Hierarchy is a world of paper ENG An interview with Marek Moś – musician, the founder and leader of the Aukso Chamber Orchestra What are contrasts in life for you? They are extremely important in music. The y cause tension and relaxation, they express changeability which constitutes the musical process. In life we tend to dislike them. We would prefer to see our lives as a continuous strand of success. It is not so however, therefore humility and pride fight within us creating a peculiar contrast. This is what we call every day life. Is there a division between the family and professional sphere in your life? I don’t think so, because my entire family is submerged in music. Everything in my life centers around music. It is the driving force. Concerts, recordings, rehearsals – on Saturday and Sunday also. When I am busy with rehearsals during the week I like to meet my students at the weekends, always when I feel they need me. Generally I do not like Sundays and holidays. They shatter me internally and ruin my rhythm. For me week days are the norm. Meeting and talking with y ou I have the impression you are a focused and spiritual person… These kind words make me feel a little shy. I understand and feel music as deriving from the spiritual world. I feel as if I was made from it. I live for it and every day try to be closer to it. In my case – although it may sound pretentious – music is religion. I talk with the God of Music. I have few friends among priests, I respect them greatly, but they would find these words immature. Perhaps they would be right, but I do not feel right in the Church filled with the faithful. I am not convinced by the noise of the Fair, rather by the hermit’s. What is conducting for you? My adventure with conducting started very late. I am 54 today and I founded Aukso when I was 42. On the one hand I lack experience because I cannot make up for those years without a ba-
ton on the stage. On the other hand I come with over twenty years as first violinist in the Silesian Quartet – an everyday struggle to bring my violin and music together somehow. When you stand in front of an orchestra, the process of mutual recognition is complete after 5-10 minutes and both sides know a lot about each other. Academic training is important though the most important here is the ability to read scores, harmony, theory, composition. Someone who stands on the podium should be gifted with an inborn talent for movement. Conductors often need to develop a technique of moving in front of a mirror. I believe this is pointless. It is enough to express music with movement, just surrender yourself, release the flow in yourself. I do not think you should speed up life because what is meant to happen will happen. I started with a group of over ten people and now I conduct orchestras of over 100. I really like to have a large orchestra in front of me. Now a return to just several people is an unusual experience, a return to the source. Recently life gave me a gift – contact with Opera. I have been interested in the Opera for a long time. The world of musical fairytales attracts and moves me. It all started with the Nostalgia Festival in Poznań with S. Sciarrino’s opera. Then there was Aleksander Nowak’s premiere in Teatr Wielki in Warsaw. At present I am working with Jacek Kasprzyk at the Wrocław Opera on ’Libreta chiama la Libreta’ by Eugeniusz Knapik. Life is giving me another opportunity to try something new so I thank it with gratitude. What methods of working with a group of artists – often strong individual personalities – do you use? I believe in enlightened monarchy in art and I trust that the king whom I represent is wise. This is the most effective model. Working with people we should refer to a community based on creating good and not on the building of authority based on fear – this is something I could not do. The most important is the respect of other people. Leading towards lightness is the only reason why an orchestra would want to meet the expectations of a conductor. I know of stories of conductors who had great names because they were despots but
they have not always left great music achievements behind them. On the other hand I do not agree with the hypocrisy of musicians’, especially those active in labour unions. These are places of selfcreation and not places where we look after people. However, Poland is torn by labour unions. The idea which gave birth to our freedom has become a caricature. Union members are often the weakest link in an orchestra and they diminish the work of those who are worth something and still want to do something. Do they not realize that they have become hypocrites guaranteeing themselves immunity. They have to realise that their place of work has to improve every day and not that a rehearsal ends on time or that auditions are not evaluated properly. Repairing the philharmonics as an institution should start from changing the attitude towards one profession. We need to reach to the sources, to high school and academy, when everyone lived music unconditionally. Back to the moment when music was the greatest passion in our lives. Otherwise only those things we have already left behind will remain, and will grow to the status of symbols: toilet paper, towel and soap. Every year I ask myself a question about world hierarchy, which is a world of paper. People do not authenticate their capabilities and their skills with their life’s work but with diplomas and titles. And the world of music is small and people know what other people are doing. The ‘desman dance’ of writing a thesis, academic careers without artistic backgrounds. To write something – you need to live through it and have a need to share it. And what about the magic of performing a piece…. the moment when you reach the Absolute? Such moments happen very rarely. They are often prevented by our shortcomings in technique. Our imagination is far from what we can really give of ourselves. There have been moments of illumination or bliss… and I hope that there will be many still ahead of me. What happens in my musical life is closely related with my health. I have often had to stay in hospital – a purgatory where our choices are verified priorities change and questions arise. I was sick in fact. I have undergone three heart surgeries. If I had been born in another era I would have been dead 25 years ago. I therefore carry the burden of my gratitude for the time which is given to me. I know this sounds very pretentious but this is how I think. The ideal situation for me would be to finish my life on stage. It almost happened once. Many years ago in Wigry I had a heart attack during a Vivaldi piece. I didn’t know about it. I felt odd and my wife took me to the hospital. I experienced it as a kind of premonition of dying. When I listen to the conversations of my younger colleagues about how high their retirement is going to be I think I will never collect mine because ‘now’ is important – this is my world. The awareness that I live on credit is a basic metaphysical moment. I owe it to Wojciech Kilar and Witold Lutosławski, who sponsored my surgery. I see their selfless help as giving me a chance which I should not waste. Perhaps this is why my honesty towards music is so serious, so deeply idealistic. POLISH GUITAR ACADEMY 2010
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