Working with Dietrich Henschel

Last Tuesday I performed Schwanengesang with Dietrich Henschel at the Wigmore Hall. This was the first of a series of concerts with music from the end of Schubert's life, the others comprising the piano trios, the last 3 sonatas, and the late piano duets (these will happen in the next couple of years). It's the first time I've 'headhunted' a musician to work with: when I decided on this project I didn't know who the singer would be. In the process of listening to many CDs, Henschel stood out for me as a musician with a sensibility I felt I could strongly relate to - his focus seemed to be very much about musical line and structure, and I also liked his willingness to take his voice to extremes. I'm very opinionated about other musicians - I think it's maybe unavoidable when one is passionate about making music - and one thing that often puts me off singers is an over-preoccupation with beauty of sound. To me it's clear that music often is not beautiful. I remember once rehearsing the Poulenc Sextet and asking the oboe player to play a particular note with a really ugly sound - it seemed to me the right effect. But it was almost a physical impossibility for him to do this, so strong was his mindset (and presumably training) about 'always making a beautiful sound'. To me this is a great shame because it severely limits what you can communicate.

To cut a long story short, I am very excited by this collaboration. We sadly only had one concert together; it would have been nice to do the programme a few times and get really comfortable performing together. But regardless of this, the process of rehearsing was so absorbing for both of us that I strongly suspect we will be performing together for years to come. He is a musician whose approach to music I profoundly respect and I have the sense there is a lot we can learn from each other.