NPR’s Rob Schmitz speaks with pianist Emanuel Ax about his new podcast “Classical Music Joyful Hour.”
ROB SCHMITZ, HOST:
All through his decades-long profession, pianist Emanuel Ax has been performing within the nice live performance halls of the world. And now, as an alternative of the stage, he’s stepping behind a microphone to host a brand new podcast with WQXR and Carnegie Corridor. It is known as Classical Music Joyful Hour, and it is half interviews, with visitors like celebrity pianist Yuja Wang and musical comedienne Isabel Hagen, and half recreation present, with information about well-known composers’ deaths.
(SOUNDBITE OF PODCAST, “CLASSICAL MUSIC HAPPY HOUR”)
EMANUEL AX: As Beethoven…
YUJA WANG: May die quicker (laughter).
AX: As Beethoven lay dying with a failing liver, his publishers thought, what he wants (laughter)? You already know what’d he actually respect? A case of wine.
WANG: Wow.
AX: And as a matter of reality, apparently, Beethoven’s final phrases have been, pity, it is come too late.
SCHMITZ: That is Emanuel Ax. Manny, as his associates know him, joins me now. Welcome, Manny.
AX: Thanks. Very good to be with you.
SCHMITZ: It is nice to have you ever. So it is fairly apparent that your podcast could be very completely different from a typical live performance corridor expertise. The place did the concept come from? And why did you assume a podcast was the correct format?
AX: Nicely, really, the concept kind of got here 20 years in the past. My good friend Yo-Yo Ma and I had all the time talked about doing a music “Automotive Speak” as a result of we have been such…
SCHMITZ: (Laughter).
AX: …Followers of that present. I feel that is kind of the way in which it started. He left it to me to kind of get some visitors, do some video games, attempt to present the personalities of not solely musicians however individuals who love music, to indicate that we’re possibly just a little extra relaxed than individuals assume we’re.
SCHMITZ: So that you and Yo-Yo Ma, the Click on and Clack of classical music podcasting (laughter).
AX: Sure. However positively the poor man’s Click on and Clack.
SCHMITZ: So loads of the conversations you have been having nearly flip the picture that many individuals have of classical music on its head. One musician who I feel does this rather well in classical music is Yuja Wang, who we heard from within the first clip on this piece. Now, I met Yuja Wang a couple of decade in the past backstage at considered one of her exhibits. I met her mom, and we had a dialog the place her mom instructed me about her husband, Yuja Wang’s father, and about how her husband – when Yuja was very younger, her husband, Yuja Wang’s father, stored telling her, you have to decelerate. Clearly…
AX: (Laughter).
SCHMITZ: …That recommendation didn’t work very effectively. As a result of if anybody who’s listening to this doesn’t know Yuja Wang or is just not conversant in her, simply put in Google Yuja Wang and “Flight Of The Bumblebee.”
(SOUNDBITE OF YUJA WANG’S PERFORMANCE OF NIKOLAI RIMSKY-KORSAKOV’S “FLIGHT OF THE BUMBLEBEE”)
SCHMITZ: She is likely one of the quickest musicians I’ve ever seen.
AX: Sure.
SCHMITZ: How are musicians like Yuja altering classical music?
AX: Whenever you meet individuals like Yuja, like Yo-Yo, like loads of the those who I’ve on this podcast – whenever you meet them speaking in a extra relaxed manner, you understand that they are very a lot enjoyable and that they do not take themselves so significantly, and subsequently, the viewers should not both.
SCHMITZ: Proper.
AX: Folks all the time assume there are guidelines to listening to music. You already know, you come to a live performance. There’s some sort of arcane rule that you simply’re not allowed to applaud. That does not make any sense. You already know, it is not solely counterintuitive, however it’s traditionally flawed.
SCHMITZ: So let me ask you this, Manny. What place do you assume classical music occupies in immediately’s world? How do you assist somebody fall in love with the music that you have devoted your life to taking part in?
AX: Nicely, I want to assume that if we will simply get individuals to pay attention – that is an important factor – ultimately or different. You already know, it’s extremely – lately, it’s extremely accessible. Yow will discover music anyplace on-line. I feel we simply have to in some way say, that is fascinating, do it. You already know, I keep in mind once we moved to this nation. I used to be, I suppose, 12 years previous, and I noticed a soccer recreation on tv – New York Giants, with Y. A. Tittle being the quarterback. That is – I am positive that is…
SCHMITZ: These have been the times.
AX: …The identify for you. It is kind of like me mentioning Beethoven to you. You already know, it is the…
SCHMITZ: (Laughter).
AX: …Identical interval of historical past. However he was the quarterback I first noticed with the Giants. And I keep in mind simply – I did not know a factor. However I acquired taken with it simply by taking a look at it, ?
SCHMITZ: Proper.
AX: And I feel it is the identical manner with music. If – in fact, not all people goes to be fascinated, however the those who is perhaps , that is perhaps excited by it, then you definitely begin listening, and the extra you pay attention, the extra . And the factor is, there’s a lot occurring immediately. There are such a lot of selections for youths, way more than there was once, I’d say. All the know-how that is made issues a lot simpler has additionally given us an unbelievable variety of selections. So music is just one of many selections now.
SCHMITZ: So, Manny, let’s return to your podcast. What’s one factor that you simply hope people take away from listening to it, apart from all the, , fascinating ways in which well-known composers have died?
AX: Yeah (laughter). Nicely, that is solely one of many video games we play. We have got a bunch of different video games. What I am hoping is that the composers I discuss to – John Adams, Gabriela Ortiz, Jeanine Tesori – are additionally seen as people who find themselves thrilling, revolutionary, enjoyable to be with. So I hope that comes via a bit.
SCHMITZ: That’s Emanuel Ax, host of the podcast Classical Music Joyful Hour from WQXR and Carnegie Corridor. Manny, thanks a lot for becoming a member of us.
AX: Thanks very a lot. Thanks loads for taking the time.
(SOUNDBITE OF JOHNNY GREENWOOD’S “TRIO FOR WILLA”)
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