CFM Interview 30 March 2008

Interview with Anne-Marie Minhall, broadcast on Classic FM Sunday 30th March, 2008.

AMM: April will see a change of tack for the violinist Maxim Vengerov as he takes to the podium to conduct fellow fiddle player Joshua Bell playing the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto.
It’s not the first time the 33 year old Russian has felt the need to put his hugely successful career as a soloist on hold for a change of direction. In recent times he has taken a sabbatical to learn how to tango and also swapped his violin for a viola.
The concert in Cardiff, where he’ll be conducting, marks the opening of the Menuhin Competition.
Started by the virtuoso Yehudi Menuhin 25 years ago, the contest is open to youngsters worldwide and previous winners have included Britain’s Tasmin Little.
Maxim Vengerov is also one of the judges this year and I asked him how much a musician’s career could be boosted by winning the competition.

MV: I think, first of all, even if you don’t win the competition it’s not a bad thing. For kids of a young age it’s nice for them to be able to take part in this wonderful festival and the legacy that Yehudi Menuhin left for us.
Yehudi Menuhin was himself a young incredible prodigy, genius at the age of 13 and he had a glorious career. He is the symbol for the wonder-child – the wunderkind.
Once you step into the competition they don’t just compete and take it literally as a sporting event: who is better, who is not; that’s not the main point. The main point is that they show us really their soul and talents.

AMM: Can we talk about the opening concert with you conducting fellow violinist Joshua Bell, with the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto – how did that come about?

MV: I always love in music to share the stage, you know? For me the stage is less to show myself, actually more to integrate myself into the musical gathering – and this is like meeting friends.
And that is what it is all about – music. Basically it is Chamber music when we talk music without actually speaking, without words.

AMM: Conducting seems to be playing a more significant role in what you’re doing at the moment. I remember you were saying – last time you were here at Classic FM, Maxim – that conducting helps you deal with the loneliness of being a soloist.

MV: For me, always the soloist – not that I always disliked being a soloist! Really being a soloist gave me a lot of possibilities to travel the world, to play with the best orchestras, with the best conductors, to learn from them: from Rostropovich, from Daniel Barenboim, from Giulini, Mehta. If I hadn’t been a soloist I wouldn’t have had the chance to learn from the great geniuses of the past and of the present.
But now for everything there is time.
I am still a soloist but I am still a young man (Maxim giggles) – only 33 – and I can learn a great deal in music.
I think if the heart tells you that you have to go a step further, you have to follow your heart. And for me the repertoire that Mahler, Bruckner, the Shostakovich symphonies – what they have to offer unfortunately does not apply to violin. Unfortunately we just don’t have a Bruckner Violin Concerto! And I think if I were to conduct these works they would complement me as a musician and reach me, reach my soul, my musicality. And when I would come back to my standard repertoire, I would play quite differently. So conducting basically will benefit my musical insight.

AMM: You always seem to be taking on new projects, never standing still. I mean in the past we’ve seen you play the viola and then, you know, the tango and

MV: Baroque violin, electric violin!

AMM: And conducting! Are you already looking further ahead and thinking “now that looks interesting, that looks like something I might be interested in in a few years” ?

MV: You know a few years ago I was teaching in Saarbrucken University. I had seven students, I had my own class and I also had quite a busy schedule of 80 concerts and recordings and my social work and everything – that was a quite incredibly rich life. But I don’t regret that I have been teaching for quite a long period of time because I have learned again – so much – and the teaching has enriched me.
And I think now, looking a few steps ahead in my life, in my musical career and my dreams and whatever I would love to try and achieve in my life, I’m looking to the education and supporting of the young generation.
Because I have been blessed since a very early childhood; I have been given every possible support from teachers, from my parents and I would like to share this with others.
Children are our future.