Le gibet, what does this mean and what is the piece about? Gibet is the french word for the english gibbet. Le gibet is another poem from Bertrand’s Gaspard de la nuit. Let me reproduce here a translation of this poem:

Once again, Ravel perfectly got the ambiance of the poem and mastered its musical transcription. Let’s focus on the last sentence: It is the bell ringing in the walls of a city below the horizon. The bell is clearly symbolized in the piece by a b flat octave ostinato running from the beginning to the end of the piece. Ravel’s challenge was to keep a pedal point of b flat for 152 bars (the whole piece). He didn’t fail at all and this ostinato is what makes this piece so hypnotic.

The fun part is the rhythm of this ostinato. In a so ecstatic piece, Ravel chose a rhythm of rumba for his ostinato (of course with a little distortion) and you don’t even notice it in this environment. The contrast is indeed funny (the rumba discovery is not from me, but from a friend composer: Steven Berryman). Here are the first three bars of the piece, with the bell pattern in red.

If you have been told there was a rumba in Le Gibet, would you have believed it? I didn’t, I really thought my friend lost it definitively! But when I looked at it closer… I found the rumba element.

Ravel’s music is always full of surprises and you never stop finding new elements in it. That’s a part of why this music is fabulous. No matter how long you’ve been playing it, there is always something you overlooked or missed. And I’m glad of it, because in ten years I still will be amazed by Gaspard de la nuit, and I’ll still have things to discover in it.

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As I like to say, a very big part of piano technique is about delivering weight. When we sit at the piano, the upper torso remains balanced over the pelvis, delivering the weight through the sit bones to the bench. As our thighbones are above the sit bones, it permits to have the legs completely free to move, using them for support when we play in extremes part of the keyboard and/or to pedal. That’s roughly what happens in the case of a balanced sitting. But to achieve a balanced sitting and avoid unnecessary tensions, you must first find the adequate bench. It must be comfortable, adjustable, silent… If you don’t find it, you’ll never achieve a balanced sitting during the performance, and the playing will suffer : technically weak, harsh sound and poor tone quality. That’s why Samson François was so right : a good piano is useless if you can’t reach a balanced sitting.

In fact, in my twenties I was obsessed with balanced sitting. I used to practice at school, and most conservatories don’t invest in benches so students get these uncomfortable cheap benches and the sitting problems that go alongside. I had to solve this issue and make my buttocks happy (as well as my back!). At first I used a cushion, but this was not plainly satisfactory; a cushion slips, is not firm enough and gets flat. So with the help of my physical therapist, I designed and built an ergonomic cushion fitting my needs. That’s how I ended up carrying a weird cushion everywhere I had to play. This cushion was so famous among Prague Conservatory’s students that it quickly got a name : podprdelka (litterally: the “underbum”).

I still use it, although I built an ergonomic bench for my home practice, and I must say it improved my playing a lot, helping me to find a balanced sitting and avoid unnecessary tensions.

So, if you want to play well, follow Samson François’ advice and meet the first requirement : sitting well. Then, you’ll choose the piano you want to play. Far too many people (even professionals) don’t even look at the bench and blame the piano if they didn’t played well. In fact, their sitting is responsible for their technical mistakes or bad sound : the bench is thus much more important than the piano itself!

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As I was writing in my post Label record deals Pros and cons 9 months ago, recording is not a source of income anymore but a kind of promotional tool. We are not expecting to earn anything but coverage and pomotion is THE important thing. But promotion is expensive and nobody wants to pay. The artist, because he already paid the product and the label services. The label, because they don’t want to invest money, so they propose only (nearly) free promotion. At least all the one I contacted. I’m sure there still are labels willing to take calculated risks but I couldn’t get my hands on them.

In fact it seemed to me the label was not a partner, but a kind of subcontractor you pay to organize (little) promotion and distribution. Moreover, for those I tested, I even had to explain how to market the product, which communication channels we should use, in fact I was simply doing their job, the job I was supposed to pay for. Funny, isn’t it?

Distribution : let’s face it physical distribution is moribund, what’s the point of distributing physical goods? Oh wait, yes, being reviewed, because most reviewers don’t want to write a line about a digital only release. If a reviewer could explain why, I would be happy to hear him.

Oh, I’m so stupid, I forgot you had to buy advertisement in the newspaper if you want to get a review, so even with a physical product and no investment in promotion/advertisement I won’t get a review. Again there are still people doing a great job and not fitting to my description, I thank them all.

So after all this thinking, I just wondered : “does releasing my CD under a label really worth the extra work, extra money and extra troubles?” In fact the answer was the same than 9 months ago, but this time my intuitions were confirmed and what was a feeling became definitely an absolute certainty : no, it doesn’t unless the deal is fair and the two parties benefit from the partnership. I would be happy to join a label under these conditions, but this kind of deals seems to be a myth nowadays, even with a solid project.

Finally, I’m happy to release this CD on my own : I’ll learn a lot, I won’t loose more time, I’ll get exactly what I want, last but not least, I’ll be totally free to do what I want to do artistically speaking.

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If you want to please the audience, please yourself first : I think programming is first about you. I may sound a little selfish here but let me explain. I deeply believe that if you are intimately connected to the works you play, the audience will do so. If you are convinced your program and playing are wonderful, you can convince an audience. Not before.

Tailor the program for the audience : I always ask presenters about their audience to find out what I can or cannot play. Most of the time the Artistic Director can tell you what sort of audience you will meet, if they don’t know, ask for the most crowded concerts from the last season and have a look at their program.

Structure, structure and structure again : Like musical forms, there must be a structure in the program involving among others the famous tension/rest couple. No audience could bear 2 or 3 very tensed works in a row, nor 3 calm works in a row. You have to let breathe the audience after tension but not send them to sleep!

Audience dislikes being lost : people like to feel in a safe environment. And what is a safe environment musically speaking? Music they know and appreciate. You have to find a balance between known and unknown pieces : enough “hits” for people who want to feel safe, enough “discoveries” for people who like surprises.

Never forget your programming is part of your public image : Programming should express who you are as an artist. Did you ever see Glenn Gould playing la Campanella or the flight of the bumble bee?

As you can see, balance is important at every level of understanding. Programming is really an exhausting task : These are only 5 advices on 5 of the hundreds of parameters you have to deal with when building a program. Programs are a part of your success if they are good, but a bad program can also ruin a recital or a tour, so take your time and think about it!

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• Internet is time consuming : The pianist’s schedule was already pretty tight and with internet we have no free time left at all. Social networks, Blog, website, forums… We have to join the conversation and its immediacy : interactions on internet are now on a real-time basis and people expect you to react faster than ever. If you’re not careful about the time you spend on internet, it can quickly become your one and only activity of the day.
• It increases our workload : As other media are not dead (yet?), we have to plan a web strategy in addition to other “traditional” media strategies. We all know how media strategies are difficult to set up and how painful this planning process is : since internet has been a mainstream media, I have much more work concerning the media planning.
• Good marketing is always pricey : Internet may be smoke and mirrors. Free marketing? It doesn’t exist. As other media, Internet has a price and increased our communication budget : running a website, advertising, creating multimedia content… Being on the web is not enough, you have to reach your audience and I don’t think you can reach someone by just saying “Hello, I’m here!”. Internet is a really good medium, but a real effective web strategy with a good ROI is far from free.
• Internet broadened offering : The classical music market is a tiny market and gets tinier every year. Internet made it easier to contact presenters and present our work, but on an already saturated market, Internet in fact broadened offering and that’s really not helping musicians : It’s more and more difficult to find concerts and our fees are going down. In brief, a logical outcome of the market over-saturation.
• Copyright issues : Yes, there are copyright issues. Who has never seen one of his articles stolen? Who can deny the impact of digital piracy on music sales? Internet made it easier for us on certain points, but the relative easiness of piracy on the web really hurts the business.

To sum up, Internet is here and you must adapt your work style to survive. In any case I would go back to the old times without Internet. It has brought fantastic opportunities to all of us in recent years and made so many things possible that were never possible before, but there are some negative points of course. The key is to recognize the drawbacks and try to minimize the negative effects. Ultimately, I would say the positives of the internet far outweigh the negatives.

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• Contacting presenters and media: Remember these paper booklets and CD demo we had to put together and send by physical mail? It’s now over. We don’t and can’t work like this anymore, it would be too expensive and not fast enough. We use electronic press kit and electronic promo kit sent by email. Thanks to internet, it’s now easy to find and contact presenters as well as media.
• New, cheap and effective ways to promote your business : The web created new tools to promote yourself : social medias, blogs… are very low-cost and can be great to target a particular market, if you know how to use these tools.
• Reaching an international market: We are in a global society and musicians are now working at an international level. Or at least they can do it. Back in the old times, it was really difficult to spread your influence beyond borders and gain new markets. Even if it’s not that easy, mainly because of national/cultural specificities, musicians can promote themselves out of their country without spending thousands dollars.
• Save time and react faster : We don’t have to spend time at the post office anymore and don’t have to wait for an answer for ages. Decision making has been optimized and we are now able to react in real time. Mobile devices and Internet have made us much more responsive without loosing your time sitting in front of a computer. I can pratice my piano and stay connected. I can cook and work at the same time.
• Connect with people : Internet made it possible to connect easely with other musicians (great not to feel lonely) and, much more important, connect with our “fans”. That’s what I do on a daily basis with my facebook page and twitter account.

Sure, Internet made our lives easier in a way. It also completely changed the business and not necessarily for the better, but this will be developped in my next post!

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The 2011 season will be so exciting! First of all I am proud to announce the recording of my first solo CD: an album planned since months, about which I thought a lot. For my first album, true to myself, I decided to promote and trust the young American composer Michael Mranti who particularly interested me. I have therefore commissioned a work for solo piano, written to fit among the other works of the program.

This album is built like a journey through the night of three leading composers of the twentieth century and a young composer of our time. The four groups of works reflect and revisit the nocturnal imagery: reassuring or terrifying illuminations (lightning, candles, moonlight), sound and olfactory perceptions of twilight (the forest, the birds at night) and spectral presences (Scarbo, Ondine) enrich the magical world of darkness which Messiaen, Carter, Mranti and Ravel knew perfectly how to set to music, each in a very different and personal way.

Another project close to my heart: the launch of a festival dedicated to keyboard instruments. Initiated in 2010, this project should take place at the end of spring 2012 in France. I was lucky enough to meet last year highly motivated people ready to invest time in this great project and put it on track, as well as magnificent performers supporting the operation and enriching our programming. I sincerely hope, despite this is pretty bad times for cultural funding, the festival will find motivated partners to let us provide the best possible conditions for the audience and the performers.

Last but not least, I always wanted to write a book about my experience as a pianist and music in general. You already know that I like sharing my thoughts and views, but for a long time now, I have been having a true desire to compile and complete several of my texts still unpublished in a form more substantial than the “simple” article. So I took my courage in both hands and the writing started in 2010 is on track. That process will continue throughout 2011 and I hope to publish this book in conjunction with my first album.

Hard work, great projects, 2011 will really be a great year!

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1. Staying fit and healthy is part of our business priorities. I underestimated their importance in our profession but playing sports, doing yoga, relaxation, receiving massages are far from useless. They are essential moments in the pianist’s life. We (over?)use our bodies, so we must take care of this body and remember we could not play an instrument without it. Of course, I mentioned exercise here, but staying in shape affects many other areas of our lives: food, lifestyle, sleep …

2. Musical Excellence, of course, but not only. Communication, marketing, business negotiations, law… there are a lot of subjects a musician should know about, and he must master certain concepts outside the music to be able to take the right decisions for his career. We can delegate part of this work, but we are always asked for the final decision, and making a decision requires a clear understanding of the situation. How can you do that if you really don’t know what your collaborators are talking about?

3. Time management: our daily fight. We have many, many things to do and little free time. Poor time management leads inevitably to overdue tasks, stress and disasters. Planning, respecting a schedule, estimating the time you need to complete a task are real challenges: we must learn how to stay organized to avoid drowning in work. Free time is precious to us, and is in fact a passive working time : cultivating your imagination, reading, watching movies, all this affects your playing, and therefore your work. This part of “free time” is essential to “feed us” as an artist.

4. Saying no. This was one of my biggest weaknesses. We must understand that as professionals we have rules: we have busy schedules, we must make choices about what fits or not our season and our long-term plans, what interests us or not, what suits us or not. It is our job, we can not do everything, nor accept anything. Quality over quantity. And being professional means you sometimes have to say no. And we must learn to do that because it’s not as easy as it looks.

The pianist’s career path is long, difficult and requires many skills that nobody teaches us during our student life. It is a major weakness in our educational system and if we were really prepared for this life, many of us would avoid many of the art business pitfalls.

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First of all, I had time to do a background work that was essential: rethinking my piano technique and exploring the repertoire really deeply. I needed to improve a few technical issues which have been embarrassing me for quite a long time, so I decided to work on it seriously. This year was the perfect slot to do this kind of thing: no deadlines and time to work or rework certain pieces. I’ve also been exploring the repertoire, and it was essential to know which path I wanted to follow. Finally, these investigations reinforced in me the idea that I feel particularly close to music of the XX^th and XXI^th centuries, although there are some other composers I love playing but only for myself.

I also discovered something else: I like solitude. Last year, I thought I would suffer from isolation but not all. In fact, far from the hustle and bustle, and far from the permanent “intellectual” disruption, I’ve really stayed focused on my work which is not as easy as it sounds. If I could in the past think that solitude was the soloist’s scourge, I find it essential now. Not that I’m antisocial, but it seems to me that if an artist wants to use his brain for a creative work, the so-called self-discipline – which is nothing but a way of moving away from society – is absolutely essential. Any creative artist who intends to produce a work worthy of interest can not help being a relatively poor social being. (I’m paraphrasing G. Gould, I know it’s a shame I can’t quote him exactly…)

On a personal level, this year has been particularly interesting. I have made a lot of progress, learned a lot about myself, and about my relationship to the piano and music. Professionally, things have changed also. I’ve changed my view on the career as a pianist, but I’ll share this in my next post.

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I think everything is a question of conditions. For example, master classes are fitting me like a glove. A few hours with a group of students, giving my point of view, advices on specific works, and sharing thoughts about music is really something magical and challenging for me. I’m not only teaching, but also learning from all these different personalities we meet in a master-class. Both the student and teacher must be like a chameleon and adapt very quickly.

For students, the preparation of these master-classes is also very interesting: they have to consider the work in all its aspects and be ready for anything, to challenge themselves in front of a stranger. For me, the preparation of a master-class is also a good way to broaden my knowledge: I take time to analyze the works to be performed during the session, and if I have time, sit down at the piano and sight-read them.

As for an education on a long term basis, I would opt for a solution that does not exist yet, as far as I know. I would have very few students, but really take care of them. Of course make them practice their piano, but also learn them how to take advantage of their skills and show them what is really the job of a pianist. Ideally, I would listen with them to recordings, criticize concerts, make them read books, but also enable them to follow me in my working days and let them observe how I manage my job and my piano practice.

Unfortunately, in schools, we are often inundated with students and do not have enough time for such an experiment. And in private lessons, students are often too young or not involved enough. I often learned by observing, and I realize now that my studies didn’t prepared me to work as a pianist. I’ve learned to play the piano well, a sine qua non conditio, but it’s far from being the only skill you need as a pianist.

I would have loved to follow my teachers in their daily musical life, see how they practice the piano, how they prepare for a concert, in fact, to learn what the job consists in, and this long before leaving school …

Finally, I would say that I like teaching, but I do not like the actual way you have to teach. I would like to teach piano, but mostly by sharing cultural moments. It might be time to create a school promoting this method?

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