{"id":36494,"date":"2016-04-26T18:40:54","date_gmt":"2016-04-26T22:40:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=36494"},"modified":"2016-04-26T19:05:47","modified_gmt":"2016-04-26T23:05:47","slug":"profile-matthias-pintscher","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2016\/04\/26\/profile-matthias-pintscher\/","title":{"rendered":"PROFILE | Orchestral Obsessions: In Conversation With Matthias Pintscher"},"content":{"rendered":"

Matthias Pintscher redefines the ego-driven approach to conducting and composing\u00a0in the 21st-century.<\/h3>\n
\"Matthias
Matthias Pintscher (Photo: Andrea Medici)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

C<\/span>onducting composers are not rare in the classical music world, where we can point to living examples like Esa-Pekka Salonen or historical examples like Gustav Mahler and Richard Wagner, whose intimate connection between the craft of composing and conducting would shape classical music practice in the early twentieth century. Many would argue that conducting, like composition, is an activity that requires a special vocation to carry out: the actions, norms and protocols of both activities can be taught, but it takes something deeply intuitive to excel in it. Where exactly does this intuition come from? Does it arise from strong convictions and commitment, or is it simply the machinations of a powerful ego, of which we see countless examples today and in history books?<\/p>\n

For composer and conductor Matthias Pintscher<\/a>, the answer is still mysterious, although success may lie in a deeply felt synergy between a conductor and his musicians \u2014 and nothing more. \u201cYou don\u2019t come in with answers, it\u2019s really a dialogue with the musicians, with the score,\u201d Pintscher says. \u201cYou rehearse. You set it up, but then you also have to let go. That\u2019s the most important element of being an interpreter. It doesn\u2019t really matter how much you know; the music has to speak \u2014 be unleashed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matthias Pintscher is currently on the cutting edge of the orchestral world \u2014 his recent conducting appointments have brought him to France, Belgium, USA, Switzerland, and now to Toronto to conduct the Toronto Symphony Orchestra for two concerts on April 28\u00a0and 30. Pintscher also has respectful accomplishments in the contemporary music sphere, where he is currently music director of the Ensemble Intercontemporain, the French ensemble founded by the late Pierre Boulez in 1976. But unlike Boulez, Matthias Pintscher is very much a 21st-century musician, having largely dispelled the ego-driven approach to conducting and composition that has notoriously, and maybe unfairly, defined 20th-<\/span>century classical music making.<\/p>\n

Pintscher\u2019s repeated assessment on the conductor-orchestra relationship is one of empathy. The music in a Beethoven symphony stays the same in the score, but the interpretation changes with each orchestra, even when the same conductor leads. \u201cYou say the same things to an orchestra, you maybe even look the same, you make the same movements, and it comes out as something completely different because it\u2019s so determined by the soul and style of the orchestra itself. You know more and more about it, but it does not necessarily mean that it helps you to understand the artwork.\u201d<\/p>\n

This method of embracing mystery and relationships also applies to Pintscher\u2019s approach to composition, which is deeply entwined with his orchestral experience. \u201cIn my very first years, 13, 14, 15-years-old, I was playing two instruments, violin and piano, and playing in my local youth symphony orchestra, leading the second violins, and I was absolutely intrigued by how sound is generated,\u201d Pintscher recalls. \u201cYou have an impact on how the entity of the sound is being shaped. And that made me want to sculpt the sound.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd naturally I had my first conducting lessons, and a couple months later I stood in front of an orchestra [\u2026] and I touched<\/em> the sound, and that was a fascinating experience, and I was even more fascinated by the fact that I could determine and structure the sound, rather than being the guy with the stick who beats the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

This obsession with orchestral sound, with large canvases with which to paint with, is the impetus for Pintscher\u2019s composing. \u201cI consider the orchestra as my instrument,\u201d Pintscher states. \u201cI wrote for the orchestra, which was the opposite of what many of my composer colleagues did, writing a little sonatina for their own instrument with piano accompaniment. I was immersing myself simply in that large canvas of the orchestra.\u201d<\/p>\n

The metaphor of sculpting sound, or painting music on a canvas, reveals Pintscher\u2019s deep connection with the world of visual art. His prominent orchestral piece, Chutes d\u2019\u00e9toiles<\/em>, is based on a massive painting by German visual artist Anselm Kiefer. A series of Pintscher\u2019s string quartets are based on artwork by Cy Twombly, also remembered for using large amounts of space in his works. Connections like these are what sets Pintscher\u2019s music apart from the heritage of 20th-<\/span>century composers like Karlheinz Stockhausen and Elliot Carter, where musical space was something almost to be feared. The result was often an overload of musical information.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think space and perspective are very crucial elements of any composition. Space allows the reader, the listener, the viewer, to include him or herself to what the artist has conceived,\u201d Pintscher says. \u201cI strongly believe that we need to provide that space, and not throw out a one-to-one intention that we are imposing on the listener. We need to find a way how people can find out something about themselves inside a piece of art.\u201d<\/p>\n

These ideas provide us with good insight on Pintscher\u2019s own piece on the TSO programme, towards Osiris<\/em>, which will receive its Canadian premiere on the 28th<\/sup> and 30th<\/sup>. But what about the rest of the concert, which will include Mozart\u2019s twenty-fourth piano concerto with pianist Inon Barnatan, and Gustav Mahler\u2019s First Symphony?<\/p>\n

\u201cMozart relates basically to everything that has been conceived after Mozart,\u201d Pintscher says. \u201cIt\u2019s the source of everything. Of musical invention, of depth\u2026 anything that music requires, or needs, is condensed in the music of Mozart.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mahler\u2019s First Symphony perhaps needs no justification: conductors and musicians love to play it, and audiences love its massive breadth. \u201cI personally love the First Symphony of Gustav Mahler, and it\u2019s one of the works that had a very strong impact on music history, like the first symphonies of other composers. I\u2019m thinking of Shostakovich, or Tchaikovsky, where you feel that the young composer wanted to put so much into these works, it\u2019s like bursting of inventive creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I chose that work because it allows a lot of individual personal creative potential of every single musician involved. I think it\u2019s a good work to get to know an orchestra with.\u201d<\/p>\n

Matthias Pintscher will conduct works by Mozart, Pintscher and Mahler with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra at Roy Thompson Hall on April 28<\/a>\u00a0and 30<\/a>, 8 p.m.<\/p>\n

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Matthias Pintscher redefines the ego-driven approach to conducting and composition that has notoriously, and maybe unfairly, defined 20th-century classical music making.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":36497,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[5723,18,875,29,4968],"tags":[6107,3359],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2016\/04\/Pintscher3_cAndrea-Medici.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9bakr-9uC","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36494"}],"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\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36494"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36506,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36494\/revisions\/36506"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36494"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=36494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}