Beethoven 250 - Unter der Oberfläche/ Beneath the Surface

Structure and Emotion

Daniel Barenboim

When I first conducted the Ring in Bayreuth in 1988, I received a wonderful gift—a visit from Pierre Boulez. He stayed at my home, and to have the chance, every night after the performance, to discuss these works with him, who knew them like the back of his hand, was a unique experience. At the time, he recalled his first Ring performances in Bayreuth, 12 years prior, and explained that musically he had chosen a completely different path than I had. “As a composer, I was interested in the Ring’s skeleton,” he said, “and it seems to me that you are more interested in its blood and muscles. I was mainly after structure; you want to express the flexible parts. That is why my tempi were faster. But I’m sure that with experience, you will also get to know the skeleton better.” Of course I felt flattered, but most of all, I found what Boulez was saying highly interesting. And I believe that I have undergone a similar process with Beethoven’s piano sonatas.

I began playing these sonatas in concert very early in life, some of them at the age of eight, then the “Hammerklavier” Sonata and the Sonata Op. 111 at 13 or 14. My father, who was my only piano teacher, was often criticized for this, but he was adamant that you should study the great works as early as possible, even if you still lacked the necessary maturity, for—as he would say—maturity will not come if the music remains on the shelf. So I learned early on that Beethoven demands not only the technical ability to play the notes, which are sometimes very hard indeed, but also true maturity of thought. In this regard, he is completely different from Mozart. Artur Schnabel said a wonderful thing once: “Mozart is too easy for children and too hard for adults.” What he meant is that it can be a challenge for an experienced artist to find the ease of expression that Mozart demands. In Beethoven this problem does not exist— he is overwhelmingly complex, and struggle is an organic part of every performance.

I have been exploring the sonata cycle for 60 years now. My first complete performance in 1960 happened almost by accident. I had been playing many concerts as a young person, but at the age of 16—no longer a child, not yet an adult—I suddenly found myself with an empty calendar. This depressed me a great deal, which may sound odd at that age. Then one day I met an acquaintance on the street in Tel Aviv who asked me what I was doing. I explained that I was going to school but had no concerts to play, and that this made me very unhappy. He told me that he had just become director of Beit Sokolov, the House of Journalists in Tel Aviv—a famous building that hosted many historical press conferences. It had a beautiful hall, and he invited me to play there. I said: “Very well, I would like to play all the Beethoven sonatas.” I don’t think he knew much about music and understood what he was in for. But that is why I simultaneously sat for my final exams and played the sonata cycle for the first time, every Saturday over a period of two months. Needless to say, I did not know all the sonatas yet at the time, so I had to learn one or two new pieces during the week between concerts. It was an incredible experience for me, and I have to say that I greatly enjoyed it. Interestingly enough, I have played the 32 sonatas in the exact same order ever since. These performances at the Pierre Boulez Saal are the first for me presenting the sonatas in the chronological order of their creation. Just as in life, in music I am particularly interested in the relations between various elements. That is why I am very keen to have the opportunity to feel Beethoven’s artistic development in a very direct way, and I hope that some of the audience will attend the complete cycle to experience it with me. It is a great journey.

When I think of artists of the past who influenced me profoundly regarding Beethoven, I think mainly of Wilhelm Furtwängler and Edwin Fischer, both of whom I met as a child. Furtwängler especially was highly expressive in his music-making. I think he too was looking for the skeleton Boulez spoke of, but the outward impression was explosive, an appearance of great freedom. When I was about 30 years old, I read Richard Wagner’s book On Conducting. In it, he says that it is not only permissible for a conductor to take certain liberties with tempo, but that it is an absolute necessity in order to shape a musical phrase. Of course this liberty must not be exaggerated—it has to happen imperceptibly, like a permanent give and take. The decision about the tempo may be the most important decision a musician has to make, especially as a conductor. When you are playing yourself, you have a permanent direct connection with the sound. I think it is a complete mistake to believe that a metronome marking has to be followed strictly. On the contrary, the challenge is to comprehend a work’s structure emotionally, and then to structure that emotion. Essentially, that is the secret of making music. I dislike the word interpretation. Beethoven does not need any interpreters or “translators.”

As a young person, I was not aware of these things, but I believe that since then I have learned more and more often to strike a balance between the extremes and to combine knowledge of the skeleton with freedom. The first contact with a work such as the “Hammerklavier” Sonata must be a shock—the piece is so huge, so titanic, it has so many details, colors, and connections. Then you slowly begin to learn it. That means the notes, of course, but it also and specifically means an almost scientific analysis of form, dynamics, and rhythm. The deeper you delve in this analysis, the more you remove yourself from the initial emotional shock. It is like meeting a person with a strong personality: you feel the strength of that personality, then you get to know each other and get closer in one way, while at the same time increasing the distance in another way. It works in a similar way in music, if you truly think in and with music. That is a complex process that takes a lifetime—60 years for me, as far as the Beethoven sonatas are concerned. It has a lot to do with rational work, and there are artists who are afraid of this analysis, because they fear losing the freshness and the improvisational nature of instinct. I am convinced that, on the contrary, knowing more is always better than knowing less. The natural, emotional aspect does not suffer from knowledge. After all, in concert I have to play every piece as if I were inventing it at that very moment. The logical work must recede, and the audience must have the impression that the piece is being discovered, here and now. Occasionally, you have to know certain things to then allow yourself to forget them. In that sense, music is philosophical. Music is architectural, it is emotional, and it is philosophical.

Many things come with experience, but experience never means routine. Routine is the greatest enemy of music-making. It is the temptation to try to repeat tomorrow the good performance you gave today. Experience means learning something new every day— at every rehearsal, in every concert.

For the Beethoven anniversary, Daniel Barenboim performs the composer’s complete piano sonatas, piano trios, and sonatas for violin and piano at the Pierre Boulez Saal.