fragments taken by prof.dr. E. Mulder for musicological use from an interview with Pierre Boulez by Wolfgang Schaufler ©, Universal Edition 28.4.2009, Vienna
http://mahler.universaledition.com/pierre-boulez-on-mahler
When did you start to conduct Mahler?
Boulez: I don’t remember exactly, but I think it was not before ’65, ’66, when I began to work with the BBC. And then it was, you know, the beginning of the Mahler trend, let’s say. Because before, even in England, it was not performed very much. The success of Mahler began really, not with Bruno Walter – certainly Bruno Walter regularly played Mahler in America, but I mean also Mitropoulos regularly played Mahler – but the big success was Bernstein, certainly. And Bernstein made Mahler popular in the States. It was his kind of responsibility, let’s say, to make Mahler popular, but there were precedents and especially Mitropoulos was very courageous. But I was told for instance, by musicians I knew in the orchestra, that when Mahler’s 7th or 5th or 6th was performed in the ’50s, the hall was emptying itself obviously, because it was considered too long and boring, simply that.
So the perspective that we have of Mahler now, generally in the world, is not at all the perspective that I had myself. Even when I was in the States in 1952 for the first time Mahler was still, you know, terra incognita more or less.
You succeeded Leonard Bernstein as chief conductor of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. Did you talk with him about Mahler?
Boulez: No, we did not have very close contact with Bernstein. I saw him, of course, from time to time, but I mean we did not discuss music, because our tastes were so far from each other that the discussion would not have gone anywhere. And I think there was a kind of agreement for not touching this type of subject.
Bernstein made Mahler popular, as you mentioned, but at the same time he conducted Mahler very emotionally. Did you feel this tradition when you took over?
Boulez: No, I did not try to fight, or to change anything. I did it my way, simply that. And of course I noticed that there were some features of his performance which are there still, and which I can very well understand. I suppose, the same thing, Mitropoulos was also very emotional, not only Bernstein. And maybe the less emotional was still Bruno Walter – I mean emotional in this sense, kind of like your Übertreibung – you know, exaggeration. And myself I think that the emotional side should be there, because it is in the music. But I mean, with Barenboim we were discussing that one cannot constantly refer to the biography to explain the music. The biography is one thing, and the biography is important to know, to see, the circumstances of the first performances, how he composed the pieces, and so on and so forth. But it does not explain the pieces at all. And you know, when he composed, he had a kind of mesh of motives, of themes, and he organised them very carefully, and it is not a kind of emotion which is thus improvising constantly; that’s an emotion which organised. And that is very important for me, that the organisation is part of the emotion.
But was it your goal to bring Mahler more down to earth for the American public?
Boulez: No. I had no goal, as a matter of fact. I was simply busy with trying to clarify this music for myself. Because, you know, in the French tradition the pieces – orchestral pieces at least – are always rather short. And even in the Viennese School, what one calls the Second Viennese School, pieces are really rather short. The Five Pieces by Schönberg for instance, Opus 16, are short pieces: very expressive, but the trajectory is very easy to manipulate. The Variations of Schönberg are really one variation after another one. They are very well put together, but you don’t have to think of the main line, you have to think of contrasts, from one short piece to another short piece. Also, I didn’t mention Webern, who has very short pieces, and the main preoccupation you have is from another planet let’s say. And for the longest piece, that’s Berg still, and with the pieces of Opus 6 even the third one is not really so gigantic.
But in Mahler you have maybe a movement which is 30 minutes long, or even more, and then you have to organise that. Certainly you cannot just go along and say, “Well I have this emotion at this moment. I am waiting for the second one”, and just play from time to time with holes in the middle. You have to have a trajectory, and to understand the trajectory, and to have the musicians understand what you call the trajectory of the piece. And so then, of course, at the beginning you think about it, and you say, well, I must think of that, because at that time that’s the main point in the piece, where the piece repeats itself or will repeat itself; then you have to pay attention to this and to that and to that, and obviously when you perform it more, then it becomes spontaneous. And in a funny way, the more understanding you are of the form itself, the more spontaneous you can become. Because otherwise, spontaneity is not just giving way to its emotion, but spontaneity is just to drive your soul, let’s say, through the movement, and never lose track of the trajectory you are taking.
I think one of the crucial points is the tempo. Mahler writes critically of a conductor that he heard, and he criticises the lack of flexibility of the tempo. I suppose this is one thing you would agree.
Boulez: Well, the number of times he writes ‘don’t drag’, or ‘don’t rush’, that’s always negative: nicht eilen; nicht schleppen. And he was afraid that you – precisely – that with the weight of the emotion, you just exaggerate what he wanted, and that’s exactly that. So, if you are excited you just push the tempo to the maximum, and then the tempo has absolutely no reason to be this quick. And, on the contrary, if you want to expand, if he writes a ritenuto, or a poco ritenuto or a molto ritenuto you do it, because then he wants that. But I mean, if there is simply nicht schleppen, then you cannot really say, well I feel this emotion at this moments, so I must go slower. Because then you have no continuity, and then, especially that’s very important when, for instance, you have not a crescendo, but a crescendo in tempo let’s say, and then you are going from 4/4 with four quarter notes, to 2/2, to two half notes; it should be absolutely without noticing. You have to go from a pulse to another pulse really, without anybody seeing the moment where you are doing that. And that is very important, especially in the 6th, where you have that in the last movement. You have it a couple of times, but you have that quite a lot at the end especially. Sometimes he wants to precipitate the tempo, and so instead of four beats you have two beats, instead of two beats you have one beat, and it’s very important to do that as smoothly as possible – not chopped, but continuous.
Could we say that the Mahler success in the late ’60s is based on a misunderstanding, to overemotionalise his music?
Boulez: Well, I think you cannot condemn anybody for making that [emotion] more or less, because if that’s the way they feel the music, the music is transformed – or deformed, if you want – but that’s their way of expressing themselves through the music. I find that if you look for authenticity, that certainly if you go against the indications of Mahler and if you make something sentimental where he writes not sentimental, then, I mean, that’s a kind of treason certainly. But I mean, what is not treason. The further the music is from us, then the less authentic you can be: it’s very difficult to be authentic with Mozart because you never know what he would have done exactly. And this whole world of authenticity, for me, is just nonsense because the authenticity doesn’t exist, simply that.
Authenticity is transmitted through literature – so books – but never through a kind of living testimony. And even living testimony, so Bartók for instance recorded some of his music, and so the pianists who are now working full time on the pieces of Bartók, certainly play better than Bartók himself, because he did not practise his own pieces so much. So what you have is what he conceived for the pieces and period. But for the conductor that’s exactly the same, because he has to deal with orchestras who are not familiar with this style, his own style, and it may be he himself also has some difficulties to find a way of bringing the message he knows he wants. But maybe he knows when he performs that he has to change that, to modify that, and so on and so forth. So, I mean you may have a recording which was made when he was young or when he was old, or you have the case of Stravinsky, who was not a very good conductor, full stop. He had a strong personality, and his personality in front of the orchestra was really something very hard and very mighty. But I mean, the technique was not there certainly. If you compare, for instance, the recordings of Furtwängler of Beethoven, and the recordings now of Beethoven – even the best recordings, even the ones that don’t pretend to authenticity – you have a big difference. Furtwängler was influenced by a sort of Wagner/Beethoven, with the tempi much slower, the crescendo exaggerated, and so on and so forth. Well that’s their way of looking at the music, and scores are done to be performed in a kind of personal way, and therefore the only authenticity is the authenticity of a personality. Otherwise it does not exist.
Do we now have more perspectives on Mahler?
Boulez: Yes, we certainly have more perspectives. But at this time also, he [Bernstein] was not the only one. At this time you had Solti, for instance – and I say Solti because he was one of the main forces in the performing level at this time – but I mean there were other ones, like Mehta for instance as well. So I don’t think he was overpowering. He was certainly a very, very strong force, but he was not the only one. And there were already people rebelling against this kind of overromanticised type of performance. You know, there was not a kind of total agreement, certainly not.
What did the composer Boulez learn from Mahler’s scores?
Boulez: […] the use of the orchestra, certainly. That’s not a use of the orchestra which can be used the same way now, but I mean certainly the weight of the instrument is very well-calculated in Mahler, and also the proportion of the dynamic. The dynamic proportions are very important there, because when he has a fortissimo for some instruments and pianissimo for another instrument, he knows absolutely the weight of the instruments, of the register, of the colour. And you know, generally when you see some scores – even in the 20th century – you have a kind of general dynamic for all the orchestra, and that’s a very primitive use of dynamic. Mahler was really modern in that.
What were the first Mahler works you conducted?
Boulez: The first one I conducted was the 5th Symphony, because it was very little performed at this time – ‘65 or ‘66, I don’t remember – and then, you know with the BBC it was my way to try how I could do it. And I don’t remember the performance; I don’t think it was the peak of the performance I have ever done, because it was the first time, simply that. I knew, of course, the style I had heard some of the works, but I was a beginner and when you are beginning, as much as I was at ease with Stravinsky, or even with Webern, so much I was not at ease with Mahler, certainly. And that was a style which was very distant from my style. When I conducted Webern it was close to me. When I was conducting Mahler, especially this Funeral March, it reminded me of Chopin more than anything else. Of course, because this funeral march, I was playing it on the piano when I was a child, and the funeral march was a kind of a cliché for me. And I had quite a lot of difficulties with entering into this cliché.
You conducted a lot of Mahler in the States and in Europe for many, many years. Is there some improvement in the orchestras?
Boulez: Well, I think certainly the works are more known now than before. I mean, in ‘65 it was especially 5, 6 and 7 that were not really performed very often. In a funny way the 4th was performed, the 9th was performed, and 1 was performed: the work where you had no voice. And 5, 6, 7 were considered to be difficult works and not really very attractive for the audience. Now that’s the contrary: if you play 5, you know, the audience is full immediately. But at this time, certainly they were not often performed, and then the musicians have to, not fight, but grow more familiar with the idiom first and with the notes second; or maybe contrary, with the notes first and the idiom second.
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