Alban's Blog

Category: Anecdotes

Dvorak in Boston

What a privilege to be able to play one of the great concertos of all times in one of the most gorgeous halls in the world, Boston Symphony Hall! I played here already three years ago, but I was far too nervous to actually enjoy and live the moment – tonight I was much more at ease, and it felt really special. Actually, today we even had two concerts; the dress rehearsal was an open one, and when I got to the hall at 9 am to practice I saw already many people streaming towards the hall. I got scared, thought, that maybe the rehearsal didn’t start at 10:30 but at 9:30. But no, it was just the free seating which made people come really easy so that could grab the best seat in the house. At 10:30 the house was packed and we didn’t “rehearse” but played a full-powered performance for this lovely audience.

Presidents and Brahms in Ludwigsburg

The other day I was asked by a journalist in a live radio interview about my open and direct writing in my blog. Wasn’t I aware that complete strangers would be able to read my deeper thoughts and feelings, and how did that feel? I must admit this question shut me up for more than a month now – maybe it felt a bit like criticism for saying too much, showing too much of myself. My beloved wife herself doesn’t agree with me being so indiscreet about myself. Well, let’s face it: another cheap excuse for not having written in a long time! 🙂 Even though I did experience many quite wonderful things since my last entry, so maybe there is a bit of truth in me having become a bit insecure about sharing everything. My problem is that I don’t have this “privace filter” in my brain. I don’t feel the need of privace, I don’t really know what it is. I am slowly learning, because it seems women need a lot of that. But for myself I found out that either I write openly, no taboos or secrets, or I don’t write at all. Took me a month to figure that one out, and now I am back on (the writing) track.

Missing Flights…

That hasn’t happened to me in several years: I missed my flight. In my calendar which I am always synchronizing between the cellphone and my laptop it said that I had to catch a flight at 5:52 pm leaving Newark to Spokane via Seattle. Minutes before I had to leave the apartment at 4 pm, I checked my e-mail and found a reminder from Orbitz that my flight was leaving at 5 pm on-time from JFK. I raced with the car which was waiting in front of the building to JFK just to get completely stuck in traffic and arrive 10 minutes after the departure of the flight.

Open Your Eyes…

Even though I should be in bed since about one hour, I suddenly felt the urge of starting this silly computer of mine (which I have avoided in the past 10 days!) to take care of some serious business like answering e-mails, paying bills, checking reviews and reading the new blog entries – thanks for them, by the way! Before turning this addiction underneath my fingertips off I decided to write a quick conclusion after these rather exhausting past two weeks with 8 concerts in four cities and two continents, playing a solorecital, Shostakovich 2nd concerto as well as Rococo, Dvorakconcerto and Dvoraks Silent woods while practising as much as possible new stuff.

Last Second Kind of Guy in Seoul

I am a last second kind of guy. Do you know people like that? Always late, not out of arrogance, but because there is always so much to do in the last seconds before one has to leave. And when do I plan to leave? Always so that I don’t have to wait – be it for meetings, concerts, trains, airplanes; check-in two hours before? Not with me! Security lines? I don’t care – I don’t want to arrive at the airport earlier than 1h10 min, with a maximum of 5 minutes extra time for disaster (flat tire, accident, traffic jam, missed train etc.).

Short trip to London

This little trip couldn’t have been more efficient: my pianist Markus Becker and me flew into London last night, arrived at 7:50 pm after a day of rehearsals in his hometown Hanover, and left today at 8:15 pm after our lunchtime concert at LSO St.Lukes.

We are our own worst judges

How was your concert? – I never know how to answer this question. I don’t know, honestly, how good (or bad) a concert was I played in myself. Why is that? Because we are our own worst judges.

Airhead

While practicing I received a text message from my friend Annette, the singer, if she could invite herself for a ride on my new motorbike – since I looked for a good excuse not to practice too much, I told her to come over.

Willkommen zu Alban’s Blog

Since a while I started thinking of starting my own blog in order to get some more feedback from fellow musicians or general audiences about the way I see, feel and understand music making, the music “scene” or business as well as general things in culture. I have no idea if there is a real interest for this, but I thought I’d check it out and see what happens…