An interview with Argentinean pianist and conductor Alfredo Corral by Javier A. Garavaglia
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During an informal meeting at the home of ILAMS' chair Alberto Portugheis, Alfredo and I had the opportunity to have a long, quite informal but utterly cordial conversation, which I resume and reconstruct in its highlights below.
"Music is a way of listening" and " .... the music phenomenon is established by the triple relationship Last October, Argentinean pianist and conductor Alfredo Corral visited London for the second time since 2006 for a series of concerts and master-classes organised b ILAMS. Corral was born in Buenos Aires in 1961. He studied piano at the Conservatorio Nacional de Música "Carlos López Buchardo" in Buenos Aires and graduated as Professor in Music with the best results in his promotion year. Among his mentors were Juan Carlos Arabián y Perla Brúgola. Since then, he has toured as soloist, soloist with orchestra and chamber music mainly in South America and Europe. He is currently Professor at the Conservatorio Nacional de Música "Carlos López Buchardo" in Buenos Aires (the same institution he graduated from) and also at the Conservatorio de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. He also conducts both the Opera de Cámara de Buenos Aires and the Camerata Juvenil FM100.3 "Cultura Musical" orchestras.
During an informal meeting at the home of ILAMS' chair Alberto Portugheis, Alfredo and I had the opportunity to have a long, quite informal but cordial conversation, which Ill try to resume and reconstruct in its highlights below.
"Music is a way of listening" and " .... the music phenomenon is established by the triple relationship Composer-Interpret-Audience ...... ..there are different kind of interprets to different music styles, who can mobilise the audience in several different ways". These were some of his most remarkable phrases during our meeting.
Apart from his traditional music education, he is especially passionate about Argentinean music. He admits, that this passion is even greater than his interest in Latin-American music. He explains this with the fact, that Argentinean music has been one of his main influences since he was a teenager (his years as a piano student), as it was during this time that his teachers and mentors introduced him to most of the significant works within this repertoire. Among these pieces (which he plays quite frequently since then) count: the Sonata C sharp minor by Celestino Piaggio, the Sonata C sharp minor by José Torre Bertucci, Carlos Guastavino's Sonata and Romance del Plata (the latter for orchestra and piano).
He also is very fond of Spanish Music, mostly through the influence of his teacher Manuel Carrá. This interest can be seen in his repertoire, which includes composers like Falla, Granados, Toldra, Halfter and of course, Albéniz. He also attended twice the Curso información de la música española in Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
Among his vast CD recordings, he chose three, all including Argentinean music. The first one contains works by Piazzola, Guastavino, Ginastera y Aguirre; the second includes the Sonatas by Piaggio and Torre Bertucci mentioned above, with the addition of yet another work by Piaggio: "Homenaje a Julián Aguirre". The composers on this second CD have in common, that they all studied in Paris in the first half of the 20th Century Thus, they all relate in some degree to the French Scola Cantorum adopting a post-Frankian style, typical for the Argentinean music of their time. Alfredo added that he is quite sure to be the first pianist who recorded the Sonata by Torre Bertucci.
The third CD however, is not completely dedicated to Argentinean music; it was the result of the Congress for Codification (referring to civil law) in America and its European origins. The Congress was organised by the Law Faculty of the Argentinean Catholic University (UCA). Politicians from the 19th Century like Esnaola, Alberdi and Alcorta were also musicians and composers. Therefore, the CD was compiled balancing the tension and analogies between waltzes and minuets by all of them with similar works by European composers from the same time including Schubert, Chopin and Beethoven.
Because Alfredo is both, Conductor and Pianist, I was curious to know which of both roles he would consider to be the most important for his career, and moreover, which would be spiritually more rewarding. He answered the following: ".. this is quite difficult to tell. There is an interchange among both and both activities combine in a very harmonious way. To be able to play professionally the piano generates a kind of 'baton' inside me, where the pianist in me plays the orchestra and vice-versa. Also, from my perspective as a pianist, I am able to understand the mentality of the players in the orchestra from a different point of view, much more than as if I were merely a conductor".
However, the solo piano-concert situation satisfies him the most, because he can materialize musically his ideas while playing, without the need of any intermediates. But he added, that on the other side, the orchestra offers him the possibility of doing the wonderful task of preparing the musicians for the concert who ultimately are the ones 'making' the music, not him. Thus, spiritually he finds more satisfaction during the rehearsals rather than during the concert situation itself, as during the latter, his job is merely reduced to remind the musicians what was agreed during the rehearsals.
Towards the end of the conversation, I asked him, which composers/works were among his favourites. Here is the list he proposed:
Bach: Goldberg Variationen, Das wohltemperiertes Klavier.
Mozart: All his Piano concertos (as an integral, unified work)
Beethoven: All 32 Piano Sonatas (again, as an integral, unified work)
Puccini: Turandot and La Boheme
Wagner: Tristan und Isolde
Mahler: 5th Symphony, Rueckert Lieder.
Berg: Wozzeck
He added, that he is also deeply interested in contemporary music, with works like, i.e. Argentinean (living in Germany) composer Juan María Solare with his works Pasaje de Seaver (piano) or Ipsofacto (string orchestra). He enjoys immensely working with living composers; one of the things he finds most exciting about this, is the fact that he can discover things in the works, which the composer has not contemplated or seen before. To this last sentence, which finished the informal 'interview-chat', I added (because I am a composer myself, as well as a viola player), that we should discuss this more profoundly next time, as this issue might be more complicated than that.
A day after this chat, Alfredo gave a superb master-class at the Studio of Anda Anastasescu in London W14. Some very talented London-based young pianists prepared works by composers like Chopin, Liszt, Guastavino and Ginastera. Alfredo taught and gave advice to these young talents with his usual professionalism and charm, making that Saturday's afternoon activity a memorable event. We cannot wait for his next visit!!!
Javier A. Garavaglia - October 2007