Interview in „CLASSICAL GUITAR” (England) 3/1999 - Auszüge
Interview in “CLASSICAL GUITAR ” 3/1999 - extract
Classical Guitar: What was the first instrument that you learned to play?
Tilman Hoppstock: With a teacher . . . it was the cello in '68. Two years later I started playing the guitar. I had started earlier but with a teacher it was in '70 /7 1.
Classical Guitar: What about your parents? Who were the influences on your early musical life?
Tilman Hoppstock: My parents are both pianists. I grew up with piano, chamber music and so on.
Classical Guitar: What inspired the guitar? Did you choose the guitar?
Tilman Hoppstock: This was funny - because it was a teacher of mine - it was at normal school and we were singing every morning and I loved the folk-songs. Every morning started with singing. At seven years old I started to play the guitar with learning chords by myself. Later I got lessons and I was a little disappointed to learn how to play open string and these exercises.
Classical Guitar: But you'd been playing the cellofor two years . . . what was the standard of your cello playing then?
T.H.: In the beginning, you mean? You know, my cello playing was very bad in those first years because it wasn't the instrument I wanted to learn. My mother was very interested and so, as a child does I played and I had a good teacher but I wasn't very enthusiastic about the cello and my playing. Much later when I studied both instruments as a professional - the years between the age from 16 to 20 - I also worked quite hard and intensive on my cello piaying.
Classical Guitar: You still play the cello?.
T.H.: Yes, in a string quartet together with colleagues from the academy.
Classical Guitar: What kind of repertoire do you play with the cello?
T.H.: During my studies I preferred the Classical Romantics: Brahms, Beethoven, etc, but after my studies I was involved more and more with Baroque music. Four years ago I recorded the sonata by Sergei Rachmanninof on CD.
Classical Guitar: You play the Baroque cello music on authentic instruments?
T.H.: No. It's a question of money to have a very good old instrument, but I try to play in a way which gives a more authentic feeling, for example I hold the bow more to the middle.
Classical Guitar: Talking of Baroque music, would you say that you were a specialist in thisfield?
T.H.: I don't know. I'm not specialised in only one thing. For a long time I learned a lot from friends and other musicians who play only Baroque music and from the musical family of Gustav Leonhardt, Franz BriAggen, Anna Bylsma - you know the cellist? So these influences have made me go on to learn a lot about this music.
Classical Guitar: It is interesting that you play the cello in this way and yet you play the modern classical guitar and not the lute.
T.H.: No, it's too much. Like flamenco music - you can't do everything. I also used to play the piano but I've stopped because it's too much. When I adapt Baroque or - for example - flamenco music for my instrument I always try to figure out the typical idiom and sense of that piece which I play, to transform it on guitar authentically as possible. I like to do that very much even though I know it will never be the same as it can be with original instruments.
Classical Guitar: What do you consider is the heart of the transcription? Take the D minor Suite by De Visée that you played the other night; the ornaments were very precise and worked out, but at the same timefelt very natural. How did you approach this arrangement?
T.H.: I get inspiration from listening to the playing of performers on original instruments. I always try to feel the pulse of this music which helps to form the ornaments as results of that. The appogiaturas and other ornaments mostly are defined in the music by itself and sometimes you do things which correspond specially with your instruments. So it happens that the same piece sounds with different ornaments depending on the instrument. Sometimes I also improvise a bit.
In general the important thing is to understand Baroque music as a language. First you have to open your mind to details, which do not mean the ornaments, of course. In the beginning you always have to pronounce all the 'words' very deeply and then you follow the big lines and phrases. It is the opposite to the romantic style.
Classical Guitar: The extensive use of the capo was a feature of your concert. Do you see that as opening up more possibilitiesfor the guitar?
T.H.: Yes, I discovered years ago that I like to play with a capo. Sometimes with the minuets by Sor. I use it for some pieces. It's not original but it gives me a new idea for the sound. There is no historical sense using the capo with the Sor, none; it just gives a new colour with a new key. For the De Vis6e music the capo gives an illusion of that sound of a Baroque guitar and all the ornaments are easier to play.
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Classical Guitar: In a recording you want it to be perfect. Is that why?
T.H.: In a recording I want to reach the best musical result possible. Of course after some years I change my mind, but at the moment it should be the best. I have a problem if there is a phrase which hasn't that important balance of phasis and emphasis. It is much easier to play without technical mistakes than to record a piece, even a very easy study by Sor, which shows deepness, colour and balance.
Classical Guitar: Which brings me to ask: after making so many recordings, do you still enjoy the recording process?
T.H.: Unfortunately I need very long time to realise my ideas on tape. But finally there are some pieces which present the best I could do in that period of my life depending on what I was able to do. The atmosphere of a concert of course you never feel during a recording session but it happens sometimes that I go much deeper into music than in concert.
Classical Guitar: Where do you record?
T.H.: The first four or five CDs I made in a normal studio. I had two or three days, but this isn't enough time for me. I need much more time than this. After a few years I bought m own studio and I work there with a good friend. We have enough time to prepare. The difference between the recording and the concert is not a big one but this extra 10 per cent that I want to reach - this is what takes a long time.
Classical Guitar: You obviously have very high standards.
T.H.: Of course, a 'live' recording is about the moment. But then, you know, it's a live recording. There is a difference that I can accept.
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Classical Guitar: Froberger is a tough composer You are bringing his music to lightfor other guitarists. The Lamento in Ebfrom Suite No. 12 Sopra la dolorosa perdita della Mista di Fernando IV is an exquisite piece.
T.H.: Do you know the Tombeau? It goes through nearly all the keys, a very deep piece.
Classical Guitar: With the Lamento I noticed that there were a lot of interruptions.
T.H.: Yes, thousands of different colours, an atmosphere about someone who has died; you remember the good moments and the bad moments. Froberger is always like this, four or five Lamenti and the Tombeau with changing atmospheres and chord changes. With this music I always try to keep in mind words, lyrics.
Classical Guitar: What is the heart of, say, the Cembalo Partita transcriptions?
T.H.: First it's another thing to listen to the music than to play it. It is the feeling of that difference. I first got this feeling playing alongside the orchestra with the cello. Because you were part of the whole thing. It is one thing to sit on the side of the audience and another to be able to go deep inside the whole body of music. Colleagues had transcribed the whole Partita, but I had to accept that the Courante would be impossible for me to play on the guitar. Not the way I wanted to do it, anyway! So firstly I have to convey what I feel of course everybody does - and with a lot of pieces I have to realise that I cannot always do what I want to do.
Classical Guitar: Can you quickly assess whether or not a piece is going to be playable on the guitar?
T.H.: After many years of playing this music, it is possible for me to do so.
Classical Guitar: Tell me about your publishing. You have published your transcriptions.
T.H.: I founded my own label (PRIM-Germany). One thing I have published is the Lute Suites. This is not so special in itself because there are many versions. The special thing is that I publish the keys normally played on the guitar, the 995 in A minor not in G, and also publish the cello version, which is A minor not C minor, the original. Also the tablature: that is a little different from the original Bach, so you have these three versions, three systems all in A minor. You can compare them very easily.
Classical Guitar: How many records have you made?
T.H.: Thirteen CDs.
Classical Guitar: What is the latest one?
T.H.: One with a very good tenor, Christoph Prégardien with music by Schubert, Spohr and Brahms. The other one that my record company has been interested in publishing is highlights of Spanish and Latin-American music and some Bach.
Classical Guitar: Which pieces?
T.H.: Villa-Lobos Preludes etc. Asturias. I enjoyed recording this. I played it when I was 14 or 15, but I started to play it seriously this year (1998).
Classical Guitar: Is it your own transcription?
T.H.: Yes I did a few new things with it. For example the middle section with the final ascending arpeggio, the whole line is played with harmonics, not doubled notes. Maybe it's new, I'm not sure.
Classical Guitar: You seem to be very active, with ajull musical life.
T.H.: The problem is that I can never decide which is the right way, to be a concert player or to teach, to play the cello, to transcribe, several things I like so much to do...
Classical Guitar: You can't decide which is the real Tilman Hoppstock?
T.H.: Everything is a part of me.
Classical Guitar: You have recorded some Barrios.
T.H.: That was an early recording. One of those recordings made in two days!
Classical Guitar: Does Barrios form part of your concert repertoire nowadays?
T.H.: No, I love Barrios but I don't play it in concert.
Classical Guitar: Your recordings of the 12 Etudes by Villa-Lobos are astonishing.
T.H.: So much effort for a concert though! I love that cycle and have invested many years in understanding that music.
Classical Guitar: Do you play them all?
T.H.: When I was 19 or 20 1 played them all the time in concert and I have recorded them two times, first when I was 19 years old, the second time in 1989.
Classical Guitar: And the Ponce Preludes?
T.H.:Yes, I played six preludes quite often in concert. Perhaps next time I will do it again with twelve of them.
Classical Guitar: Do you feel, as an artist, you must have something new to say?
T.H.:Yes, this is the reason why I don't play a lot of pieces by Albéniz. When I heard the Barrueco recording I said 'Ok, that's it. I can't add anything new to that!' Julian Bream and John Williams also gave a deep impression for that music. It is curious for me now to play that piece - Asturias - which is played to death. Here I found some very new details which has given me motivation to practice that piece. But anyway there is that difference between life and recording. On stage I play just for fun and of course the atmosphere is much more important than to hit the audience with new ideas all the time. For recording a piece I definitely think first what the reason is to do that.
Classical Guitar: In your concert You use the score. Do you always playfrom the score or is that just a guide?
T.H.: Yes, because it saves time. When I was 20 1 always played without the music. I remember it was in '82/'83 that I had a total drop-out during a concert, twice during a Bach Suite. After this concert I was totally shocked because I couldn't get back into these pieces during the concert. I asked myself: 'Why are you doing this?' I don't want to upset myself. I mostly play with the score now. I save so much time and am much more relaxed. Some pieces don't need the score, obviously. When I play Paco de Lucia, Falla or Villa-Lobos Preludes I feel OK without reading the music but most of the time I prefer to have the score in front of me, like the cembalo players who always play with the score.
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Classical Guitar: Concerts and recordings are two very different things. What about your next CD?
T.H.: The recital CD next year is aimed at a 'normal' audience. Something for business...
Classical Guitar: Crossing over?
T.H.: I try to do both. In concert I would never play three Suites by Froberger; too concentrated and difficult to follow. But on a recording it would be worth doing. I am preparing another recording of clavier music by Bach, Louis Couperin, Buxtehude and Froberger. A mixture with one theme, one idea, but with music of different styles to that I hope it will be easy to follow for 15 minutes!
