http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/classicalmusic/8221582/Alfred-Brendel-old-master-in-search-of-new-horizons.html
Alfred Brendel: old master in search of new horizons
Approaching 80, Alfred Brendel shows no sign of hanging up his hat.
Alfred Brendel: impressed by English musical life
For a man who officially retired from performing two years ago and is approaching his 80th birthday, Alfred Brendel has a remarkably packed schedule. When I meet him he has just returned from giving a lecture series in Munich, and the next day is due to talk on “Character in Music in Beethoven’s 32 Piano Sonatas” at the Wigmore Hall. He’s also about to bring out a collected edition of his poems (in German and English) and next month will be giving master classes in Paris.
With all this hectic activity, Brendel has hardly had time to miss the concert platform, and certainly gives no sign of it. “Well, it seemed the right time. Ideally I would like to have just quietly stopped without telling anyone, so I could avoid all those farewell parties, with the tears I did not shed!”
He laughs, clearly relishing the memory of disobeying a social convention. “The Pianist Who Was Stony-faced as the Audience Wept” could be the title of one of his subversively humorous poems, which often reflect the idea of something uncouth and outrageous bursting through a civilised veneer. This is something Brendel enjoys hugely, and here and there evidence of it peeps out. Perched in mock triumph on piles of learned books on the mantelpiece are little grotesque figures, including a grinning alligator in a dress and bonnet (“Yes, that came from New Orleans,” he says, peering at it fondly).
This is the safety valve for the iron control and meticulous forethought that has always marked his life — including his retirement. “I mapped out exactly what I would do when I retired. For a long time I had a literary life – not a hobby, a second life,” he says, eyeing me to be sure I’ve grasped the distinction, “and it was nice to pursue lecturing and writing in a more focused way.”
That sense of a person absolutely in control was there from the beginning. Brendel had an unusual, peripatetic life as a child. His businessman father was constantly on the move, and the family travelled round various middle-sized middle-European cities. Being remote from any musical centre, and growing up in an unmusical family (one gets the sense the parents were in awe of their gifted, self-assured boy), Brendel was driven in on himself. “I was never over-ambitious,” he says, picking nervily at the protective Elastoplasts he’s wearing on a finger and thumb (he illustrates his lectures at the piano, so he hasn’t quite stopped performing). “I had an idea when I was 20 that I wanted to reach a certain standard by the time I was 50. The pianists I really admired like Kempff and Fischer were mostly in their fifties and sixties. When I reached that age, I thought, well I’ve done most of the things I wanted to do but there is still room to do more.”
He makes the story sound as inevitable and unhurried as a fruit ripening. But did he not get frustrated at the slow progress? “No, I was very glad that my career grew slowly and not because of publicity or hype. Also it meant I had time to acquire a big repertoire. When I was 25 I had 10 completely different recital programmes. Young pianist nowadays who get famous overnight do not have that.”
Moving at a slow pace meant that Brendel could devote time to unfashionable things. He championed Liszt’s grandiose romantic piano music decades before it became fashionable. “I was one of the first to play the complete Years of Pilgrimmage cycle,” he says, “and also those extraordinary, very late pieces where Liszt really foreshadows modern music. When you put these pieces next to Schoenberg’s Opus 19 set of piano pieces you realise they belong to the same world.”
Mentioning Liszt brings us on to other composers who’ve risen in public estimation during Brendel’s 60-odd years in music. “There’s the general acceptance of Mahler as a great composer,” he says, “which interestingly runs in parallel with the recognition of Schubert sonatas. Even more recent is the international triumph of Bruckner, which has surprised me. I always imagined he would fade away when the great Bruckner conductors I saw in Vienna died. The biggest change and for me one of the most beautiful is the recognition of Handel’s operas, which came from this country and spread round the world. You know how the Germans insisted Bach was the great baroque composer, but now they put Handel and Bach side by side. I approve of this, I understand exactly why Beethoven admired Handel so much.”
This, and the recent upsurge in brilliant young violins and singers (“wonderful, there’s never been anything quite like it”) arouse Brendel’s enthusiasm. I point out he’s starting to sound almost optimistic, which is surprising from someone who described himself as a pessimist. “A pessimist about most things, but an optimist about music,” he corrects me. It doesn’t take long for a pessimistic note to creep in. Like many intellectuals who were formed as the supremacy of “High Culture” was drawing to a close, he’s bewildered by modern cultural life. “I am not quite reconciled to seeing the pop reviews in the newspapers,” he says. But he points out with a glint a pride that his daughter Doris is a rock singer-songwriter.
These days Brendel spends more time in Germany and Austria, and I wonder whether this points to a homing instinct for German-speaking culture. “No, I am still glad I settled here [in 1971]. London became a great musical capital, thanks to William Glock [a radical reforming director of the Proms during the Sixties and Seventies]. Britain became much more international then. Also this is a very musical nation. I was very struck when I first came to England by the quality of the choirs, professional and amateur. They were so superior to anything I had heard in Europe.”
But that doesn’t mean Brendel has gone native. “I’m happy to speak and count and think in English, but I’m not someone who needs or wants to be rooted. I want to be as cosmopolitan as possible. I had the good fortune not to grow up in one place. I prefer to be a paying guest. It’s a lesson I learnt in the war, to be suspicious of nationalism.”
Just as he was in his twenties, Brendel is still keen on self-improvement, still searching for new horizons. “You know, even though I have stopped playing, my musicality is still developing,” he says. “I notice it when I teach that the clarity and speed of my musical vision has actually improved. If I could play Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy today with the physical condition of 30 years ago that would be ideal, as I have a much clearer idea what to do with it now.”
So much self-possession is intimidating. It’s only at the end, as I’m getting ready to leave, that a chink appears in his armour. “You know, when I retired I was sure everyone would forget about me. It’s very nice to be proved wrong!”
Moving at a slow pace meant that Brendel could devote time to unfashionable things. He championed Liszt’s grandiose romantic piano music decades before it became fashionable. “I was one of the first to play the complete Years of Pilgrimmage cycle,” he says, “and also those extraordinary, very late pieces where Liszt really foreshadows modern music. When you put these pieces next to Schoenberg’s Opus 19 set of piano pieces you realise they belong to the same world.”
Mentioning Liszt brings us on to other composers who’ve risen in public estimation during Brendel’s 60-odd years in music. “There’s the general acceptance of Mahler as a great composer,” he says, “which interestingly runs in parallel with the recognition of Schubert sonatas. Even more recent is the international triumph of Bruckner, which has surprised me. I always imagined he would fade away when the great Bruckner conductors I saw in Vienna died. The biggest change and for me one of the most beautiful is the recognition of Handel’s operas, which came from this country and spread round the world. You know how the Germans insisted Bach was the great baroque composer, but now they put Handel and Bach side by side. I approve of this, I understand exactly why Beethoven admired Handel so much.”
This, and the recent upsurge in brilliant young violins and singers (“wonderful, there’s never been anything quite like it”) arouse Brendel’s enthusiasm. I point out he’s starting to sound almost optimistic, which is surprising from someone who described himself as a pessimist. “A pessimist about most things, but an optimist about music,” he corrects me. It doesn’t take long for a pessimistic note to creep in. Like many intellectuals who were formed as the supremacy of “High Culture” was drawing to a close, he’s bewildered by modern cultural life. “I am not quite reconciled to seeing the pop reviews in the newspapers,” he says. But he points out with a glint a pride that his daughter Doris is a rock singer-songwriter.
These days Brendel spends more time in Germany and Austria, and I wonder whether this points to a homing instinct for German-speaking culture. “No, I am still glad I settled here [in 1971]. London became a great musical capital, thanks to William Glock [a radical reforming director of the Proms during the Sixties and Seventies]. Britain became much more international then. Also this is a very musical nation. I was very struck when I first came to England by the quality of the choirs, professional and amateur. They were so superior to anything I had heard in Europe.”
But that doesn’t mean Brendel has gone native. “I’m happy to speak and count and think in English, but I’m not someone who needs or wants to be rooted. I want to be as cosmopolitan as possible. I had the good fortune not to grow up in one place. I prefer to be a paying guest. It’s a lesson I learnt in the war, to be suspicious of nationalism.”
Just as he was in his twenties, Brendel is still keen on self-improvement, still searching for new horizons. “You know, even though I have stopped playing, my musicality is still developing,” he says. “I notice it when I teach that the clarity and speed of my musical vision has actually improved. If I could play Schubert’s Wanderer Fantasy today with the physical condition of 30 years ago that would be ideal, as I have a much clearer idea what to do with it now.”
So much self-possession is intimidating. It’s only at the end, as I’m getting ready to leave, that a chink appears in his armour. “You know, when I retired I was sure everyone would forget about me. It’s very nice to be proved wrong!”
- To mark Alfred Brendel’s 80th birthday, Decca Records releases four CD sets, including a Birthday Tribute, which contains his favourite live recordings of Mozart’s C Major Concerto K503 and Brahms’s First Piano Concerto. Brendel’s Collected Poems are published in a new bilingual edition by Phaidon Press.
