March 31, 2024 • 65 mins
There is a way to listen to music so it touches the very core of you as a human being. I was so fortunate to discover this almost 30 years ago through the teachings of the Spanish conductor Jordi Mora. With these five newly made conversations with him, I invite you to a very special journey into this fascinating and deeply moving world of music.
His unique teachings opens up the inner world of music in a way that creates connections to our life experiences as a human being. I recently I met up with him in Barcelona to once again delve into the fascinating world of this approach that is called phenomenology of music. The result are these 5 podcast episodes. I hope you will feel inspired after listening to it! Annabel Guaita is frequently touring in Norway and abroad with the concert lecture: "The Art of Listening For feedback, questions or booking: post@lyttelos.no www.youtube.com/@AnnabelGuaita Episode 1: Introduction. What is musical phenomenology? Musical example: Edvard Grieg Heimweh opus 57 nr 6 Summary In this extensive conversation, we delve into the deep connections between music, phenomenology, and life experiences. Mora recounts personal experiences with his renowned teacher, Sergiu Celibidache and how these interactions shaped his understanding of music. They touch upon the importance of evolution in music and life, emphasizing the continual change and growth inherent in both spheres. Breathing is highlighted as a key element in music, reflecting the essence of continuity and evolution. The discussion delves into the significance of unity in music, aiming for a cohesive whole that reflects the essence of a piece. "The four Essentialities" are outlined, covering evolution, breathing, continuity, and the ultimate goal of oneness within a musical composition. Mora emphasizes the experiential nature of phenomenology, noting that true understanding comes from personal engagement and interpretation rather than written texts. In conclusion, the conversation underscores the richness of direct musical experience in conveying the essence of phenomenology and life itself. JORDI MORA, conductor
Born in Barcelona, he begins his musical studies at the city's Music Conservatory. He graduates at the Höchschule für Musik in Würzburg as an oboist, and graduates in Musicology and Philosophy at the University of Munich with the thesis "Organisation of the vertical functions in the instrumentation of the symphonic work by Beethoven".
He studies orchestra conducting and phenomenology of music primarily with Sergiu Celibidache, and he has attended masterclasses and conducting courses at the University of Mainz, the Münchner Philarmoniker in Munich, and other courses in Trier, London, Stuttgart, and Paris. He has been principal conductor of the National Orchestra of Greece and of the Orquestra Simfònica del Vallès.
He regularly conducts orchestras in Germany, Spain, France, the United States, Russia, Romania, Greece, Argentina and Venezuela as a guest conductor.
At the same time, he is also involved in many pedagogical projects, especially in Argentina (Fundación Cultural), Switzerland, Spain, Italy and Germany. In 2004 he became professor of orchestra conducting at the Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya (ESMUC )and from 2010 to 2015, guest professor at the Grieg Akademy in Bergen (Norway).
He is currently conductor of the Symphony Orchestra of "Segle XXI" and of the Bruckner Akademie Orchester. With this last orchestra, he is performing the complete symphonic works of this composer.
He was appointed as principal guest conductor of the Orchestre Philharmonique du Lebanon (LPO) and Franz Schubert Philharmonie as well.
Contact
www.jordi-mora.com
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:15):
We're here in Barcelona. I'm very happy to see you again.
Jordi Mora. Thank you. Same. We have been teacher and student for almost 30 years now. Yes.
And it's very nice now because it's like we are looking back,
both of us, to what has happened and how the impact you've made on my choices as a musician.
(00:42):
And I want to I want to just share the best memory I have with you was I came
here to Barcelona to study with a pianist Albert Attenelle it was in 94,
and I had wonderful lessons with him and I didn't know that you were teaching
at this Escola de Musica de Barcelona you were teaching chamber music you were around 40 years old.
(01:17):
Yes 45 something like that
and we formed a group me
and a cellist, Jose Mor and
a clarinet player, Carlas Pertegaz, and we had lessons
with you three times a month excuse me
i was at this year i was
40 exactly 40 40 41
(01:39):
now 93 and i remember
you as this strong incredible radiant powerful
teacher that you know just opened the pandora's box for me with music and i
was like what nobody has been talking about music in this manner you are showing
(02:01):
me something that i don't really know what is,
it's connecting with me as a human being.
And then I, after one or two lessons, I ran out and bought a recorder.
One of these DUT players, you know. And I said, I'm going to record every word you say about music.
(02:21):
And that became this journey for 30 years.
I remember. Yeah. I remember this fish stitching. Yeah. With your, yeah.
I was like shaking because it was very strong, what you were saying.
And you were, how many, how long time was it since you were finished with Chilibidake at that point?
(02:47):
Well, I knew Chilibidake, I met him November 73.
I went to Germany to study conducting when I was at the end of 19 years old.
And then my parents asked a special important person here in music,
(03:10):
classical music, where's the best place?
I could have gone also to the United States. I had the possibility to go to Indianapolis.
And then this person said no, if he wants to learn music, Germany.
And, well, I was very happy because Germany is the language of Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, and so on.
(03:37):
And I had the intuition that I didn't know very much, but I liked the idea.
So I went to the Bayreuth Festival in August 1973.
And afterwards, I went to Würzburg to study conducting. conducting.
Why Würzburg? Because in Würzburg there was one Catalan conductor,
(04:02):
a little bit older than me, I was 20, that he was studying already with Celi Vidalche.
I knew Celi Vidalche from name, but not really more than this.
And well, I went into the high school of music in Würzburg, but not as a conductor,
(04:26):
because I couldn't play piano well enough.
So I started with Oboe, and I did the whole studies in Oboe.
And then I met Francesc, that was this Catalan conductor, and he told me,
do you want to be a conductor?
Yes, yes, and I'm looking for something which gives me answers to many questions
(04:50):
that I have since many years. Well, I am with Chelyabinsk if you want to come to Stuttgart.
That was 180 kilometers from Stuttgart.
I didn't choose it. I was put there. So I went with Francesc, November 73.
And the first thing I experienced with Chelyabinsk was a choir rehearsal.
(05:13):
And the choir rehearsal was the Mozart C minor, C minor mass.
And I was without
words because this is
what I'm looking for after five minutes rehearsal does this is what them but
the first experience which I like was with choir was not with Augusta that's
(05:38):
something yeah and he gave after the the rehearsal.
A class, a teaching of the people who were there.
All the rehearsals were open with him, you could always get in.
And then in the teaching, he started to speak about relationship,
(06:04):
about phrasing, and then start to phonology, which for me, it was,
I had no idea what this is.
But the most important thing is the questions that I had with 15,
16, 17 and so on about music.
And these first five minutes of rehearsal, I knew here's the answer.
(06:31):
I knew it. It's very similar to what I experienced when I met you.
Because my questions as a student, I had already been studying piano for four years.
And i had this impression that musicality
is very subjective you do a little bit here you a
little bit there this is very nice moments but but but
where is actually the where's the direction i
(06:53):
was lost i felt really lost it's
like musical parts which is like how does it connect with the beginning and
there was no answer to this because it this this sense of of finding finding
some kind of superior idea about musicality.
(07:14):
Yeah, that's the point. Because what I felt is that in the music world.
Either you have players which they play very subjective and very as they want
without really criterion.
And on the other side, you have music analysis, form analysis,
(07:42):
very straight and very complicated sometimes.
So the world of thinking in music was separated of the world of doing.
Doing and thinking, they were separated. So, I was looking for some knowledge
which has directly to do with doing, with playing, with singing,
(08:05):
with conducting, but directly.
And it has to be a very intelligent person, which is at the same time a fantastic musician.
It has to be both. and I
didn't stay with because he was so nice and so fantastic he was also very very
(08:25):
difficult with treatment sometimes but because he represented for me the person which unifies the.
The playing of music, the realization of music, with what you have to know to
make the realization better.
(08:47):
To go into the realization. Not speaking about music, there's C major,
G major, there's first tema, second tema, this is all static.
I learned with him that the knowledge can be incredible static facts,
facts, isolated facts, and facts which are true,
(09:09):
but doesn't help you to go into the piece.
And then I saw that phenomenology of music, which Csillagy took from Husserl and von Ansermet.
Philosopher Husserl, who grounded the phenomenology at the first half of the
20th century in Germany, in Freiburg.
(09:32):
And then also Ernest Ansermed a little bit later took some ideas of Husserl
and he was in this direction.
But Chelyabinsk was very, very constant and very consequent of applying the
phenomenology because he saw that it goes to the point.
(09:55):
Phenomenology goes to the point, to the essence. And I was amazed to have found
one person who makes both at the same time and makes a unity of both,
because I'm very intellectual also.
But intellectual alone is not enough. So that was my first meeting with Chelyabinsk.
(10:23):
Yeah, so we're going to come a little bit closer to what is phenomenology,
maybe for the listeners who is not so familiar with it.
And that was also one of my first questions as a student, because one of my
fellow students at the school,
Sebastian, I talked to him and said, wow, this Jordi Mora, he's talking about
(10:44):
music in a way that I never experienced before. What is his background?
Well, he said, well, he's speaking about phenomenology of music.
So what is phenomenology of music? If you would kind of summarize it very,
very, it's a big question, I know, but if we can kind of summarize,
(11:04):
what is phenomenology itself?
Phenomenology, in general, is a method to understand reality so much as possible.
That means that to understand reality,
phenomenology goes away from science, which is a truth but out of the life experience of person,
(11:31):
and goes away from too much personal understanding of the things,
which the taste,
it's very important.
Not too much subjective and not objective, which has nothing to do with life experience.
(11:57):
Phenomenology helps you as a method, intellectual method, of course, to.
Little by little, understand which is important, which is less important,
which is not important at all, and which is essential.
Yeah, that's why it's a method who helps very much to understand the things
(12:27):
and the facts, but not from a static point,
but from a vitality point.
That you have the experience, you shake inside.
So it is a knowledge who helps you to listen to music more deeply as before you knew it.
(12:54):
I know that Cesar Vitake used to use this heimweh, this theme from Grieg. Yes.
Should we just try to go into that a little bit, just to make an example? Yeah, yeah.
And then in music, phenomenology is a special good, because music is so abstract
that one has the feeling he can do whatever he wants.
(13:18):
And thus, the phenomenology just respects the own singularity of every person.
There are not two persons which are equal, but at the same time there is something
essential that all we have to discover to meet together what in phenomenology
we call intersubjectivity.
(13:39):
To meet in the intersubjectivity. That means you are different as me,
but if you listen to to the essence of this phrase, of this part.
And me too, we meet and witness the structure of this part.
So it is very good that we go now to the first example so that we have a direct
(14:05):
experience of what I'm talking about.
Let's do that. Let's move to the piano. Yes.
(14:31):
Music.
(14:56):
So, this is a wonderful piece of Greek, Jaime, and it is very clear.
What is the structure of this melody?
He repeats again and again the same.
(15:20):
It is very simple. So the phenomenology teaches us that everything is in evolution.
It comes four times, but not one of these four times is equal.
One will be the birth of the peace, then it will go to more or to less.
(15:46):
We will see. That depends on the harmony. money.
So there is an evolution, what we say in phenomenology is a landscape,
which mountains and valleys.
And the mountain, the first mountain is like this and goes back to the valley.
The second mountain is a little bit higher, goes to the valley, but not so deep.
(16:12):
And we have to listen to what Gilles Vidacke called the discovering of the landscape.
This evolution, you say, I remember you said this evolution is not something you choose.
No. It's something that happens in us. Yeah. Either we want it or not.
So that is the intersubjectivity or the essence of hearing.
(16:33):
Either you're a musician or not. So the difference will be not music.
(16:56):
There's no evolution here. You hear four times, practically the same. but,
already,
melodically the second time it goes a little bit more in the tension as is the
(17:19):
first time because a little bit higher the note, that's right,
that's right I'm speaking only melodically And then again, then you can think,
if I listen again to the same thing,
(17:41):
so that will be probably less because I knew this already.
I know that from before. And what I know is has less tension of what is new.
At the beginning is new and then is no. No, but Greek utilize the harmony to
(18:03):
show us that when it comes back, it's not less, but it is more.
So you're saying that just because it's repeating so much, the tendency of this
tension is already very strong.
Music.
(18:24):
So it's a little more second time.
And now it's equal, so theoretically it's less. Theoretically it's less.
And then to close.
That's right. But Greek, it's not only melody, but harmony.
(18:46):
If you put the harmony, it becomes everything more clear.
Yeah, let's do it slowly and talk me through it.
Music.
(19:08):
So less as before, it's a little bit more as the first time that we went down.
Now, important, listen to harmony.
Music.
New harmony, new perspective.
Doppel dominant and now the most incredible dissonant.
(19:31):
Music.
And realization. So with the harmony, I see evolution from beginning towards more.
And then when he repeats the same, the harmony opens more because the tension is greater.
(19:54):
So finally, I'm going to the second part of the melody.
And here is what we call the culmination of the first. That's right.
(20:19):
And that for me creates the perspective that makes everything a part of the whole.
Absolutely. because at the beginning we have four bars one, two,
three, four and then when we listen the first, the second is a little bit more
than the first so we have a big,
(20:42):
part, a bigger part and we have a bigger second part so we have first we have
four and then we have two and two and at the end we have one,
One direction towards the culmination and one direction back.
So at the end, we have just one phrase.
(21:06):
So that is one of the most important things that phenomenology teaches us.
First, we have four, then we have two, and at the end, we have one.
So the goal is to go to the one.
One phrase. I don't speak about one motif who repeats four times.
(21:30):
I don't speak about one bow, two bows.
I speak one melody. When I say one melody, everything is inside of this one.
And the structure of this one, it is like man is, this is breathing.
(21:52):
When we breathe, we inhale, there's tension, and we start to exhale,
maximal force, and then goes to relaxation.
We go towards, we culminate, and we go back.
Every breath that every human being does in life, it is like this.
(22:16):
So music is not like this because it's a casuality.
Music is like this because it's
a mirror of the inner structure of human being, but in sound relations.
So what makes us happy is for multiplicity of notes and motives and so,
(22:38):
finally to go to the one melody.
So how we play a beginner, a child which is starting or a mature person.
(23:00):
This is not music. Every equally. Equal.
Equal, not evolution, not breathing, not going to, not coming back from.
And this is the difference. That's why music, to go to music,
we need notes, but music are not the notes. notes.
(23:25):
Music are the life experience of the result of the relationship between the notes.
Yeah, the relationship. I remember you said once that this melody is something
like a history of the E, because the E is this first fundamental note.
(23:49):
Music.
So that shows that this E is so dependent on its context it appears so different
(24:16):
we experience it so differently if it's a fundamental note a fifth or a seventh
and that's also this this idea of,
listening to how it appears in the context it's very interesting So,
notes, they have to tell us something, an history.
(24:42):
If there is no history, why do you listen to a nice history when someone reads it?
Because there's an evolution there. And now we go to the mountain and we found
a fantastic lake. and this lake was a special flower which I was looking since many years.
(25:05):
So there's an evolution, everything mountain, lake, flower.
So in music we have to go always towards something or we go back from we have already found it.
That was a very different, difficult knowledge for me to understand in the beginning. Thank you.
(25:30):
But I think it has to do with because we always are in evolution, isn't it?
So the evolution is never static. It's never the same.
That means that it's always towards or against. Yeah.
Towards or coming back from. Or coming back from, yeah. It's very difficult
to understand it on an intellectual level. Yes.
(25:51):
Yeah. Yeah, the thing is, why we are happy, the feeling,
the life experience when we get a whole melody or when a child is playing note
by note. What is the difference?
Because we are evolution. That's the point.
(26:14):
So there's a mirror of what we are. And then there's an identification with
my essence by listening to relationship which has an evolution and it has a phrasing.
Phrasing, I mean tension and relaxation.
It breathes, it goes somewhere, so that's me. There's identification.
(26:39):
If it's equal and mechanical, I don't have any identification because I'm not mechanical.
Human being is not mechanical, has nothing to do with machine,
has nothing to do with repeat and repeat and repeat and going nowhere.
And that is why phenomenology help us, teach us, everything is in evolution,
(27:05):
everything has to breathe, and everything has to be in continuity.
I cannot do ta-ra-ta-di-di-di-da, and then go to the bathroom,
And five minutes later, it's not possible.
Music obliges us, if you start, you have to finish.
(27:27):
Because the unity is so perfect in music that you cannot cut it in the time.
By reading a book, you can read a book, one chapter, two chapters,
you close the book, and the next day in the evening, you keep reading. That's possible.
(27:47):
Better next day and not one year later. One year later you have to start again.
But it's possible to go on by meeting some gods.
If the book is very, very good and like this touching, you have to read. You cannot stop it.
(28:08):
But if you stop and you go one day later forwards, it is possible.
In music, this is not possible.
Music is so close everything with everything that it has to be done as a whole immediately.
Immediately you cannot put it
(28:30):
in parts and that's why music this uh
feeling of oneness is so strong and if you think uh tolstoy war and peace and
you have 1200 pages And you need three weeks to read it.
(28:53):
Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is 30 minutes.
But what you experience in 30 minutes is incredible because you have everything.
You have erudicity, lyrism, and suffering, and joy, and very, very good structure.
(29:14):
So music has the power in a very short time to show incredible parts of your inner nature.
You don't need three months or three weeks or two weeks. No,
no. 30 minutes can be a whole life.
(29:34):
Do you think it's possible to grasp this big, long symphonies the first time
you hear it? or do you need to really know it to get this continuity?
What is the...
How is it possible to have a unity? Who builds the unity?
(29:56):
The unity in itself is nothing, doesn't exist. The unity is the result of the
relationship between the small parts.
So the small parts make the unity possible.
So it is possible to listen to every small part the first time that you... No, it's not possible.
(30:18):
A Mozart symphony is a little bit easier to listen as a Bruckner symphony, for example.
But you have to listen, and to listen again, and now again, and you start to
catch relationships which at the beginning you didn't hear.
So that's why it's necessary to make a study and to give you time to make this piece is yours.
(30:44):
This is the one phenomenological sentence, a very important one.
So unity is the result of relationship of the small parts.
So you have to become aware of the small parts and that needs time.
(31:06):
Some of the strongest experiences I had during your teaching is when you were
pointing to certain things in the music that you said to me,
no, the composer has to have this chord.
You're pointing out, it's not possible to not have this chord.
It's like something as a consequence.
(31:26):
Like, for example, when he's in the end, and you say it will drop too easily if it doesn't support.
You have to support. We have to support. So should we play the whole page?
And maybe you can talk about you know the second time yeah or you can start
(31:46):
over in the second part already yeah.
Music.
(32:52):
Yeah, very nice. So when we hear after the middle part, this is A,
B, A, yeah, there's three parts.
We listen to this completely different than the first time. Why?
Because the first time...
(33:17):
And now it starts to... the evolution one octave higher.
New, something is new and something is similar. This is a good composition.
But it goes towards more. It makes the evolution.
(33:43):
And then there is a moment you think you go down.
And Greek, right scrachendo.
Bridge.
(34:09):
And then goes back. Goes back from what?
From one moment of the piece which the tension was the most stronger.
So, in one small,
Motif, it takes birth and then goes, and relax.
(34:35):
But what happens in the small motif happens also in the whole piece.
The whole piece is a question of start from silence.
Always music comes from silence to go back to silence. That's music.
And when the end is an end,
(34:59):
and when the beginning is a beginning, when the relationship between the evolution
towards the culmination,
it is proportional in harmonic relationship with the way from the culminant point to the end.
So if you grow until the culminant point and then you go back and you relax
(35:25):
exactly the same tension that you have boiled it until the culmination,
then the end will be an end.
And that's very important. So it's balance. It's balance.
So it's discovering what gives tension and what gives us this tension.
Tension gives, first of all, everything what is new.
(35:49):
Everything what is new. What is new. So sound. Gives tension.
Silence. That's right. So when it's new, yeah, when I do this.
Wow. And then, when I experience this again, it is not any more new,
(36:14):
it's old, no, not old, but I know,
so, I don't know, new, tension,
I know, relaxation, this is a natural tendency, This is the first thing,
combination of new things and new things.
(36:35):
And that the composer can make also to go against the natural tendency, for example,
You hear here.
(36:55):
That goes down and down and down and down. This is too long down. That's why he writes.
So the melody goes down and the composer wants a crescendo.
(37:19):
So he goes against the natural tendency of the pitch of the melody.
And that creates tension. So you can go with the natural tendency or against the natural tendency.
And the composer sometimes goes to the natural tendency against,
(37:40):
excuse me, to create this tension.
This tension for what? To have the culmination.
And then how he's going back after the culmination. Here.
Through a way which I already know. What is the essence of the sonata form?
(38:04):
What is the recapitulation? Why recapitulation?
Because I have to go back after the culmination, which is at the end of the development.
So this is a fantastic example to learn many things.
But one of the most important things of this piece is that he goes to the culminant
(38:26):
point by going against the melody.
Shall we hear that? Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, but you cannot start so much piano, because there are four bars that you will go down.
(38:47):
Start from the beginning, you will see, from the beginning.
Music.
(39:14):
And now, octave more.
Let's.
And a little bit more.
(39:35):
And relaxation. Pianissimo, pianissimo, Annabelle, pianissimo.
That was not pianissimo. Very important, the pianissimo.
Why? Because the pianissimo is the relaxation of this.
Music.
And now relaxation.
(39:56):
And then, yeah, go. And then how do I build the tension back?
By experience the same as I did.
Music.
(40:38):
Session. Why is there so much tension with the F? Because F belongs not to E-minor.
Music.
That's right. F is a lot of tension. But why doesn't he just...
He could just stop there. That's right, but here is a...
(41:02):
This is a coda tension and he says bye bye this is the bye bye what is a coda?
Because I remember very much that coda was we learned at school that coda was
this ending of a piece and it was called a tale but nobody explained,
(41:23):
the real phenomenological reason for a coda,
before you started to talk about The coda is when you go back and you think
it is finished, there is something lacking still,
there is some tension inside us.
(41:43):
And then the coda is necessary to liberate us from this tension by expressing attention.
So the coda is the last chance that life gives to us to have a wonderful end.
(42:05):
This is the last chance. So, Greek things, this is too simple. I cannot...
(42:28):
So he takes this little tension that's still in us, and he expresses the tension.
By expressing the tension, you liberate. It's like you have a relationship.
This relationship at the beginning is very nice, and then you fight.
Yeah, there's a lot of bling.
(42:50):
And then you go back. Okay, you make your way. I make your way. And we are friends.
But at the end, you have the feeling, I have to call him once because there's
one thing which is not clear. And then you call him.
What you told me, it's very good, but you forgot that I did this because... And then you say, yes.
(43:17):
You're right. And then you're free. Then you hang the phone and this relationship is,
Good end. This is not. Left with tension. Left in tension. You see. That's the goal.
That's the last goal. That's the goal. Yeah.
And that's exciting to bring into bigger forms when you start to.
(43:40):
I remember we did the Mozart sonata this. F major.
And the F minor section in the middle was leaving tension.
Yeah. And we. And this. I don't know if I can play it now. But.
And then in the end it's... Yeah, yeah.
(44:03):
And you asked me, why does Mozart write this coda in major? Yeah.
And you didn't want to answer me that lesson. You said, you have to think about
it one week. That's my system.
Yeah. That's Celibidake's system also. And Celibidache made questions,
and he answered the question perhaps one year later.
(44:26):
This is a poem. Not one week. Yeah, one week or so. Why?
Because important is not that you get the answer, but the way you make to answer this.
And there were some questions he did never answer.
(44:48):
And he took this to the sepultura, to the grave.
Oh, he took that answer. Yes, he never answered.
This is the last teaching already. You have to find it. You have to find it yourself.
Yes, because you finally, every one of us, we are the best and finally only
(45:17):
one teacher of ourselves.
That is what Chelyabinsk is. But you took some of the knowledge from Chelyabinsk
and you structured it in different ways.
I remember you were talking to me about the four essentialities. Yeah, yeah.
Should we like summarize it up with the four essentialities maybe?
(45:42):
Because you've been talking about breathing here. Yeah, yeah.
You call it, I remember you called it the two ways directionality,
which is opening and closing.
Well, we have already spoken about this.
The essentialities help us to have more order.
(46:05):
So it's as normal as every student,
and this is also fantastic in phenomenology, because it gives you a lot of creativity.
Because every of us are different.
So if I teach you something, you just, when you understood really what I mean,
(46:29):
there's a moment that when you explain to other people, you explain that in your way.
That's normal. But it has to become yours.
This is not, Maestro Mora said, this, and this, and this.
And then, no, no.
You have to practice this. It has to become yours.
(46:54):
And then you teach this in your way.
And the goal is the same. So I did that with Chelyabinsk also, because it's normal.
So the situation, if I'm teaching at the university, or people which are only
four years with me and not 30 like you. So I cannot teach in the same way.
(47:18):
I have to give him four years, the maximum of information. I cannot wait.
We will do this in eight years now.
So I develop a way to teaching phenomenology which goes a little bit faster and gives you the whole.
Important knowledge. And this is what if we have to find.
(47:47):
The essence of the piece, then we have to know which are the essence normally,
not only music, but also in life.
And the essence of music are the same the essence in life. There's no difference.
On the other way, the essence in music are these because we are like this.
(48:12):
First human being and then what human being does music, ok then music has to be like him,
so the four essentialities you always start
with first one is that everything is in evolution everything is in evolution
so there is no two moments which are equal in our life as well in our lives
(48:35):
even if you think you are the same now now and five years before. No, you are not.
And you are not the same now and one day before. We are continuously changing and evolving.
And one started in the moment of the conception and will finish in the moment of the death.
(48:59):
So, like a candle, yeah? You put fire in a candle, there's no one instant that
the candle doesn't have an evolution towards the end, towards that.
But we like this in the moment that we are born, the evolution, yeah, until we die.
That will be the first essence. So we have to look at the evolution of the piece
(49:27):
if you want to transform these notes in music. music.
But how look this evolution? And then we come to the second.
Is an evolution so.
(49:47):
It goes up, it breathes, and then it goes a little bit down.
It goes up and a little bit down. It goes up a little bit down. So it's just not...
(50:09):
It breathes. Ah, very important. So first, it has to be everything in evolution.
And second, this evolution has to breed to become part of our essence.
If you don't breed, yeah, ta-ra-ta-ti-do-ta-ti-ta, ta-ra-ta-ra-ta-to-ta-ti-ta, that doesn't breed.
(50:33):
So it doesn't not function.
And this is only with evolution and breeding Reading, you have two fantastic
tools, that's what phenomenology gives you. Tools, to what?
To practice listening, to practice listening.
(50:53):
And now, it doesn't...
It's too equal.
Too equal.
(51:15):
You see how it breathes the piece, how it goes towards more tension or relax.
This is very simple to understand, but very complicated to discover sometimes.
Well, you know, the phrasing can be very clear or I'm totally lost,
(51:35):
which is normal because there are pieces which are very complicated.
But the way is to discover the topography, and the topography is how is the
evolution and how is the breathing. That's the essence of topography.
That's the two first essentialities, and then the third one is a bit difficult
(51:59):
to distinguish from evolution.
Well, no. Continuity. Yeah. Yeah, well, the third one, you have to make a good
upbeat before you speak about the word. No, buck.
Okay, sorry. And the upbeat is...
(52:19):
Yeah, but it can be evolution and breathing, but one essence thing is I cannot
stop middle of the piece, go to the bathroom and buy and then continue.
It's impossible with music. So what happens?
Music has to take place at once in total continuity.
(52:43):
Because if not you cannot cut the piece in parts like a,
theater piece in three parts you can make different movements but even if you
play in different movements,
the silence between the movements are also in continuity you cannot wait too
(53:05):
much between first and second movement And the silence that you do between first
and second movement is not the same as the silence between second and third.
And the silence between third and fourth normally is the shortest silence.
Why? Because our consciousness works in total continuity.
(53:33):
That's why. So if you want to go back to your own nature, what you do,
it has to be in continuity.
And music oblige us to experience continuity because you cannot cut it.
And why continuity? Because breathing is a part of us, evolution is a part of
(53:55):
us, and continuity is also a part of us.
Because in the moment that you are created until the end, there is no one moment
that the consciousness doesn't work.
It's always there. And now sleeping with dreaming, deep sleep,
continuing, never stops.
(54:17):
That's why if you do something.
Yeah, you're playing the piano, and suddenly sounds that phone.
You see, oh, it's very important. Okay, I have to answer. Okay, good.
And then after minutes, boom, again. And then you say, that's not possible.
Because if there is something which breaks the continuity, that goes against my consciousness.
(54:41):
So that's why yogis, they say, what you do, do it totally.
Concentrate in only one thing. It doesn't matter what you do.
If you wash dishes, don't put music by washing dishes.
Wash dishes, every corner.
(55:03):
And then you will be faster, and you will wash better the dishes.
Why? Because the consciousness is put in this.
This is not only phenomenology. It comes also from yoga.
And not today, yeah, because today we did very much already,
(55:25):
you will see that the essence of yoga is exactly the same as the essence of phenomenology.
So phenomenology comes from the Western world, yoga comes from the Eastern world,
and the essence has to be the essence, not culture difference, no, no.
And yoga, finally, the main point of yoga, yoga means unify.
(55:51):
Yoga comes from yuj, unifying.
Unifying what?
The individual soul with the universal soul. Which is the fourth and the most important thing.
Essence. Which is the fourth, which is the one.
And then you have the three main columns, and then the column which makes the
(56:20):
cathedral with full meaning.
Finally, what is the goal to experience evolution, to experience breathing,
and to experience continuity?
What we are looking Looking for what is the one, one phrase with what we did
(56:42):
at the beginning half an hour ago.
So I have this part and this part relationship. I have a bigger part.
I have four at the beginning. Remember, then from four, I have two bigger and at the end I have one.
So that's the goal. The goal is that everything is in part of the whole.
(57:07):
And then begin, coming and point, and end.
It is nothing but a big breathing. But one breathing.
Go, combination, and back.
So the goal is to have one.
And this is a phenomenology. But in yoga, it is exactly the same.
(57:34):
No difference. So to round it up, why did Chalabedake not write this method
or this philosophy down in books?
Is it hard to grasp in words?
Well, you are making me questions that normally I need one hour to answer.
(57:55):
I spoke about things with normally I need four hours already we are speaking
one hour fifteen minutes so.
The thing is, life is an evolution.
We are never the same.
(58:19):
So, I explain this to you now, and I phrase with my speaking.
It's not only what I say, but how do I say that you understand.
And then, if you make such eyes and such a face, I try to answer in one way
that you understand better now.
(58:40):
So I adapt the knowledge to the explanation here and now.
So if you write it, what I say today, you write it in a book.
First of all, a book doesn't phrase.
You have to phrase the book. The book is neutral. You can say,
(59:04):
I have to go tomorrow to the cathedral. It's written.
Who says to you, I have to go tomorrow to the cathedral?
Or I have to go tomorrow to the cathedral? And the book is not written.
You have to discover. So, danger of what? Of many interpretations.
(59:28):
Yeah, that's why there are so many Christians. Christians, they are Orthodox,
they are Catholics, they are Evangelists, they are Coptics, they are blimps,
and there's just one Bible, how is it possible?
Because it comes from a book, and everyone interprets the book as he feels in this moment.
So a book is a good information, but it's very dangerous.
(59:54):
Don't get the right meaning, what the writer wanted to give.
And in phenomenology, it's already very difficult to explain.
By Tolkien, it's already very difficult. If you write it, if I write,
evolution is important and you have to breathe.
(01:00:15):
One person, what does it mean? Breathing in music and so on.
I don't understand why he cannot understand just by breathing.
Because it lacks the example of sound, live sound.
Yeah, that's why this becomes a lie when we are talking together and you are
(01:00:38):
listening to me, I'm playing for you, and we'll never die.
It will always be necessary to be many people sharing the experience. Absolutely.
I remember you said what you can demonstrate is not essential.
What is essential is not possible to demonstrate and that has been that's the point.
(01:01:03):
Socrates he didn't write anything because is practicing the Socratic way of teaching like me,
Socrates was experienced the here and now and every moment depends,
he was in the street with people and one makes a question so he He answered
(01:01:25):
to this person, and here and now, and depends how the question is made.
So next day, another person asks the same question.
She will answer not equal because the answer.
So this here and now, that's why Socrates didn't write anything.
(01:01:46):
And Platon came, and he started to write, and then you have the academy,
and then start the problems, which is good.
Not Rudolf Steiner wrote anything. Anything from Rudolf Steiner is the students
who write in the conference.
Well, and if you go higher, Buddha didn't write anything.
(01:02:08):
Jesus didn't write anything.
Why? If it's important, the New Testament, why did Jesus not write himself?
Why? Because it's not possible.
This is too essential. If you write, there are so many possibilities of interpretation,
and this is not essential.
(01:02:29):
That's why in philosophy it's very interesting, in theology also,
but you cannot go until the end, because the end is the life experience,
which a book cannot give to you.
Of course, there's a difference if you read a book of Meister Ecker, which is fantastic.
(01:02:51):
Meister Ecker, the mystic, or Santa Teresa de Jesus, or San Juan de la Cruz.
This mystic, when they write, they write, but there's more poetry than writing.
Like Nietzsche. Nietzsche is not a straight philosopher. He writes an aphorism.
(01:03:12):
And what Nietzsche does is to inspire you, so that you go far away from the words what he writes.
So he's between a writer and a spiritual leader.
You see, the phenomenology is so much here and now that it is very difficult
(01:03:37):
and even dangerous to write about.
That is the reason why Chelevidake, he wrote a lot of things,
but he didn't publish finally.
Because they will misunderstand. Understand. They will misunderstand.
In the manuscript, is it lost or is it published?
(01:03:59):
The son has the manuscript. The son has it. Wow. Yeah.
But the teaching of phenomenology is you become a phenomenologue when you are
able to explain this. You don't need the book anymore.
You, one person who starts the first... Maestro, can you give us literature about phenomenology?
(01:04:21):
It's normal. And I say a book from Husserl, Ansermed, Hindemith,
he wrote a fantastic book, not about phenomenology, but there are so many phenomenological things.
So book can be a help, but it can give you an answer.
The direct experience. The direct experience, impossible. So that's why music
(01:04:43):
is fantastic. It can show us the direct experience of the phenomenon.
So let's round it up here.
And we will continue this conversation, luckily. Okay.
We're here in Barcelona. I'm very happy to see you again.
Jordi Mora. Thank you. Same. We have been teacher and student for almost 30 years now. Yes.
And it's very nice now because it's like we are looking back,
both of us, to what has happened and how the impact you've made on my choices as a musician.
(00:42):
And I want to I want to just share the best memory I have with you was I came
here to Barcelona to study with a pianist Albert Attenelle it was in 94,
and I had wonderful lessons with him and I didn't know that you were teaching
at this Escola de Musica de Barcelona you were teaching chamber music you were around 40 years old.
(01:17):
Yes 45 something like that
and we formed a group me
and a cellist, Jose Mor and
a clarinet player, Carlas Pertegaz, and we had lessons
with you three times a month excuse me
i was at this year i was
40 exactly 40 40 41
(01:39):
now 93 and i remember
you as this strong incredible radiant powerful
teacher that you know just opened the pandora's box for me with music and i
was like what nobody has been talking about music in this manner you are showing
(02:01):
me something that i don't really know what is,
it's connecting with me as a human being.
And then I, after one or two lessons, I ran out and bought a recorder.
One of these DUT players, you know. And I said, I'm going to record every word you say about music.
(02:21):
And that became this journey for 30 years.
I remember. Yeah. I remember this fish stitching. Yeah. With your, yeah.
I was like shaking because it was very strong, what you were saying.
And you were, how many, how long time was it since you were finished with Chilibidake at that point?
(02:47):
Well, I knew Chilibidake, I met him November 73.
I went to Germany to study conducting when I was at the end of 19 years old.
And then my parents asked a special important person here in music,
(03:10):
classical music, where's the best place?
I could have gone also to the United States. I had the possibility to go to Indianapolis.
And then this person said no, if he wants to learn music, Germany.
And, well, I was very happy because Germany is the language of Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, and so on.
(03:37):
And I had the intuition that I didn't know very much, but I liked the idea.
So I went to the Bayreuth Festival in August 1973.
And afterwards, I went to Würzburg to study conducting. conducting.
Why Würzburg? Because in Würzburg there was one Catalan conductor,
(04:02):
a little bit older than me, I was 20, that he was studying already with Celi Vidalche.
I knew Celi Vidalche from name, but not really more than this.
And well, I went into the high school of music in Würzburg, but not as a conductor,
(04:26):
because I couldn't play piano well enough.
So I started with Oboe, and I did the whole studies in Oboe.
And then I met Francesc, that was this Catalan conductor, and he told me,
do you want to be a conductor?
Yes, yes, and I'm looking for something which gives me answers to many questions
(04:50):
that I have since many years. Well, I am with Chelyabinsk if you want to come to Stuttgart.
That was 180 kilometers from Stuttgart.
I didn't choose it. I was put there. So I went with Francesc, November 73.
And the first thing I experienced with Chelyabinsk was a choir rehearsal.
(05:13):
And the choir rehearsal was the Mozart C minor, C minor mass.
And I was without
words because this is
what I'm looking for after five minutes rehearsal does this is what them but
the first experience which I like was with choir was not with Augusta that's
(05:38):
something yeah and he gave after the the rehearsal.
A class, a teaching of the people who were there.
All the rehearsals were open with him, you could always get in.
And then in the teaching, he started to speak about relationship,
(06:04):
about phrasing, and then start to phonology, which for me, it was,
I had no idea what this is.
But the most important thing is the questions that I had with 15,
16, 17 and so on about music.
And these first five minutes of rehearsal, I knew here's the answer.
(06:31):
I knew it. It's very similar to what I experienced when I met you.
Because my questions as a student, I had already been studying piano for four years.
And i had this impression that musicality
is very subjective you do a little bit here you a
little bit there this is very nice moments but but but
where is actually the where's the direction i
(06:53):
was lost i felt really lost it's
like musical parts which is like how does it connect with the beginning and
there was no answer to this because it this this sense of of finding finding
some kind of superior idea about musicality.
(07:14):
Yeah, that's the point. Because what I felt is that in the music world.
Either you have players which they play very subjective and very as they want
without really criterion.
And on the other side, you have music analysis, form analysis,
(07:42):
very straight and very complicated sometimes.
So the world of thinking in music was separated of the world of doing.
Doing and thinking, they were separated. So, I was looking for some knowledge
which has directly to do with doing, with playing, with singing,
(08:05):
with conducting, but directly.
And it has to be a very intelligent person, which is at the same time a fantastic musician.
It has to be both. and I
didn't stay with because he was so nice and so fantastic he was also very very
(08:25):
difficult with treatment sometimes but because he represented for me the person which unifies the.
The playing of music, the realization of music, with what you have to know to
make the realization better.
(08:47):
To go into the realization. Not speaking about music, there's C major,
G major, there's first tema, second tema, this is all static.
I learned with him that the knowledge can be incredible static facts,
facts, isolated facts, and facts which are true,
(09:09):
but doesn't help you to go into the piece.
And then I saw that phenomenology of music, which Csillagy took from Husserl and von Ansermet.
Philosopher Husserl, who grounded the phenomenology at the first half of the
20th century in Germany, in Freiburg.
(09:32):
And then also Ernest Ansermed a little bit later took some ideas of Husserl
and he was in this direction.
But Chelyabinsk was very, very constant and very consequent of applying the
phenomenology because he saw that it goes to the point.
(09:55):
Phenomenology goes to the point, to the essence. And I was amazed to have found
one person who makes both at the same time and makes a unity of both,
because I'm very intellectual also.
But intellectual alone is not enough. So that was my first meeting with Chelyabinsk.
(10:23):
Yeah, so we're going to come a little bit closer to what is phenomenology,
maybe for the listeners who is not so familiar with it.
And that was also one of my first questions as a student, because one of my
fellow students at the school,
Sebastian, I talked to him and said, wow, this Jordi Mora, he's talking about
(10:44):
music in a way that I never experienced before. What is his background?
Well, he said, well, he's speaking about phenomenology of music.
So what is phenomenology of music? If you would kind of summarize it very,
very, it's a big question, I know, but if we can kind of summarize,
(11:04):
what is phenomenology itself?
Phenomenology, in general, is a method to understand reality so much as possible.
That means that to understand reality,
phenomenology goes away from science, which is a truth but out of the life experience of person,
(11:31):
and goes away from too much personal understanding of the things,
which the taste,
it's very important.
Not too much subjective and not objective, which has nothing to do with life experience.
(11:57):
Phenomenology helps you as a method, intellectual method, of course, to.
Little by little, understand which is important, which is less important,
which is not important at all, and which is essential.
Yeah, that's why it's a method who helps very much to understand the things
(12:27):
and the facts, but not from a static point,
but from a vitality point.
That you have the experience, you shake inside.
So it is a knowledge who helps you to listen to music more deeply as before you knew it.
(12:54):
I know that Cesar Vitake used to use this heimweh, this theme from Grieg. Yes.
Should we just try to go into that a little bit, just to make an example? Yeah, yeah.
And then in music, phenomenology is a special good, because music is so abstract
that one has the feeling he can do whatever he wants.
(13:18):
And thus, the phenomenology just respects the own singularity of every person.
There are not two persons which are equal, but at the same time there is something
essential that all we have to discover to meet together what in phenomenology
we call intersubjectivity.
(13:39):
To meet in the intersubjectivity. That means you are different as me,
but if you listen to to the essence of this phrase, of this part.
And me too, we meet and witness the structure of this part.
So it is very good that we go now to the first example so that we have a direct
(14:05):
experience of what I'm talking about.
Let's do that. Let's move to the piano. Yes.
(14:31):
Music.
(14:56):
So, this is a wonderful piece of Greek, Jaime, and it is very clear.
What is the structure of this melody?
He repeats again and again the same.
(15:20):
It is very simple. So the phenomenology teaches us that everything is in evolution.
It comes four times, but not one of these four times is equal.
One will be the birth of the peace, then it will go to more or to less.
(15:46):
We will see. That depends on the harmony. money.
So there is an evolution, what we say in phenomenology is a landscape,
which mountains and valleys.
And the mountain, the first mountain is like this and goes back to the valley.
The second mountain is a little bit higher, goes to the valley, but not so deep.
(16:12):
And we have to listen to what Gilles Vidacke called the discovering of the landscape.
This evolution, you say, I remember you said this evolution is not something you choose.
No. It's something that happens in us. Yeah. Either we want it or not.
So that is the intersubjectivity or the essence of hearing.
(16:33):
Either you're a musician or not. So the difference will be not music.
(16:56):
There's no evolution here. You hear four times, practically the same. but,
already,
melodically the second time it goes a little bit more in the tension as is the
(17:19):
first time because a little bit higher the note, that's right,
that's right I'm speaking only melodically And then again, then you can think,
if I listen again to the same thing,
(17:41):
so that will be probably less because I knew this already.
I know that from before. And what I know is has less tension of what is new.
At the beginning is new and then is no. No, but Greek utilize the harmony to
(18:03):
show us that when it comes back, it's not less, but it is more.
So you're saying that just because it's repeating so much, the tendency of this
tension is already very strong.
Music.
(18:24):
So it's a little more second time.
And now it's equal, so theoretically it's less. Theoretically it's less.
And then to close.
That's right. But Greek, it's not only melody, but harmony.
(18:46):
If you put the harmony, it becomes everything more clear.
Yeah, let's do it slowly and talk me through it.
Music.
(19:08):
So less as before, it's a little bit more as the first time that we went down.
Now, important, listen to harmony.
Music.
New harmony, new perspective.
Doppel dominant and now the most incredible dissonant.
(19:31):
Music.
And realization. So with the harmony, I see evolution from beginning towards more.
And then when he repeats the same, the harmony opens more because the tension is greater.
(19:54):
So finally, I'm going to the second part of the melody.
And here is what we call the culmination of the first. That's right.
(20:19):
And that for me creates the perspective that makes everything a part of the whole.
Absolutely. because at the beginning we have four bars one, two,
three, four and then when we listen the first, the second is a little bit more
than the first so we have a big,
(20:42):
part, a bigger part and we have a bigger second part so we have first we have
four and then we have two and two and at the end we have one,
One direction towards the culmination and one direction back.
So at the end, we have just one phrase.
(21:06):
So that is one of the most important things that phenomenology teaches us.
First, we have four, then we have two, and at the end, we have one.
So the goal is to go to the one.
One phrase. I don't speak about one motif who repeats four times.
(21:30):
I don't speak about one bow, two bows.
I speak one melody. When I say one melody, everything is inside of this one.
And the structure of this one, it is like man is, this is breathing.
(21:52):
When we breathe, we inhale, there's tension, and we start to exhale,
maximal force, and then goes to relaxation.
We go towards, we culminate, and we go back.
Every breath that every human being does in life, it is like this.
(22:16):
So music is not like this because it's a casuality.
Music is like this because it's
a mirror of the inner structure of human being, but in sound relations.
So what makes us happy is for multiplicity of notes and motives and so,
(22:38):
finally to go to the one melody.
So how we play a beginner, a child which is starting or a mature person.
(23:00):
This is not music. Every equally. Equal.
Equal, not evolution, not breathing, not going to, not coming back from.
And this is the difference. That's why music, to go to music,
we need notes, but music are not the notes. notes.
(23:25):
Music are the life experience of the result of the relationship between the notes.
Yeah, the relationship. I remember you said once that this melody is something
like a history of the E, because the E is this first fundamental note.
(23:49):
Music.
So that shows that this E is so dependent on its context it appears so different
(24:16):
we experience it so differently if it's a fundamental note a fifth or a seventh
and that's also this this idea of,
listening to how it appears in the context it's very interesting So,
notes, they have to tell us something, an history.
(24:42):
If there is no history, why do you listen to a nice history when someone reads it?
Because there's an evolution there. And now we go to the mountain and we found
a fantastic lake. and this lake was a special flower which I was looking since many years.
(25:05):
So there's an evolution, everything mountain, lake, flower.
So in music we have to go always towards something or we go back from we have already found it.
That was a very different, difficult knowledge for me to understand in the beginning. Thank you.
(25:30):
But I think it has to do with because we always are in evolution, isn't it?
So the evolution is never static. It's never the same.
That means that it's always towards or against. Yeah.
Towards or coming back from. Or coming back from, yeah. It's very difficult
to understand it on an intellectual level. Yes.
(25:51):
Yeah. Yeah, the thing is, why we are happy, the feeling,
the life experience when we get a whole melody or when a child is playing note
by note. What is the difference?
Because we are evolution. That's the point.
(26:14):
So there's a mirror of what we are. And then there's an identification with
my essence by listening to relationship which has an evolution and it has a phrasing.
Phrasing, I mean tension and relaxation.
It breathes, it goes somewhere, so that's me. There's identification.
(26:39):
If it's equal and mechanical, I don't have any identification because I'm not mechanical.
Human being is not mechanical, has nothing to do with machine,
has nothing to do with repeat and repeat and repeat and going nowhere.
And that is why phenomenology help us, teach us, everything is in evolution,
(27:05):
everything has to breathe, and everything has to be in continuity.
I cannot do ta-ra-ta-di-di-di-da, and then go to the bathroom,
And five minutes later, it's not possible.
Music obliges us, if you start, you have to finish.
(27:27):
Because the unity is so perfect in music that you cannot cut it in the time.
By reading a book, you can read a book, one chapter, two chapters,
you close the book, and the next day in the evening, you keep reading. That's possible.
(27:47):
Better next day and not one year later. One year later you have to start again.
But it's possible to go on by meeting some gods.
If the book is very, very good and like this touching, you have to read. You cannot stop it.
(28:08):
But if you stop and you go one day later forwards, it is possible.
In music, this is not possible.
Music is so close everything with everything that it has to be done as a whole immediately.
Immediately you cannot put it
(28:30):
in parts and that's why music this uh
feeling of oneness is so strong and if you think uh tolstoy war and peace and
you have 1200 pages And you need three weeks to read it.
(28:53):
Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is 30 minutes.
But what you experience in 30 minutes is incredible because you have everything.
You have erudicity, lyrism, and suffering, and joy, and very, very good structure.
(29:14):
So music has the power in a very short time to show incredible parts of your inner nature.
You don't need three months or three weeks or two weeks. No,
no. 30 minutes can be a whole life.
(29:34):
Do you think it's possible to grasp this big, long symphonies the first time
you hear it? or do you need to really know it to get this continuity?
What is the...
How is it possible to have a unity? Who builds the unity?
(29:56):
The unity in itself is nothing, doesn't exist. The unity is the result of the
relationship between the small parts.
So the small parts make the unity possible.
So it is possible to listen to every small part the first time that you... No, it's not possible.
(30:18):
A Mozart symphony is a little bit easier to listen as a Bruckner symphony, for example.
But you have to listen, and to listen again, and now again, and you start to
catch relationships which at the beginning you didn't hear.
So that's why it's necessary to make a study and to give you time to make this piece is yours.
(30:44):
This is the one phenomenological sentence, a very important one.
So unity is the result of relationship of the small parts.
So you have to become aware of the small parts and that needs time.
(31:06):
Some of the strongest experiences I had during your teaching is when you were
pointing to certain things in the music that you said to me,
no, the composer has to have this chord.
You're pointing out, it's not possible to not have this chord.
It's like something as a consequence.
(31:26):
Like, for example, when he's in the end, and you say it will drop too easily if it doesn't support.
You have to support. We have to support. So should we play the whole page?
And maybe you can talk about you know the second time yeah or you can start
(31:46):
over in the second part already yeah.
Music.
(32:52):
Yeah, very nice. So when we hear after the middle part, this is A,
B, A, yeah, there's three parts.
We listen to this completely different than the first time. Why?
Because the first time...
(33:17):
And now it starts to... the evolution one octave higher.
New, something is new and something is similar. This is a good composition.
But it goes towards more. It makes the evolution.
(33:43):
And then there is a moment you think you go down.
And Greek, right scrachendo.
Bridge.
(34:09):
And then goes back. Goes back from what?
From one moment of the piece which the tension was the most stronger.
So, in one small,
Motif, it takes birth and then goes, and relax.
(34:35):
But what happens in the small motif happens also in the whole piece.
The whole piece is a question of start from silence.
Always music comes from silence to go back to silence. That's music.
And when the end is an end,
(34:59):
and when the beginning is a beginning, when the relationship between the evolution
towards the culmination,
it is proportional in harmonic relationship with the way from the culminant point to the end.
So if you grow until the culminant point and then you go back and you relax
(35:25):
exactly the same tension that you have boiled it until the culmination,
then the end will be an end.
And that's very important. So it's balance. It's balance.
So it's discovering what gives tension and what gives us this tension.
Tension gives, first of all, everything what is new.
(35:49):
Everything what is new. What is new. So sound. Gives tension.
Silence. That's right. So when it's new, yeah, when I do this.
Wow. And then, when I experience this again, it is not any more new,
(36:14):
it's old, no, not old, but I know,
so, I don't know, new, tension,
I know, relaxation, this is a natural tendency, This is the first thing,
combination of new things and new things.
(36:35):
And that the composer can make also to go against the natural tendency, for example,
You hear here.
(36:55):
That goes down and down and down and down. This is too long down. That's why he writes.
So the melody goes down and the composer wants a crescendo.
(37:19):
So he goes against the natural tendency of the pitch of the melody.
And that creates tension. So you can go with the natural tendency or against the natural tendency.
And the composer sometimes goes to the natural tendency against,
(37:40):
excuse me, to create this tension.
This tension for what? To have the culmination.
And then how he's going back after the culmination. Here.
Through a way which I already know. What is the essence of the sonata form?
(38:04):
What is the recapitulation? Why recapitulation?
Because I have to go back after the culmination, which is at the end of the development.
So this is a fantastic example to learn many things.
But one of the most important things of this piece is that he goes to the culminant
(38:26):
point by going against the melody.
Shall we hear that? Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, but you cannot start so much piano, because there are four bars that you will go down.
(38:47):
Start from the beginning, you will see, from the beginning.
Music.
(39:14):
And now, octave more.
Let's.
And a little bit more.
(39:35):
And relaxation. Pianissimo, pianissimo, Annabelle, pianissimo.
That was not pianissimo. Very important, the pianissimo.
Why? Because the pianissimo is the relaxation of this.
Music.
And now relaxation.
(39:56):
And then, yeah, go. And then how do I build the tension back?
By experience the same as I did.
Music.
(40:38):
Session. Why is there so much tension with the F? Because F belongs not to E-minor.
Music.
That's right. F is a lot of tension. But why doesn't he just...
He could just stop there. That's right, but here is a...
(41:02):
This is a coda tension and he says bye bye this is the bye bye what is a coda?
Because I remember very much that coda was we learned at school that coda was
this ending of a piece and it was called a tale but nobody explained,
(41:23):
the real phenomenological reason for a coda,
before you started to talk about The coda is when you go back and you think
it is finished, there is something lacking still,
there is some tension inside us.
(41:43):
And then the coda is necessary to liberate us from this tension by expressing attention.
So the coda is the last chance that life gives to us to have a wonderful end.
(42:05):
This is the last chance. So, Greek things, this is too simple. I cannot...
(42:28):
So he takes this little tension that's still in us, and he expresses the tension.
By expressing the tension, you liberate. It's like you have a relationship.
This relationship at the beginning is very nice, and then you fight.
Yeah, there's a lot of bling.
(42:50):
And then you go back. Okay, you make your way. I make your way. And we are friends.
But at the end, you have the feeling, I have to call him once because there's
one thing which is not clear. And then you call him.
What you told me, it's very good, but you forgot that I did this because... And then you say, yes.
(43:17):
You're right. And then you're free. Then you hang the phone and this relationship is,
Good end. This is not. Left with tension. Left in tension. You see. That's the goal.
That's the last goal. That's the goal. Yeah.
And that's exciting to bring into bigger forms when you start to.
(43:40):
I remember we did the Mozart sonata this. F major.
And the F minor section in the middle was leaving tension.
Yeah. And we. And this. I don't know if I can play it now. But.
And then in the end it's... Yeah, yeah.
(44:03):
And you asked me, why does Mozart write this coda in major? Yeah.
And you didn't want to answer me that lesson. You said, you have to think about
it one week. That's my system.
Yeah. That's Celibidake's system also. And Celibidache made questions,
and he answered the question perhaps one year later.
(44:26):
This is a poem. Not one week. Yeah, one week or so. Why?
Because important is not that you get the answer, but the way you make to answer this.
And there were some questions he did never answer.
(44:48):
And he took this to the sepultura, to the grave.
Oh, he took that answer. Yes, he never answered.
This is the last teaching already. You have to find it. You have to find it yourself.
Yes, because you finally, every one of us, we are the best and finally only
(45:17):
one teacher of ourselves.
That is what Chelyabinsk is. But you took some of the knowledge from Chelyabinsk
and you structured it in different ways.
I remember you were talking to me about the four essentialities. Yeah, yeah.
Should we like summarize it up with the four essentialities maybe?
(45:42):
Because you've been talking about breathing here. Yeah, yeah.
You call it, I remember you called it the two ways directionality,
which is opening and closing.
Well, we have already spoken about this.
The essentialities help us to have more order.
(46:05):
So it's as normal as every student,
and this is also fantastic in phenomenology, because it gives you a lot of creativity.
Because every of us are different.
So if I teach you something, you just, when you understood really what I mean,
(46:29):
there's a moment that when you explain to other people, you explain that in your way.
That's normal. But it has to become yours.
This is not, Maestro Mora said, this, and this, and this.
And then, no, no.
You have to practice this. It has to become yours.
(46:54):
And then you teach this in your way.
And the goal is the same. So I did that with Chelyabinsk also, because it's normal.
So the situation, if I'm teaching at the university, or people which are only
four years with me and not 30 like you. So I cannot teach in the same way.
(47:18):
I have to give him four years, the maximum of information. I cannot wait.
We will do this in eight years now.
So I develop a way to teaching phenomenology which goes a little bit faster and gives you the whole.
Important knowledge. And this is what if we have to find.
(47:47):
The essence of the piece, then we have to know which are the essence normally,
not only music, but also in life.
And the essence of music are the same the essence in life. There's no difference.
On the other way, the essence in music are these because we are like this.
(48:12):
First human being and then what human being does music, ok then music has to be like him,
so the four essentialities you always start
with first one is that everything is in evolution everything is in evolution
so there is no two moments which are equal in our life as well in our lives
(48:35):
even if you think you are the same now now and five years before. No, you are not.
And you are not the same now and one day before. We are continuously changing and evolving.
And one started in the moment of the conception and will finish in the moment of the death.
(48:59):
So, like a candle, yeah? You put fire in a candle, there's no one instant that
the candle doesn't have an evolution towards the end, towards that.
But we like this in the moment that we are born, the evolution, yeah, until we die.
That will be the first essence. So we have to look at the evolution of the piece
(49:27):
if you want to transform these notes in music. music.
But how look this evolution? And then we come to the second.
Is an evolution so.
(49:47):
It goes up, it breathes, and then it goes a little bit down.
It goes up and a little bit down. It goes up a little bit down. So it's just not...
(50:09):
It breathes. Ah, very important. So first, it has to be everything in evolution.
And second, this evolution has to breed to become part of our essence.
If you don't breed, yeah, ta-ra-ta-ti-do-ta-ti-ta, ta-ra-ta-ra-ta-to-ta-ti-ta, that doesn't breed.
(50:33):
So it doesn't not function.
And this is only with evolution and breeding Reading, you have two fantastic
tools, that's what phenomenology gives you. Tools, to what?
To practice listening, to practice listening.
(50:53):
And now, it doesn't...
It's too equal.
Too equal.
(51:15):
You see how it breathes the piece, how it goes towards more tension or relax.
This is very simple to understand, but very complicated to discover sometimes.
Well, you know, the phrasing can be very clear or I'm totally lost,
(51:35):
which is normal because there are pieces which are very complicated.
But the way is to discover the topography, and the topography is how is the
evolution and how is the breathing. That's the essence of topography.
That's the two first essentialities, and then the third one is a bit difficult
(51:59):
to distinguish from evolution.
Well, no. Continuity. Yeah. Yeah, well, the third one, you have to make a good
upbeat before you speak about the word. No, buck.
Okay, sorry. And the upbeat is...
(52:19):
Yeah, but it can be evolution and breathing, but one essence thing is I cannot
stop middle of the piece, go to the bathroom and buy and then continue.
It's impossible with music. So what happens?
Music has to take place at once in total continuity.
(52:43):
Because if not you cannot cut the piece in parts like a,
theater piece in three parts you can make different movements but even if you
play in different movements,
the silence between the movements are also in continuity you cannot wait too
(53:05):
much between first and second movement And the silence that you do between first
and second movement is not the same as the silence between second and third.
And the silence between third and fourth normally is the shortest silence.
Why? Because our consciousness works in total continuity.
(53:33):
That's why. So if you want to go back to your own nature, what you do,
it has to be in continuity.
And music oblige us to experience continuity because you cannot cut it.
And why continuity? Because breathing is a part of us, evolution is a part of
(53:55):
us, and continuity is also a part of us.
Because in the moment that you are created until the end, there is no one moment
that the consciousness doesn't work.
It's always there. And now sleeping with dreaming, deep sleep,
continuing, never stops.
(54:17):
That's why if you do something.
Yeah, you're playing the piano, and suddenly sounds that phone.
You see, oh, it's very important. Okay, I have to answer. Okay, good.
And then after minutes, boom, again. And then you say, that's not possible.
Because if there is something which breaks the continuity, that goes against my consciousness.
(54:41):
So that's why yogis, they say, what you do, do it totally.
Concentrate in only one thing. It doesn't matter what you do.
If you wash dishes, don't put music by washing dishes.
Wash dishes, every corner.
(55:03):
And then you will be faster, and you will wash better the dishes.
Why? Because the consciousness is put in this.
This is not only phenomenology. It comes also from yoga.
And not today, yeah, because today we did very much already,
(55:25):
you will see that the essence of yoga is exactly the same as the essence of phenomenology.
So phenomenology comes from the Western world, yoga comes from the Eastern world,
and the essence has to be the essence, not culture difference, no, no.
And yoga, finally, the main point of yoga, yoga means unify.
(55:51):
Yoga comes from yuj, unifying.
Unifying what?
The individual soul with the universal soul. Which is the fourth and the most important thing.
Essence. Which is the fourth, which is the one.
And then you have the three main columns, and then the column which makes the
(56:20):
cathedral with full meaning.
Finally, what is the goal to experience evolution, to experience breathing,
and to experience continuity?
What we are looking Looking for what is the one, one phrase with what we did
(56:42):
at the beginning half an hour ago.
So I have this part and this part relationship. I have a bigger part.
I have four at the beginning. Remember, then from four, I have two bigger and at the end I have one.
So that's the goal. The goal is that everything is in part of the whole.
(57:07):
And then begin, coming and point, and end.
It is nothing but a big breathing. But one breathing.
Go, combination, and back.
So the goal is to have one.
And this is a phenomenology. But in yoga, it is exactly the same.
(57:34):
No difference. So to round it up, why did Chalabedake not write this method
or this philosophy down in books?
Is it hard to grasp in words?
Well, you are making me questions that normally I need one hour to answer.
(57:55):
I spoke about things with normally I need four hours already we are speaking
one hour fifteen minutes so.
The thing is, life is an evolution.
We are never the same.
(58:19):
So, I explain this to you now, and I phrase with my speaking.
It's not only what I say, but how do I say that you understand.
And then, if you make such eyes and such a face, I try to answer in one way
that you understand better now.
(58:40):
So I adapt the knowledge to the explanation here and now.
So if you write it, what I say today, you write it in a book.
First of all, a book doesn't phrase.
You have to phrase the book. The book is neutral. You can say,
(59:04):
I have to go tomorrow to the cathedral. It's written.
Who says to you, I have to go tomorrow to the cathedral?
Or I have to go tomorrow to the cathedral? And the book is not written.
You have to discover. So, danger of what? Of many interpretations.
(59:28):
Yeah, that's why there are so many Christians. Christians, they are Orthodox,
they are Catholics, they are Evangelists, they are Coptics, they are blimps,
and there's just one Bible, how is it possible?
Because it comes from a book, and everyone interprets the book as he feels in this moment.
So a book is a good information, but it's very dangerous.
(59:54):
Don't get the right meaning, what the writer wanted to give.
And in phenomenology, it's already very difficult to explain.
By Tolkien, it's already very difficult. If you write it, if I write,
evolution is important and you have to breathe.
(01:00:15):
One person, what does it mean? Breathing in music and so on.
I don't understand why he cannot understand just by breathing.
Because it lacks the example of sound, live sound.
Yeah, that's why this becomes a lie when we are talking together and you are
(01:00:38):
listening to me, I'm playing for you, and we'll never die.
It will always be necessary to be many people sharing the experience. Absolutely.
I remember you said what you can demonstrate is not essential.
What is essential is not possible to demonstrate and that has been that's the point.
(01:01:03):
Socrates he didn't write anything because is practicing the Socratic way of teaching like me,
Socrates was experienced the here and now and every moment depends,
he was in the street with people and one makes a question so he He answered
(01:01:25):
to this person, and here and now, and depends how the question is made.
So next day, another person asks the same question.
She will answer not equal because the answer.
So this here and now, that's why Socrates didn't write anything.
(01:01:46):
And Platon came, and he started to write, and then you have the academy,
and then start the problems, which is good.
Not Rudolf Steiner wrote anything. Anything from Rudolf Steiner is the students
who write in the conference.
Well, and if you go higher, Buddha didn't write anything.
(01:02:08):
Jesus didn't write anything.
Why? If it's important, the New Testament, why did Jesus not write himself?
Why? Because it's not possible.
This is too essential. If you write, there are so many possibilities of interpretation,
and this is not essential.
(01:02:29):
That's why in philosophy it's very interesting, in theology also,
but you cannot go until the end, because the end is the life experience,
which a book cannot give to you.
Of course, there's a difference if you read a book of Meister Ecker, which is fantastic.
(01:02:51):
Meister Ecker, the mystic, or Santa Teresa de Jesus, or San Juan de la Cruz.
This mystic, when they write, they write, but there's more poetry than writing.
Like Nietzsche. Nietzsche is not a straight philosopher. He writes an aphorism.
(01:03:12):
And what Nietzsche does is to inspire you, so that you go far away from the words what he writes.
So he's between a writer and a spiritual leader.
You see, the phenomenology is so much here and now that it is very difficult
(01:03:37):
and even dangerous to write about.
That is the reason why Chelevidake, he wrote a lot of things,
but he didn't publish finally.
Because they will misunderstand. Understand. They will misunderstand.
In the manuscript, is it lost or is it published?
(01:03:59):
The son has the manuscript. The son has it. Wow. Yeah.
But the teaching of phenomenology is you become a phenomenologue when you are
able to explain this. You don't need the book anymore.
You, one person who starts the first... Maestro, can you give us literature about phenomenology?
(01:04:21):
It's normal. And I say a book from Husserl, Ansermed, Hindemith,
he wrote a fantastic book, not about phenomenology, but there are so many phenomenological things.
So book can be a help, but it can give you an answer.
The direct experience. The direct experience, impossible. So that's why music
(01:04:43):
is fantastic. It can show us the direct experience of the phenomenon.
So let's round it up here.
And we will continue this conversation, luckily. Okay.
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