only ever play two pieces) but who then practised for up to six hours a day over a nine month period in his attempt to finally conquer this beautiful instrument, despite already being in his early fifties. Says McGowan: “By taking on the idea of making an album, I hope to encourage people of any age to play the piano, but perhaps particularly those at an age where it’s easy to think that it’s all too late”.

McGowan had started out playing the piano as a boy, but gave it up after only two years in favour of tennis and football. He went on to train as an actor at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and worked for many years on television, on radio and in the theatre (being nominated for an Olivier Award in 2006), as well as successfully performing around the country for almost thirty years as a stand-up comic.

Having always yearned for the piano, in 2016, McGowan devised the one-man stage show, ‘Erik Satie’s-faction’, based on the French composer’s comedic writings, letters and music, for which he had to learn to play some short piano pieces by Satie and Debussy as an integral part of the show – the first time he had ever played in public. Emboldened by this well-received first public experience, it was not long before he was enthusiastically identifying and learning other short pieces which he felt that he – and others with similarly limited playing experience – could realistically manage.

McGowan notes: “I have become so passionate about the piano over the past three years. It has really taken me over and I have made the time to practise (time I never thought I had) with a few simple lifestyle changes. This album contains a wealth of beautiful music that I think anyone can tackle, given time, passion and determination. Learning to play the piano has been an incredible challenge – often frustrating – but, ultimately, hugely enjoyable and emotional. It’s so satisfying when you realise that you are improving daily. I hope this encourages everyone who harbours a secret ambition take up music -it really is never too late!”

McGowan was mentored by concert pianist and ‘Olympianist’ Anthony Hewitt and also attended the exclusive (and very expensive) piano summer courses at La Balie in south-west France. He practised on friends’ pianos and used ice packs to relieve tension and pain in his hands and legs, the result of his long practise sessions.

His solo piano album features music from composers as diverse as Bach, Chopin, Glass, Grieg, Liszt and Satie, together with vocals by Alistair McGowan’s singer wife, Charlie.

Alistair McGowan: The Piano Album is released on 29 September on the Sony Classical label

 

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At a recent Wigmore Hall concert, given by the wonderful young Russian pianist Pavel Kolesnikov, I eschewed the printed programme and went into the hall empty-handed. It hardly mattered – I knew what was on the programme (and I could peek at my concert companions’ programme if I needed to) and it was rather liberating not to be clutching a large-ish booklet for the entire evening.

The printed programme is a traditional accoutrement of the classical concert format. When I went to concerts with my parents as a child, I found the printed programme a curious, esoteric document, full of complex, often foreign words and concepts. As I recall, I liked looking at the pictures of the soloist or conductor, many of whom had artistically wild hair (conductor Louis Fremaux, for example, who worked with the CBSO in the 1970s), but the programme notes were largely incomprehensible to me. When my musical studies were more advanced, I was better able to decipher programme notes: I understood terms like Ternary Form, Rondo or Coda, but still the notes seemed to inhabit a rarefied world of musicology which only a select few could enter.

Usually I don’t like audiences reading their programmes as one plays

– Steven Isserlis, cellist

I understand where Steven Isserlis is coming from with this comment from a recent tweet. If your head is buried in the programme, you’re obviously not going to give the music and the performer/s your full attention. Without a programme to read during Pavel’s performance, I found myself listening even more attentively than usual (and, by my own admission, I am generally an attentive concert-goer). My ears were alert to every dynamic nuance and expressive shift, and I found myself making interesting aural connections between the different composers in the programme (C P E Bach, Schubert and Schumann). In short, I was fully engaged and absorbed by the music. This is, of course, largely due to the performer’s skill in drawing the audience into his personal soundworld and communicating the composer’s intentions, but programme notes can be distracting, and without them, one tends to listen more carefully.

Programme notes have changed a great deal since my earliest concert going days in the 1970s. The esoteric, musicological or high-falutin language has largely disappeared, replaced with text which is accessible, readable, informative and informed, though some still remain nothing more than a sterile playlist. The best programme notes offer the audience a way in to the music (this is especially useful when hearing new or lesser-known music). Good programme notes will give an overview of the context in which the works being performed were created, some biographical details about the composer, and information about the structure of the music, but will also include text which can stimulate our anticipation of what we are about to hear or highlight the emotional content of the music, which often makes its more relateable to an audience of non-specialists. Sometimes there are anecdotes about how the work was received when it was first performed, or a quote from a contemporary observer or critic, or how the work is related to another piece or pieces in the programme. For song or choral recitals, programme notes usually contain the song texts in the original language and in translation. In general, today’s programme notes are well-written documents which I often return to after the concert has been and gone.

Sometimes performers writer their own programme notes, which adds a more personal take on the music, and the practice of the performer introducing the programme via a short pre-concert talk is becoming more common. I really enjoy such talks, especially when the performer offers more personal insights about the music or explains the music as he or she sees it. Most audiences are very interested in a performer’s reasons for choosing certain repertoire or why it is special to them, both compositionally and in terms of what it is like, physically and emotionally, to play it. Talking to the audience also breaks down that awful “them and us” barrier that can exist at concert venues, thus giving the audience a greater connection to the performer and a sense that a concert is very much a shared experience.

Modern technology has also changed the traditional programme note. Many concert venues now post videos or podcast interviews with performers or commentators ahead of a performance, which “adds value” to the printed programme. And some venues offer audiences the option to download a copy of the programme in advance. This is a very good innovation, in my opinion. One thing that does irk me about concert programmes is the cost of them: some are as much as £5 and contain page after page of advertising (the Proms programmes being a particular case in point – a veritable bumper edition of advertising and just 5 pages of actual programme notes……). Interestingly, when I attended a Sunday morning concert at the Vienna Konzerthaus, the programme contained only 5 adverts, of which 4 were directly related to the venue and its resident orchestra.

The lighting – or lack thereof – at some venues (Queen Elizabeth Hall and the Coliseum, for example) renders reading the programme during a performance almost impossible, which is probably a good thing. Programmes can be read and enjoyed before the performance, or during the interval, or indeed on the train on the way home. For many of us, the programme becomes a cherished souvenir of a memorable event – especially if it is signed by the performer!

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The dance is as old as music itself, and many dances for keyboard or piano have their origin in folk dances such as the Mazurka, Polonaise, Polka, Tarantella and Tango. These folk dances and their characteristic rhythms and metres were taken by composers such as Fryderyk Chopin and elevated into refined salon pieces which are popular with audiences and pianists alike.

Playlist curated by Frances Wilson.

Listen to the playlist