Music Matters - 13/09/2008

Tom Service visits the celebrated Lucerne Festival Academy in Switzerland, where 140 musicians from around the world come together to explore contemporary classical music under the direction of Pierre Boulez and members of his Ensemble Intercontemporain. Conductors stay in the spotlight as Tom and Petroc Trelawny meet two other major figures: Esa-Pekka Salonen, newly appointed principal conductor and artistic advisor to the Philharmonia Orchestra, and Charles Mackerras, who talks about Mozart as he launches the Royal Opera House season with Don Giovanni. In this programme:- Lucerne Festival Academy The Lucerne Festival has been running since 1938, when Arturo Toscanini brought together a special orchestra to play a concert in the grounds of Wagner’s house. Now Lucerne’s concert hall, the KKL, hosts Claudio Abbado’s Lucerne Festival Orchestra and visiting orchestras from around the world. In addition, for three weeks of the Festival, the Lucerne Festival Academy assembles with 140 of the world’s finest young players to focus exclusively on 20th and 21st Century repertoire. The Academy is an opportunity for young musicians to learn from a living legend: Pierre Boulez. Tom went to Lucerne to visit the Academy and talk with Boulez and his students to find out exactly how the experience changes the lives of the young players, composers and conductors who take part in it. Sir Charles Mackerras Born in New York in 1925, Sir Charles Mackerras was brought up in Sydney and emigrated to England in1946. In the course of a remarkable conducting career, Sir Charles promoted Janacek’s music and the repertoire of the period instrument movement, including Handel and Mozart which he performed in groundbreaking new ways in the 1950s and 60s. Sir Charles is currently conducting Mozart’s Don Giovanni at the Royal Opera House in London, and continues as Principal Guest Conductor of the Philharmonia and Conductor Laureate of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. Tom went to meet Sir Charles at home and to ask him what inspires him as he continues to take to the podium in his eighties. Link: Royal Opera House http://www.roh.org.uk/ Esa-Pekka Salonen Finnish conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen takes up his post as Principal Conductor of the Philharmonia in London this autumn. Salonen has been running the Los Angeles Philharmonic for the last 16 years whilst simultaneously composing an impressive catalogue of music. But, how does he balance the hectic schedule of an international conductor and the creative demands of his compositional life, and why does he think now is the right time to take up such a significant role in London? Petroc Trelawny talked with Salonen about the appeal of his new appointment. Link: Philharmonia http://www.philharmonia.co.uk/