Alban's Blog

Category: Personal

Operation Valkyrie

January 20, 2009

I just got back home after my very first movie premier, and I must admit I was more touched by it than I thought I would. It was the European Premier of the Operation Valkyrie, the Stauffenberg movie which is just coming out, controversial here in Germany because Tom Cruise isn’t much loved because of his scientology membership or however you want to call this. We received our tickets from friends of whom we had acquired our new apartment, an actor’s couple. He, Christian Berkel, is acting in that film, and since we are hoping to doing some projects together (reading-playing) it was a great chance for me to see his work for the very first time.

Messiaen in Lisbon, Birmginham and London – Debut in Poland

December 13, 2008

When I look at all the works I have played so far for cello – be it solo, with piano or with orchestra – I might be tempted to state that the cello repertoire is not that small, but if I just have a tiny little look at the piano rep I must admit that we have nothing in comparison. This year we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the great French composer Olivier Messiaen, and while the pianists are in full combat-mode (2h15 minutes of “Vingt regards” for piano solo, or the 80 min Turangalila-Symphony, which is more or less a piano concerto, just to name a few) we cellists have practically nothing. Nothing? Well, there is the heavenly beautiful “Quatuor Pour La Fin Du Temps” for piano, violin, cello and clarinet, and since my friend and piano-partner Steven Osborne is one of the top Messiaen players (well, not only top for Messiaen) I am lucky enough to have been able to play this 50-min piece a couple of times this year, among others last week in Lisbon, Birminham and London’s Wigmore Hall.

Moving – Unpacking – Playing Concerts in between….

October 17, 2008

Oy wey, I feel guilty, haven’t written in such a long time, and now I am writing without having anything specific to say. This will be probably the shortest blog ever on this page, but somehow I have to justify its existence, and since some people seem to read it, I don’t want to stop without at least trying to keep writing at least once a month. I just finished playing another Elgar performance in the very charming little city of Madison – I think it wasn’t a bad performance, but somehow I didn’t feel the closest of all connections with the audience; there was quite some coughing in the first minutes of the piece, and I guess it’s my upbringing to look for the blame in myself. I didn’t manage to engage them and draw them in with what I had to say with the music which resulted in the fact that they weren’t quite with me.

Facial Expressions during the Dvorak Concerto in Canada

September 14, 2008

Chilling out and preparing for a short night on the plane from Toronto to Munich I take the opportunity of the wireless service here in the Air Canada Lounge to write about my thoughts of my past week. I played the Dvorak with the orchestra of Kitchener/Waterloo (near Toronto) conducted by their very talented young chief conductor Edwin Outwater. I met him before in San Francisco and heard such wonderful things about him from the musicians of the SF Symphony that I decided to come to Canada for only these performances to open his 2nd season – and I didn’t regret that decision: each performance got more flexible and more profound, a real treat for a maybe over-played concerto.

Loosing 3 kilos in 6 days just by recording Prokofiev

September 6, 2008

When I arrived last night at home in Berlin after having been gone for the week, my roommate looked at me and claimed that I had lost weight. This morning after sleeping like a child for almost 9 hours I verified her claim: 3 kilos (6,6 US pounds) in 6 days – and that without sports or dieting, just pure and utter stress. What had happened?

Well, the last week I had spent in  beautiful Bergen, Norway, in order to record for Hyperion two big concertos by Prokofiev, his op.58 “Concerto” and the more famous “Sinfonia Concertante”, both considered among the toughest pieces for cello; technically and physically that might be true. As usually I was very well taken care of by my favorite producer-team of all times, Andrew Keener and Simon Eadon, and the Bergen Philharmonic under their “chief” Andrew Litton was in splendid shape, but he schedule was grueling.

In London at the Proms

August 19, 2008

While my little family is still sleeping in the hotelroom here in London I am taking the opportunity to do a bit of writing before the gap to my last entry is too long and I broke my promise to write at least twice a month. Normally they are never travelling with me, but since the Royal Albert Hall is one of the most amazing places to play at in the world (and one of the most scary as well – soooo big, and without amplification we feel like little dwarfs in front of far too many people) I thought it would be nice for them to see their father/husband sweat. And sweating they’ve got plenty of to see….

Are you afraid to perform?

August 1, 2008

Not really – it is rather a kind of curious nervosity. It is not so much the fear of failure which gives me this tingling in the stomach area but rather the anticipation of a fun-ride like a roller coaster; you know you will arrive, but so much can happen on the way… Maybe it’s the theater blood of all my ancestors, who were singers, actors, conductors and dancers which gives me this strange love for the stage which lets me deal with all the hassle of travelling, the tristesse of being alone, the hard work of always starting at zero again, being exposed to criticism all the time, as if the self-criticism wasn‘t destructive enough.

Of what are you particulary proud?

August 1, 2008

I am happy that after 15 years of playing the cello professionally I am still able to feel the same childlike pleasure making music as I did when was allowed to play chambermusic for New Years 1979 together with my father and some of his colleagues the entire evening. I am glad that I can experience and listen to music with the same naïve amazement as I did as a four-year-old in my first concert visits. I am grateful that I am lucky enough to play with wonderful musicians in beautiful halls and even get paid for it. Proud I am maybe of my discipline to not let myself go in spite of my lazy nature and not to give up whenever there is some resistence as I did constantly as a child, and that until today I am fighting against the temptation to choose the security of a „job“ (teaching or orchestra position) over the freedom of a soloist.

Teaching and playing in Madrid and Washington

March 26, 2008

Time flies, it is unbelievable – I had to get up this morning at 5:30 am in order to catch my flight back to the US at 6:50 (this is only possible in Berlin, since we have this lovely little city airport Tegel) which just has been cancelled, and it was already getting light when I was leaving my apartment at 5:50 am. Yes, it’s spring, and lazy me hasn’t written anything in here since a while. No, I wasn’t that busy, but I took a very welcome little break, skiing with my little family in Switzerland.