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Who or what inspired you to take up the piano and make it your career? 

One Sunday morning, on satellite television, I heard for the first time W. A. Mozart’s Eine Kleine Nachtmusik; the family legend says I was in rapture for the whole broadcast and this gave my parents the idea to buy a small toy piano for my next – fourth – birthday. Since that day, piano and music have been faithful companions in my journey through life.

Making it my career was, quite simply, a question I really never posed myself. Practicing the piano was much more entertaining and challenging to me than any other school subject. Certainly it felt much more natural than solving mathematical equations or translating verses from Latin.

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

It is amazing how much one can learn from a fellow musician and how the smallest detail, the simplest word or metaphor can have an impact and open a whole new landscape of possibilities and thoughts. I have been very fortunate to study with and learn from tremendously inspirational figures and feel I have inherited from all a composite array of ideas and teachings.

Admiration for artists of the past has played an important role too in my development, on top of being a subject that has often spurred wonderful debates, and I feel that different periods of my life have been marked by an attraction for different giants of the past. When the great Horowitz-Rubinstein debate raged in pianistic circles in the late ‘80s I remember being a faithful follower of the former. Cortot captivated me ever since I heard a Chopin recording in class during my Master’s degree in the USA. Although, if I were forced to make one single name, and I feel you are challenging me for it, Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli is an artist who leaves me speechless and towards whom I am constantly drawn.

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

Mainly the struggle to keep my own development as the primary focus, especially after finishing formal education. I reached emancipation from any doubts after realising the gratification I get in trusting my instinct supported by historical research of a score. Upholding certain principles and my own artistic integrity has guided me through any glitches I may have had at times.

Which performance/recordings are you most proud of?

It is hard to avoid falling for the clichéd answer in this case: the last one. In fact, each album I have recorded is a unique creation; each represents, together with the build up that precedes the red light going on, a set of memories and a particular state of mind in a time and place.

I would like to share a few thoughts on my latest effort, Empire of Sound. The label A Fly on the Wall was set up to allow artists to express their individualities and to capture them at their most creative, taking live footage during recording sessions. A slight, but fundamental, difference with purely studio recordings.

It was by chance I noticed that Debussy’s Second Book of Preludes, Granados’ Second Book of Goyescas and Stravinsky’s Petrouschka (the ballet/orchestral version) were all composed in 1911. All signify a key moment for pianistic writing and music history in general, hence the title – a quote from Debussy in a letter to Stravinsky of the same period. This serendipity was too beautiful to be overlooked.

I could not have asked for a better artistic partnership to put on disc my passion for this programme.

Which particular works do you think you perform best?

I like to think I have a particular affinity for the music and worlds of Schumann and Brahms, although this is just my opinion. Posterity, or the listener, will judge if required.

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

Planning for repertoire often takes unusual and unforeseen twists and turns. One piece may lead to ‘discovering’ another and I especially enjoy finding relations and threads that unite them, to create a combination that, with a little bit of luck, has not been tried before.

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

As an adopted Londoner, Wigmore Hall – inaugurated by the Italian pianist Ferruccio Busoni – is a gem that remains dear to me above all others. I debuted there with the Pavào Quartet on the 40th anniversary of the Moon landing, a date I will forever remember. Aside from the glorious beauty of the stage and the intimate character of the hall, the backstage rooms are inspiring and make one feel part of a centenary musical legacy.

Favourite pieces to perform? Listen to?

Right now it would be Brahms’ Piano Quintet.

Surprisingly perhaps, I seem to escape listening to music as a pastime. Although when the mood strikes, recordings of Bernstein’s version of Tchaikovsky’s 5th Symphony or a Mozart Opera are never far away. I also indulge in some jazz – Jaques Louissier’s Bach arrangements are always in the car – and, probably even more surprisingly, enjoy the dark sounds of Pink Floyd.

Who are your favourite musicians?

Those who know how to listen and have an individual voice.

What is your most memorable concert experience? 

When this question arises my memory invariably goes to a solo recital in Nottingham a few years back. I was being driven to the venue and due to difficult road conditions I was still in the car by the 19:30 starting time. Phone calls were made in order to keep the audience reassured of my arrival, which meant I had to change to my performing clothes in the car, enter the venue through the main entrance (free of charge, I admit) and – summing up all courage – start Chopin’s first Scherzo without trying the instrument nor having had a chance to warm up. It all conjured up for a very pleasant post concert celebration.

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

As with many things in life, it is all about balance. Without a doubt great sacrifices are required through the years, but the priceless payoff is the spiritual relationship created with our instrument. I always insist on the fact that this life-long endeavour gives us a special perspective on the world and a unique means to learn about our own selves.

What are you working on at the moment? 

I have two recording projects in the pipeline for A Fly on the Wall. The complete Clarinet Sonatas by J. Brahms (including the transcription for clarinet of his First Violin Sonata) with Jordi Pons and a Violin and Piano recital with Giovanni Guzzo; accidentally, musicians and friends who have an individual voice.

As far as solo repertoire is concerned, I am building a rather wonderful programme based on Variations by different composers, including an exciting 20th century English work.

What is your idea of perfect happiness? 

A fleeting moment of awe, a momentary loss of control over the senses. If that fails, a fine meal and a challenging conversation accompanied by a glass of Mosel Riesling and Mozart’s Le nozze di Figaro will get me close to a perfect happiness.

What is your present state of mind? 

Rachmaninov is ominously looking towards me and it is suitably late for a short practice session. It’s a good state of mind!

Marco Fatichenti was born in Italy in 1980 to parents of Italian and Spanish heritage. After receiving his Diploma at the Rossini Conservatoire in Pesaro, Italy, he moved to the United States to continue his studies in the class of eminent pianist Joaquin Achucarro at the Southern Methodist University, Dallas. At this institution, by the age of twenty-one, he completed an Artist Certificate program and consequently a Master of Music in Piano Performace. In 2002 Marco was granted a full scholarship to attend the Royal Academy of Music to study with Professor Christopher Elton. Having been a recipient for two consecutive years of the Myra Hess Scholarship, presented by the Musicians Benevolent Fund, and of a prestigious grant by the George Solti Foundation, Marco finished his formal studies receiving the highly coveted DipRAM award.

A keen performer both as recitalist and chamber musician, Marco has performed in some of the most prestigious venues across Europe and the United States, including the Auditorio Nacional de Musica in Madrid, the Teatro Arriaga in Bilbao, the Auditori in Barcelona, the National Concert Hall in Dublin and Birmingham’s Symphony Hall. Recent highlights include an invitation by the Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs to perform at the EXPO in Saragozza, performing on the revolutionary instrument Fazioli ‘Onda’, his debut at Wigmore Hall collaborating with the Pavao String Quartet and a chamber recital in the Palau de la Musica in Valencia.

His performances have been recorded and broadcasted by the Spanish RTVE, Irish RTE, Polskie Radio and several times by the BBC, including a live appearance in the program ‘In tune’ presented by Sean Rafferty. Marco has also released two albums under the Jaques Samuel label, which have received roaring press reviews as well as a great success among the public.

In the past few years Marco has become a very sought after teacher and lecturer, being invited to take a position at Uppingham School and holding annual masterclasses in the prestigious National Young Pianists’ Week.

www.marcofatichenti.net

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Who or what inspired you to take up the piano and make it your career?

When I was 11, by chance, I saw a piano in a front garden in my street. It had a sign on it saying’ Good Home Wanted. I wanted it! We wheeled it home and I was instantly drawn to it. I somehow knew that it contained something life-changing. From then on it was just a matter of learning, studying, and finding a way to make the piano speak. I knew when I first touched the piano that it would become my life.

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

That warrants a multi-layered answer, I’m afraid, as there have been so many! One hugely important aspect has been my personal drive – not a ‘pushy’ drive, but more an absolute necessity to strive to play and communicate. A kind of influence from within…

Studying with Yonty Solomon when I was at the Royal College was life-changing. Up until then I’d never been taught – teachers had never nurtured or enhanced anything musical in me, and I now put this down to ego-driven, lazy, (non) teaching. Yonty was so generous and humble – I often worked every day with him. He opened up a whole new world of sound, expression and creativity. His ability to make me aware of things the piano could do was sheer genius.

Finally, although it sounds a bit downbeat, I have to admit that going through tremendous turmoil and difficulty in life has influenced and strengthened everything I do musically. From anguish comes understanding and creativity…

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

Although I didn’t quite realise it at the time, I think making a ‘comeback’ concert after some 15 years of not even owning or touching a piano was a huge challenge, physically and emotionally. Not to mention musically! And I hadn’t played to an audience of any size for 18 years. So, a packed Cadogan Hall, plus critics, TV cameras and radio, and the English Chamber Orchestra on stage, and then playing two concertos (a Bach and Beethoven No. 5) could’ve been a recipe for disaster. I’m not quite sure how I did it, actually!

Which performances/recordings are you most proud of?

Along with the above performance, I have to say I’m incredibly proud of my recording of Bach’s Goldberg Variations. It was my first CD – released after the ‘comeback’, but recorded just before it – and it was sheer joy to finally connect with the piano after so many years away from it. It felt like ‘coming home’ and embracing something truly wonderful.

Which particular works do you think you perform best?

That’s such a hard question. I adore performing Bach, Beethoven, Mozart and Schumann solo works and concertos. I can only leave it to others to decide which I perform best…

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

It’s not difficult: I re-learn works that are programmed each season, and then I usually decide to add some new works to the mix. But I’m very, VERY traditional – core Classical repertoire only for me: Bach, Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, and then Schumann and Brahms as the Romantics. I spent too many years thrashing away at Liszt, Prokofieff et al. Now I realise that there’s little room in that repertoire to stamp an absolute ideal, my own personality, or even something a bit different. It all pretty much sounds the same no matter who plays it – and so many do play it, and so well. But it still all sounds pretty much the same…

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

I have to make an admission here: I usually love each hall I play in, at the time, Then, on reflection, I usually end up thinking it wasn’t such a great hall to perform in after all! It’s probably more to do with the actual pianos. The perfect piano in the perfect hall is so hard to find. Each needs the other. Alas it’s the life of a pianist to have to adapt to so many differing instruments.

But, there is one hall I do absolutely adore. The Metropolitan Festival Hall (Bunka Kaikan) in Tokyo – playing there was a dream as I really did have a perfect piano in an utterly magnificent hall.

Favourite pieces to perform? Listen to?

Gosh, that’s a hard one. In theory, I love every work I’m playing. But, there’s nothing quite like performing the Goldberg Variations – yes, it’s massive and very draining by force of sheer concentration, but the experience is indescribable and almost other-worldly.

As for listening, I don’t really do as much of it these days as I’d like. So much music is whirring through my brain when I’m away from the piano that to add to it, by listening to something else, gets a little overwhelming.

Who are your favourite musicians?

I’m afraid they’re all dead. I am never unmoved by the commitment of Klemperer’s conducting. The effortless musicianship of Elisabeth Schwarzkopf’s voice. The power and pathos of Birgit Nilsson’s. Glenn Gould for the eccentric mind that drove his playing – and sometimes even for the odd giggle at what he does. Myra Hess’s piano playing, for the artistry. Youra Guller, a practically unheard of pianist now – but she was incredible. And so many more…

What is your most memorable concert experience?

Hearing/seeing ‘Tristan und Isolde’ in Munich a few years back – with the magnificent Waltraud Meier singing Isolde, and Zubin Mehta conducting. Earth-shattering!

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

To work on each piece as though your life depends on it. But always try, with or without a teacher, to find something ‘personal’ to put into the music – something uniquely ‘you’. Nothing distasteful or silly, I’m talking more about making each piece really mean something on an emotional level. Aspiring musicians are so often schooled to play for exams or competitions, or to please this or that teacher, that the music is lost sight of. If there’s going to be any hope for the future of Classical Music, then we have to get back to basics: music is about feeling. Those pieces, even if composed hundreds of years ago, contain emotions just as valid to us today as they were to the composer. These are not ‘elite’ feelings – they’re simple and real and available to everyone. We can all connect on this level. Let’s not lose sight of it!

What are you working on at the moment?

I’m juggling Beethoven and Schumann: Beethoven Concertos 1 and 4. And Schumann’s ‘Kreisleriana’ and the ‘Etudes Symphoniques’. Next week I’ll add a Bach Partita to the mix. I think I need a holiday!

What is your most treasured possession?

A silver chain my late mother gave to me the night before I recorded the Goldberg Variations. She wore it every day for 40 years. I am never without it.

What do you enjoy doing most?

Spending time at home with my partner and my dog.

What is your present state of mind?

Focused. Yet still raring to go. And it’s 3am!

Nick van Bloss’s new CD of Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations is available now

Nick van Bloss was born in London and began piano lessons at the age of 11. His musical training began as a chorister at Westminster Abbey and he entered the Royal College of Music at the age of 15 as a Junior, attending full time from the age of 17, studying with Yonty Solomon and winning prizes for his playing. Further studies were with Benjamin Kaplan. In 1987, on hearing him play, the great Russian virtuoso, Tatiana Nikoleyeva, described van Bloss as the ‘finished article of a pianist’.

Read Nick’s full biography here

 

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The London concert scene is alive with pianists and piano-talk at the moment. Hard on the heels of Daniel Barenboim’s acclaimed survey of Schubert’s completed piano sonatas, performed on a brand new bespoke piano with his name emblazoned across on the fall board, comes Murray Perahia, who like Barenboim is afforded the status of a demi-god, though more for purely musical reasons.

I’ve always admired Perahia. My parents took me to hear him in concert when he was a young man and I was a little girl. His discs of Chopin, Bach and Schubert are my go-to recordings for their musical insight, pianistic prowess and lack of ego. Perahia has worked with some of the finest musicians of the 20th century – Vladimir Horowitz, Pablo Casals, Benjamin Britten, Peter Pears and Clifford Curzon – yet he wears his accolades lightly and one has the sense, when hearing him live or on disc, that he always puts the music first. He is the very model of a modest virtuoso.

Read my full review here

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(Photograph by Marco Borggreve)

 

Who or what inspired you to take up the piano and make it your career?

My family owned a piano but no one was playing it. I was somehow intrigued by it and began to pick out all kinds of cheesy radio tunes and later tried to harmonize them. The piano is a very friendly instrument if you are 5 years old and eager to make a sound, much more so than the violin which makes you practically languish for months until anything more than a scratch is heard. But more than that, I particularly remember how gloriously rewarding it felt to be able to add my own crude chords to those tunes and to literally touch the magic that is melody and accompaniment.                                                                                                                          

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

I was very lucky to have a rich musical education from a very early age and the opportunity to study not only piano but also composition and improvisation since I was about 9 had a big influence, I feel, on the way music seemed to me. I would like to think that it enabled me to look at music also through the eyes of the composer and not only from the angle of the performer.

But I was also emotionally affected a lot by the life stories of the great composers, particularly Mozart (Amadeus had just come out as a movie and I went to see it 3 times! At the part where they sing the finale of The Abduction from the Seraglio I completely forgot I was at the movies and started applauding vigorously – I can still remember all those heads turning back at me…) and Beethoven (a dog-eared copy of a book on the lives of composers included a heart-wrenching account of the miseries of his childhood which left me devastated).

Later on, it was mostly recordings that I listened to endlessly as well as a few unforgettable concerts I was lucky enough to be taken to, that made me feel that music was an inseparable part of who I am.

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

The greatest challenge for any performer is to reach the feeling that he or she was able to bring across exactly what they see and feel in the piece and that the audience has been there with them in it throughout. The second greatest challenge is to persist in this quest without being distracted or discouraged by the more mundane aspects of the music business, which are inescapable in their own way.

Which performance/recordings are you most proud of? 

The performances that make me feel most satisfied are the ones where I felt as if (and I repeat, as if!) I was creating the piece as it goes along. Doesn’t happen too often, unfortunately but that’s the goal. As for recordings, I don’t really listen to my own recordings after they are finished because one’s views of pieces naturally changes with time and, of course, once a recording is done, it’s done…

Which particular works do you think you perform best?

I try to avoid seeing works I play this way, because the ones I feel closest to also tend to be ones you spend a lifetime with and never cease to study. But in recent years, I have gravitated towards Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert to a certain extent.

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

I try to start with a main piece that I feel an uncontrollable urge to learn and then see what could go with it in a way that would either illuminate it in an interesting way or that would provide an intriguing contrast to it. I also try to keep a healthy mix of new and less new pieces, as much as possible.

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

There isn’t a single one, but of course there are some that immediately come to mind, with very special acoustics and atmosphere, such as Wigmore Hall in London, to pick a famous example. But also places like Sala di Notari in Perugia, Italy – which is not a full-time concert hall but is absolutely ravishing.

Favourite pieces to perform? Listen to?

I don’t get to listen to music nearly as much as I would like, but when I do I am always in the mood for one of the Mozart da Ponte operas, for example. But there are many others.

Who are your favourite musicians?

What is your most memorable concert experience?

As a child growing up in Israel, one of the concerts that really left a mark was a recital by Radu Lupu which felt like a transformative experience in real time. Another was the first time I heard the Brahms D Minor Piano Concerto. I actually don’t remember the circumstances at all, but I vividly recall the terrifying bang of the timpani and horns in the very beginning and the overall impression that the opening tutti made on me, as if I was being let into the darker realms of music for the very first time.

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

That what we think we are doing is often perceived very differently to outside listeners and that learning how to listen that way to yourself while you are playing is single most important thing any musician can ever strive to accomplish.

What are you working on at the moment?

More Schubert, as well as Haydn (one of the pieces is subtitled “It takes Eight to sterilize a Sow”…), some Mozart, some Ligeti…

www.shaiwosner.com