{"id":32948,"date":"2016-01-07T07:59:48","date_gmt":"2016-01-07T12:59:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=32948"},"modified":"2016-01-07T08:37:30","modified_gmt":"2016-01-07T13:37:30","slug":"feature","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2016\/01\/07\/feature\/","title":{"rendered":"OPEN LETTER | Christina Petrowska Quilico Remembers Pierre Boulez"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Pianist
Pianist Christina Petrowska Quilico with Pierre Boulez, 2002. CBC\u2019s Glenn Gould Studio, Toronto (Photo: Andre Leduc)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The following is an open letter written by Toronto-based pianist Christina Petrowska Quilico, one of Canada\u2019s foremost interpreters of new music, on her memories of Pierre Boulez.<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Christina Petrowska Quilico<\/a><\/p>\n

I received the sad news of Boulez\u2019s passing on Wednesday, and in a momentary time warp, it seemed as if things had returned to the early <\/em>1970s, when I first met Pierre Boulez after a concert at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa.<\/em><\/p>\n

It was the Quebec conductor Fran\u00e7oys Bernier who had introduced me to Boulez. I was working on my doctoral dissertation about his third sonata and had a created a lot of drawings based on his serial rows and concepts for the work.\u00a0 I needed his permission to use my art in conjunction with his scores. Several years earlier, I had written him a letter called \u201cMusical Chairs and the New Revolution,\u201d in which I argued with some of his writings. In it, I had included a program of a recital I had performed in Paris, with the program stapled front side down: it had my photo, and I didn\u2019t want Boulez to think I was a child.\u00a0 Bernier had assured me he probably didn\u2019t receive the letter and certainly wouldn\u2019t remember it.\u00a0 Not only did Boulez remember the letter but he also recalled my name. When I walked over to him in Ottawa, he immediately remarked: \u201cSo you are the girl who wrote me that letter.\u201d\u00a0 I was floored. He was extremely kind to me. I was a young student at the time and both very much in awe and nervous in his presence.<\/em><\/p>\n

We met again in Cleveland when he was the guest conductor of the orchestra, and in California, where he also conducted. He seemed very taken with my art and <\/em>work and encouraged me to go to Vienna to meet the boss of Universal Editions. He had given them his approval in writing to use his scores for my work. He had also invited me to Bayreuth to see him conduct Parsifal. I was studying in Darmstadt at the time and commuting to Paris. What a surprise! \u00a0After the opera as I was walking down the street, a Mercedes convertible stopped for me. It was Boulez, offering me a ride to where I was staying. I told him how much I loved his conducting of the opera and at his invitation, came a second time, but was accorded a special seat \u2013 in the orchestra pit. What a thrill it was to sit on a cushion at the foot of the conductor\u2019s podium for Parsifal. It is one of my most treasured moments.<\/em><\/p>\n

Pierre Boulez also wrote a letter to the CBC, giving me carte blanche to use his scores in my art for an exhibit during a performance I did of his third piano sonata.<\/em><\/p>\n

During his time in New York, critics accused him of being too metronomic.\u00a0 So I sent him a drawing I made with metronomes, one of which said, \u201cBoulez is not one of us.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

The last time I saw him was at the CBC\u2019s Glenn Gould Studio when he received the Glenn Gould Prize in 2002. I was playing his first piano sonata. He coached me at eight that morning. I had worked so hard to perfect every detail, only to have him change many of his original markings in the score. That is certainly a composer\u2019s right. It shows the organic flow of the music.\u00a0 It made things challenging, but after the performance, Boulez clasped both my hands in his and said, \u201cBravo!\u201d\u00a0 I was so moved!<\/em><\/p>\n

MORE THAN A MUSICAL INSPIRATION:<\/h3>\n

Boulez\u2019s writings on his music intrigued me as much as his compositions. He liked the same poets, <\/em>authors, and artists as I \u2013 Mallarm\u00e9, e.e. Cummings, Rimbaud, Kafka, Joyce, Klee and many others.\u00a0 His musical structure in his scores made me <\/em>question and analyze everything from new perspectives. I now began to look at form, structure, shapes, variations and their creation and destruction. His concept of the performer\/interpreter as a traveler who uses the score as a map, guided by chance and intuition as much as any preconceived plan, influenced me immeasurably. I began to think of drawing variations of buildings \u2013 inner views of rooms and their structures; buildings of scaffolding only, their changing shapes eventually emerging as abstractions made of dots and lines \u2013 from ghostly apparitions to full detail, gradually forming themselves into cities. Boulez gave me a new insight into <\/em>structure and the technique to adapt and change by way of different perspectives. His use of serialism taught me discipline and control. Without Boulez, my drawings would never have developed.<\/em><\/p>\n

Boulez was a great inspiration in my life. His early writings awoke the rebel in me. His complex scores made me work hard both intellectually and physically. His literary, poetic and artistic ideas influenced me musically and in my art.\u00a0 There is a lot more to this story, and I will cherish my memories of this great composer\/conductor.<\/em><\/p>\n

***<\/p>\n

Boulez\u2019s comment on the visual art that Christina Petrowska Quilico created to Boulez\u2019s printed score for his third piano sonata:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00ab J\u2019ai vu les po\u00e8mes-graphiques de Christina Petrowska qui s\u2019est inspir\u00e9e de ma partition (3e sonate), et je suis d\u2019accord pour qu\u2019elle l\u2019utilise chaque fois qu\u2019elle voudra montrer ces graphiques tr\u00e8s ing\u00e9nieux.\u00a0\u00bb\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

(English translation)<\/span> \u201cI have seen the graphics of Christina Petrowska-Br\u00e9gent* using very ingeniously my printed score and I agree definitely that she can use my score for showing these graphics, very inventive as they are, for any visual purpose.\u201d<\/p>\n

#LUDWIGVAN<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Want more updates on Toronto-centric classical music news and review\u00a0before anyone else finds out? Get our exclusive newsletter\u00a0<\/em>here<\/a><\/span>\u00a0and follow us on\u00a0<\/em>Facebook<\/a><\/span> for all the latest.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The following is an open letter written by Toronto-based pianist Christina Petrowska Quilico, one of Canada\u2019s foremost interpreters of new music, on her memories of Pierre Boulez.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":32951,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5723,4967,41],"tags":[766,4596],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2016\/01\/Boulex-CPQ.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s9bakr-feature","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32948"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32948"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32948\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32962,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32948\/revisions\/32962"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32951"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32948"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=32948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}