Music is a journey. I must have mentioned it, for these are my two greatest passions in life. I\u2019m fortunate that they can join together and shape each other.
\nAt its most basic, the point where production of music and the magic of travel meet is performing concerts in various parts of the world.<\/p>\n
Yet that road begins far earlier, before you even pack your suitcases and pay the airfare. It begins with solitude and blank manuscript paper. No one else will take the trouble to tell your life\u2019s story with all its twists and turns, and highs and lows. No one will give all those moments a shape to reflect the condition of your soul in that or any other moment of life. That road you must embark on and walk in solitude, blending the best suitable sounds together in such a proportion that nothing more can be added or subtracted from the whole.<\/p>\n
And let\u2019s remember that there\u2019s no one to find the right key for you. No one is going to arrange the parts of instruments that your soul plays. In music, the same as in life.<\/p>\n
A journey within, a voyage to your innermost core. So often dangerous, yet always fascinating. It produces music that, after a time, comes out as a score or a recording. How many hours, evenings, entire weeks of solitude have I spent on those explorations, roaming the keys with my fingers, trying to chart on paper the route I should follow. Memories, the present, the planning of the future \u2013 they all belonged to the baggage I had to lift and carry. Yet I never once regretted the effort.
\nMusic certainly opens plenty of doors and is a passport to the world. Unlike literature, it needs no go-between to reach the audience. It needs no translators and interpreters, as it speaks a universal language, understandable for everyone, irrespective of where on this earth they have their homes.<\/p>\n
Some time ago, I started combining my concerts with presentations of moving images that do not so much illustrate my music as develop a mood that is coherent with it. How much of the tension developing at the interconnection of various facets of art you will take home depends to a great extent on you, on your sensitivity. All that the artist does here is to lend a helping hand and invite you along for a journey.
\nIn the contemporary world, with its predominance of visual impulses, adding illustration to music is an incentive to take that one extra step and plunge into the realm of sound.
\nLyrics are a different case. A song pins the piece down far more than images ever could, as it imposes content and emotions, which is what I\u2019ve always wanted to avoid. My music is there to strum the strings of the audience\u2019s hearts, and to do so without indicating a single path of interpretation. It gives freedom as it leaves a space that the audience must fill themselves.<\/p>\n
I have visited various corners of the world with concert tours. Some memories have etched far deeper into the memory, others \u2013 and that for a variety of reasons \u2013 have slowly become obliterated. What will certainly remain with me forever is Asia. To travel is to learn. To absorb as much as you can.<\/p>\n
In China, the musicians and I had a fair amount of freedom, and wandered the streets on our own, though quite likely under the discreet surveillance of the relevant authorities and forces. What caught the eye was the stark contrast within the society. Vast, downright overwhelming wealth right next to a slum district. Shanghai as well as Beijing. China is developing dynamically, so by now some details might have changed. I don\u2019t believe, however, that the general social structure of the country has transformed.
\nI talked to people working for a bowl of rice. Asked whether they would like to change anything, they answered that they wouldn\u2019t. They felt good where they were. They had food and a place to live. They were taken care of and wanted no change.
\nWe Europeans are incapable of understanding the mentality of the East. We follow different notions and cherish different values. This is something you always need to have in the back of your mind while visiting Asia.<\/p>\n
An open-air concert was lined up in Shanghai for the grand opening of a large financial centre. The weather forecasts were in our favour, yet what happened next is proof that you must not put too much trust in forecasts \u2013 meteorological or otherwise. It suddenly started to rain. The musicians were pleased: for various reasons, they preferred playing indoors to performing in an open space. We were taken to a hall with a capacity of 3,000 people, yet we were immediately told that this was where we would have our rehearsal only. The concert must be held in the open, as planned. At the evening reception, I was approached by the director of the Shanghai Festival: \u201cI\u2019m ready to embrace your faith,\u201d he said, and, seeing my surprise, added, \u201cbecause your god heard you, and mine gave me no chance\u2026\u201d Indeed, had the concert not been held in the form intended, rather than talking to me at the banquet, the director would quite likely have been packing his suitcases, clutching a ticket to a small town in backwater China. My invitation to play a concert tour in China contained only one condition: the programme must include the work of a Chinese composer of my choice. I listened to perhaps a dozen of the options proposed, and went for one, whose name \u2013 Quan Xiang \u2013 meant nothing to me. It was only on my arrival that I learned who that Xiang was, and what position he held in China. An advisor to the president, he was the director of the Beijing Philharmonic. In his hand were more than just the decisions about China\u2019s largest music events. He also determined which city would open a philharmonic, and which would close one. Other than that, he was really an exquisite composer. And a Chopin buff. I asked him about my records. Chopin is a great love of Chinese artists \u2013 there\u2019s no doubt about it. And the Chinese are among the finest interpreters of Chopin in the world. The decisive factors include the technique resulting from rigorous preparation from their earliest years, as well as the innate precision and appreciation of order and accuracy. The only question is whether, among all that perfection, they don\u2019t lose something\u2026 Is there still a message within, an expression of the idea? Sometimes I have my doubts. Travelling goes far beyond landscapes, as it is first and foremost an opportunity to get to know people. Such a conversation about the music you perform is crucial. While preparing for performance of a piece, I spend a long time talking to the conductor and musicians. We discuss the potential changes, and try out different versions to choose the best. Believe me \u2013 the road is worth travelling and the conversations worth having. Yet more than that, life is worth living.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Music is a journey. I must have mentioned it, for these are my two greatest passions in life. I\u2019m fortunate that they can join together and shape each other. At its most basic, the point where production of music and the magic of travel meet is performing concerts in various parts of the world. Yet […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-columns"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1124"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1124\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1126,"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1124\/revisions\/1126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/januszbielecki.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nWe are not<\/em> going out: the orchestra dug their heels in. Amidst growing tensions, I set about negotiating between the organisers and our musicians. All eyes were on the forecast, updated in real time. A window of weather opportunity opened: an interlude in the rain lasting for just over an hour.
\nSeveral dozen technicians came running onto the stage, and immediately had everything that you need to play a concert ready: they wheeled in the piano, and fetched the chairs and the stands. As all the performances by the folk bands and all the speeches \u2013 apart from a short address from the mayor of Shanghai \u2013 were called off, we could start our concert, losing no more precious seconds. Lift off! The countdown of the dry minutes had begun.
\nAs the echoes of the last chords rang out, the heavens opened! But we made it! We played it!<\/p>\n
\nThe rain took a break, the director\u2019s position was saved, and we played our concert streamed live to an audience of over 100 million.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cI like the piano one most,\u201d he answered. And when I asked about the reasons for his choice, he answered, \u201cbecause this is where you can hear Chopin best.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nIt remains an open question whether, without growing up in Poland, without absorbing Polish emotions and matters of the heart, without Polish experience, you can duly render the spirit of the great composer\u2019s works. Perhaps it is better to let go of perfection, stumble here or there, yet with your performance render something that does not as much result from the score but from the spiritual content of the piece? Something that is so difficult to grasp? This is what you should captivate the audience with, and it is precisely this that your performances should instil into the audience.<\/p>\n
\nThanks to travelling, I have met many consummate musicians, and chance has also led me to meet remarkable conductors. Many such meetings transformed into long-term friendships. That was the case, for example, with the eminent conductor Herman Engels. I worked with him in Belgium, and he also conducted several concerts of my music in Poland. One day, after a rehearsal, he turned to me and remarked, \u201cIt\u2019s a great pleasure to be working with a living composer. You can talk to him about his music.\u201d
\nIn most cases, Herman conducted the works of outstanding, albeit dead, composers.<\/p>\n
\nWe meet on the road to share our thoughts and reflections.<\/p>\n