>> From the Library of
Congress in Washington, DC.
>> Anne McLean: Good
evening, I'm Ann McLean
from the Library's
Music division.
We are very delighted to
give our warmest welcome
to an early music luminary
and legend, Jordi Savall.
So delighted to have you here.
And we want to say that
this is a rare opportunity
to have a chance
to hear all three
of your incredible ensembles.
Do you travel with them
as a trio very often?
Is this unusual to
have all three?
>> Jordi Savall: No, for
some big programs we can
combine both.
All three, yes.
>> Anne McLean: And this is a
remarkable program that we have
with the, with the music
from so many cultures
and Venice the focus.
Like so many of your projects
you bring together kingdoms,
eras, cultures, religions
and everything.
And you also have
a remarkable group
of friends that you travel with.
I was thinking about Andrew
Lawrence King's comment
that you have to,
that it's like surfing
in big waves to, to
perform with you.
You have to have the skills
of a virtuoso musician,
you have to have the
improvisational abilities
of a jazz artist and also
to be a great accompanist.
How do you manage
to get together people
like this everywhere?
>> Jordi Savall: Well, you know
I'm in this job mostly 50 years.
And in experience
you meet people.
And when you meet people
and the teams goes well,
in both sides you are happy.
You have a good relation.
And my principle always
philosophy is you can only make
nice music if you have
nice human relations
with the musicians.
It's so essential.
Because making music is
very intimacy experience.
When you make music you are,
you are only with your heart
and you have to share
everything.
The most essential emotions
and you have to do this
with people do you trust.
People you feel really
close and mostly,
well all the musicians
they have tonight
in the concert are good friends.
Some of them, not for long time
like the group from [inaudible].
I know them only from the,
from the spring of last year.
But still we have make
so nice experience
and now they are really
like friends also.
>> Anne McLean: Can you say
for you this is the happiest
experience to be on stage,
performing and gives
you a tremendous energy.
And you'll hear this
tonight and amazingly so.
I wanted to ask you
about the Byzantine music
that is the thread
woven throughout this
and you have a remarkable
ensemble here tonight.
How did you meet Mr. ?
? How did this come about?
[audience applauds]
>> Jordi Savall: Well
when I have a start to,
to have the conception
of this program,
the first difficult
question was how
to found very precise
the music from 1828,
28 when the supposed
[inaudible] arrived to Venice ,
it was necessary to have a vocal
piece exactly from this period.
And so the next different
moments,
the whole thousand years.
I have listened through
my friends from Greek
and from Turkey (Turkey?)
different vocal ensembles
from different,
mostly orthodox singers.
And finally I choice [inaudible]
because I found him
really the best.
And them I visit
him in Salonique.
And was very simple, I have
been invited in his place
where they rehearsal and
say to them, [inaudible],
I need from them a piece
from 8 hundred, 828.
Oh, no problem we
have [inaudible],
this is exactly the same time.
Sounds like this,
[singing], [audience laughs].
I was like, my God.
I was, we have spent the whole
day to listen pieces then I had
to make a choice of the
music for the whole concert.
I have to say the first choice
from all the music
for the program.
The result was program
for four hours music.
[audience laughs]
>> Jordi Savall: It's
not tonight like this.
But at the beginning,
it was really chose-ing
the most important dates,
most important moments
and chose-ing the music.
But I have to say the first
concert we do in France
and in Utrecht, the
program was the first have
of the program was one
hour and 30 minutes.
And the second part
a little more.
Now we have to do a little,
now I think the first part is
about fifty fifth minutes
and the second part, one hour
and five minutes [inaudible].
It's difficult to, to make
a thousand years of history
and music in less
time [inaudible].
[audience laughs]
>> Jordi Savall: If you
start the piece you have
to have the time to develop
the piece otherwise it makes no
sense, you know.
But I think what, what, it's the
difficult this concert, we have,
I need people that can
play medieval music,
early renaissance
music, renaissance music,
early baroque music, baroque
music and still classical music
because we finish in
1797 and the last piece
of the concert it's already
more 19th century piece
as baroque music, no.
Then I need really
very good musicians,
they can play medieval harp,
renaissance harp, baroque harp,
they play then different
type of instruments.
[Inaudible] some of the
winds they play [inaudible],
they play [inaudible], they play
flutes, they play baroque flutes
and this is I think the
quality of our group.
And then I have a very nice
group of oriental musicians.
We have a great player
from [inaudible],
from Greece, [inaudible].
We have a fantastic player
of [inaudible] and, and,
and Armenian [inaudible].
[Inaudible].
And then I have two great
musicians from Istanbul.
[musician name] who
plays, is one of the best ?
players in the world and
[musician name] is one
of the best also, oud
player, Turkish oud.
This makes, allow me to play
some of the oriental music
like a Turkish mass
representing the,
the attack of the Turkish
Ottoman troops to Constantinople
and other play sometimes
a Persian music.
There were different
moments of the concert.
And the [Inaudible] of both
arrive at certain moments
like nine, 1791,
a great composer,
Amadeus Mozart is visiting
Venice and of course,
I have choice "Alla
turca", [audience laughs]
which is a beautiful piece
that we normally listen
with the piano [inaudible].
But I'm sure the
Mozart was inspired
with the real Turkish musician.
And you'll hear how the,
the Turkish musicians,
especially the [inaudible] are
improvising before this using
the material from Mozart.
It sounds like [inaudible]
happens,
like Mozart is taking the
ideas from the [inaudible]
to build this "Alla
turca" march, no.
And then we use of
course the orchestra
to play this [inaudible].
This my idea, in fact music
it's the only time machine
that we have today.
we can travel to the
time with the music.
And when you will listen this
"Alla turca" you can very
easy imagine to be in Venice
in the time of Mozart was there.
With musicians taking the
pleasure to preform this
"Alla turca" was the Turkish
music was very a la mode.
And with this music you
can feel the same emotion,
theres the people from the
time [inaudible] they to have.
As always when the history
finish from a civilization,
from a culture, sometimes the
last year the people are crazy
and makes really
absolutely crazy things.
And the history says that
the last carnival before the,
the troops [inaudible] arrive
here, it's arriving was one
of the most absolutely
special carnival.
Everybody was like crazy and
I have choice for this moment
to represent the special moment
two beautiful [inaudible],
the songs, the gondolas,
they were singing.
And from a collection from
exactly the same time,
collected by Adolph[inaudible],
the master,
the opera [inaudible]
in this time.
And this is again you will
feel, you will hear music
which has a little
bit Mozart, popular.
It's a very nice
mixed of, of styles.
And you will have very, the
impression to be in the center
of Venice with the, with
the, gondolas moving
through the small canals.
And after this, it's the end.
And the end was the most
difficult thing to found.
I have to say they
have spend a lot,
a long time to see how
can I finish this program.
It's a tragedy at the end.
It's, Venice lost his freedom
and with will be attached
to the Italy for a long time.
And I found by a [inaudible]
thing, I found in Paris,
a manuscript who was performed
in Paris, a little later
but represented this ideal
from tragedy revolution
and all the mystery
of this time.
And this is song in
four parts, compose,
arranged by Luigi [inaudible]
and Italian composer was
in Paris in this time.
He has takes two
moments of two symphonies
by Beethoven and
you'll hear this.
I don't tell anymore.
[audience laughs] It's
really a surprise.
It's, the music by Beethoven is
one of the most beautiful music
but listen this music
with singers.
It's really incredible
because when it's [sings].
It is, it is really
a every time,
every time my skin it becomes
like a. Anyway, ideas
always music.
It's the really living
human history
because the music it takes
always about the emotion.
And then with, when we listen
the emotion in twelve hundred
by the Crusades song
[inaudible] or when we listen
to the lamentation
of Constantinople
by the [inaudible] or when
we listen to the battle
of Marianne by [inaudible].
Every time you will feel
a very special emotion.
And this is the power
of the music.
We can feel today the same
emotions the people they,
they have a thousand years
ago, five hundred years ago,
three hundred years ago.
And this is the great
power of the music.
And this is why I do music.
>> Anne McLean: And you've said
that for you there are two types
of music, sleeping music
and and contemporary music.
[audience laughs]
>> Jordi Savall: Yes,
this is a [inaudible].
Many times they tell me,
playing ancient music.
And my answer is always
there's no ancient music.
Somebody will have the idea
to say the Shakespeare is
ancient, ancient theater.
Nobody will think the, the plays
from [inaudible]
this old theater.
This is contemporary
theater always.
And with the music I think the
same, we have old manuscripts,
ancient manuscripts,
ancient printings
but when you play the music,
when you sing the music,
the music becomes
your contemporary.
Because the music
it's only finished,
it's only well not
finished, it's never finished.
The musicians part is beautiful.
But music becomes a new
life every time the singer
and musician plays.
And this, it's long and
we are singing and playing
and when we stop, music stop.
And what remains, what remains
after this, the memory, memory.
Ah, ah Voltaire says with "
sans les sens y pas de memoire".
The sense, all the things that
touch us, it makes our memory.
We don't, we remember only
the things that touching us.
A nice pasta, [audience
laughs], a nice beautiful breeze
and the sun and the afternoon.
A beautiful person.
We remember from the, the nice
times, also the very bad things.
But human beings has tendence
to forgot the bad things
and to remember the best things.
And this is the quality
of the music.
For this is so important to play
the music with the old emotion
and all the beauty because only
like this we will remember
this moment forever, you know.
And I think this is a
quality that's possible
because with music
we cannot lie.
As you know, many
people are lying today.
[audience laughs] And it's
very easy to lie with the words
but with the music
no, it's not possible.
Even the most [inaudible]
person,
the person who has
no idea about music,
will feel if a singer is
singing with emotion or not.
It's not necessary to
start in conservatory
to know about musicology.
Everybody and hear every singer
sing with emotion or not.
If a musician is
playing with sensitive,
sensibility and pleasure.
And this, I think, is
the most important thing.
And this is why the music
remains a fantastic source
of dialogue, of comprehension
of sharing experience,
building bridges.
Because you will see tonight
we have 14 different varieties,
the first soprano is from
Morocco, the second is
from Italy, contralto is from
the Basque land, the tenor is
from Catalonia, the
base is from Italy.
We have the musicians
from Istanbul,
from Armenia, from Greece.
We have the vocal
ensemble from Salonique
and from the musicians we
have the first violins from,
from Argentina, the cello from
Hungary, the [inaudible] one
from Germany, the
other from Austria.
The harp from England, the
guitar from Spain and etc tetra.
And this is, but this is,
and still we are a family.
And we share the music
with great joy and respect.
And the thing is this is
the best thing to do today.
To show the, even with the
very strong differences,
we can be very well together.
The diversity is not a tragedy.
It's a country and your country
it's the best example today.
How a country is built,
extraordinary diversity
of cultures and has
living together
for so many hundred years.
Thank you.
[audience applauds]
>> Jordi Savall: I need a bow.
I need a bow.
I don't see any bow.
Can play like a guitar but.
One moment.
>> Anne McLean: You know
while he's asking for the bow,
we should say that in our
cases tonight, if you have time
to look at them, there
a number of rare items
that show the history of Venice
as a music publishing center.
So for example we have
have the famous auhexitan
which was the first by Petrucci,
the first score printed
in musical movable type.
The first musical score
printed in movable type.
So that's on display tonight.
We also have, I believe
the eighth book
of the Monteverde
madrigals [inaudible]
and a number other
of very rare items.
Venice was a printing center and
so printers like [inaudible],
Dorea, Gardona and others were
making it a commercial hub
for that.
It was also a home
for gamba making
which I was thinking Mr.
Savall would talk about.
Oh, thank you so much.
This instrument he's kind enough
to demonstrate briefly for us is
by Peter Rumboughs,
1708 it's part
of the Library's Wilson's files.
[Jordi Savall tunes instrument]
>> Jordi Savall: This
is a viola gumba.
In fact it's like a
lute with the bow.
We have the same
feeling as a lute.
[music]
>> Jordi Savall: And [inaudible]
it's not playing everyday.
[audience laughter].
She's a little...undormi
[audience laughter].
But anyway [inaudible].
As you can see, as is typical
from the viola gumba,
seven strings.
This is one of the reasons
why people abandon the viola,
[audience laughter],
it's too many strings.
[audience laughter] And it's
seven frets making the divisions
and this is not for
helping to tune.
It's more to help the
quality of open song.
[music]
>> Jordi Savall: And on of
the [inaudible] of the viola,
we don't take the bow like
the violin, it's the cello,
[inaudible] was the
base of the violin.
The name of the cello
in the beginning before the
[inaudible] was the villo.
La base, le villo.
Your arm was like this.
If you play it with the
instrument in this position,
like it was the beginning,
before the violin.
Two families of bows, the viola
[inaudible], play on the arm.
And this is a natural position.
And the contrary of the
gamba position this is not,
[inaudible].
This is more natural.
This is a very natural position.
And the reason after this time,
it's not possible to
make tension here.
Like this you can control
tension with your fingers.
[inaudible] control the music.
Everything you are
doing, soft, [inaudible],
crescendo [inaudible]
is made by this finger.
[inaudible].
This was so important the
[inaudible] finger was called
"lamb la music".
[inaudible] It was a
connection with feeling.
And well, I will play
you a little piece
to see how it sounds
the instrument.
[tuning instrument]
[music]
[audience applauds]
>> Anne McLean: We very
much would like to thank you
on behalf of the Library
for taking the time.
You're very gracious to try the
instrument before your concert.
>> Jordi Savall: I would like
very much to take it too.
>> Anne McLean: We'll talk,
we'll talk with the curator.
But ah, we've just wanted
to say that this concert,
this extraordinary concert
of music and musicians
that you have brought
to us gives us a sense
of tremendous joy and helps us
to understand in person tonight
so much of why you are a
UNESCO artist for peace.
And why we admire you and
we thank you tremendously.
From the bottom of our hearts.
[audience applauds]
>> This has been a presentation
of the Library of Congress.
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