A CHAT with RODOLFO RICHTER You Were Born in Brazil, Have a German Last Name, and Are Now Based in the UK

British/Brazilian violinist Rodolfo Richter appears as soloist and director with, among others, Academia Montis Regalis (Italy), Bach Collegium San Diego (US), Barokkanerne (Norway), B’Rock (Belgium), Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, English Concert, and Academy of Ancient Music (UK) in concert halls around the world, including such prestigious venues as London’s Wigmore Hall, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Vienna’s Konzerthaus, Sydney’s City Hall, Chicago’s Orchestra Hall, and New York’s Alice Tully and Carnegie Halls. He is also very active as a chamber musician, and is a member of the acclaimed Palladian Ensemble. Rodolfo has recorded Vivaldi solo concertos, Bach and Telemann triple concertos, Bach Brandenburg Concertos with AAM, Handel Trio Sonatas op. 2 and op. 5, Petersen Violin Sonatas, Vivaldi Four Seasons, a CD of sonatas by Tartini and Veracini, and the first recording of the complete sonatas by Erlebach. Future recording plans include the premiere recording of Guretzkyi’s violin concerto, as well as sonatas and concertos by Bach. Rodolfo was trained as a modern violinist with Moysés de Castro, Klaus Wüsthoff, and Pinchas Zukerman, and studied composition with Hans-Joachim Koellreutter and Pierre Boulez. He later specialized in the baroque violin with Monica Huggett at the Royal Academy of Music. He was a prizewinner at the prestigious International Early Music Competition for Ensembles in Bruges (2000), and won first prize at the Antonio Vivaldi International Violin Competition (2001). Rodolfo Richter is concertmaster of the Academy of Ancient Music and B’Rock, professor of baroque violin at the Royal College of Music in London, and director of the Early Music Course and Festival at the Oficina de Música de Curitiba in Brazil. A CHAT WITH RODOLFO RICHTER You were born in Brazil, have a German last name, and are now based in the UK. Tell us how you arrived there. I was born in Brazil and my family came from Europe. My great-grandfather was born near Prague and it’s hard to say exactly when they came to Brazil — we never could trace it. I’m from the town of Curitiba, just south of São Paolo — with three million people, it's considered small by Brazilian standards! I left Brazil at age twenty, and now live in London. Can you describe your musical awakening? My father’s family — uncles and aunts — was very musical. I had an aunt who was a concert pianist, and my father was always listening to music. Every weekend he invited people to come and play chamber music, so there was live music in the living room. When I was about seven, I really wanted to do something with music. Funnily enough, the piece that lit this flame for music was a recording my father had of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion. It is a very long piece, and he was amazed that I actually listened to the whole piece in an afternoon. From that moment I was hooked on music — and it didn’t matter whether I had an instrument in hand or not. In fact, at first, more than playing, I wanted to compose. That’s still part of my life, though not so much professionally any more. I’m just interested in everything about music! Originally you trained as a modern violinist. How did the switch to baroque violin happen? The cello was my instrument for the first seven years, and then I picked up the violin. There was not much early music in Brazil when I was growing up. I studied modern violin, as one does, alongside composition. The turning point came when I was living in Chicago. I was playing in the orchestras there, starting to make my living as a violinist. The only baroque pieces played by my violin friends were the Bach solo sonatas and partitas. They might play one or two Mozart concertos if they had to with the orchestras, but mostly they played romantic repertoire. I wanted to explore the music of Marini, Biber, Fontana — early music for the violin. It was fascinating! And of course the modern violin was not the right instrument to voice this music. So by chance I met someone who played double bass with Harnoncourt in Vienna — he was visiting Chicago — and he said, “Look, I think you should follow your instincts and try the baroque violin.” And he gave me the phone number of Monica Huggett in London. I had that number for many months, and I thought OK, what do I do, should I call? I was 25 or so and I was doing OK playing modern violin. I thought, I have enough money here and can dedicate some more time to composition. But at the same time I had a real urge to play this repertoire — not only baroque, but classical repertoire too, with the proper instruments. The idea of playing chamber music with smaller ensembles was something that attracted me more than playing in a symphony orchestra, regardless of how good that orchestra could be. I knew that I would have to leave America and go to Europe to do this properly (at that time). I finally called Monica and said, “I’m coming to London, and I’d like to play for you — is that OK?” I went to London and she was very generous and said, “We need more people like you.” I thought, OK, but should I make this move or not? Well, I did and I have no regrets! This is a wonderfully festive concert to get the Tafelmusik season started. How did this programme evolve? I got an email from Jeanne Lamon about a programme — she asked me to include Handel’s Fireworks, and to play a violin concerto, etc. It was quite a mixed bag of ideas. Fireworks is a great piece, but it requires a large orchestra: three horns, three trumpets, etc. I always feel for the woodwinds and brass players — they sometimes play just one piece in a programme. So I set out to devise something where they might play more. I considered including another piece like Handel’s Fireworks so that people could compare, and that led me to Heinichen’s Serenata di Moritzburg, which is basically a feast for the horn players — there are two or three movements in that piece that are like horn concertos. Then I came to the idea of doing a Corelli concerto grosso — again a kind of festive music. A friend of mine had discovered a piece — just the front page, as the music is lost. But the title page states that it is an occasional piece by Corelli with trumpets, oboes, bassoons, and strings for the visit of a prince. So that inspired me to arrange one of the concerti grossi originally published for strings to match this orchestration. I then turned to a piece that I absolutely love, which is the Telemann Concerto for trumpet and violin. And finally I was asked to play a concerto and it was easy to choose Vivaldi’s Grosso Mogul. The two pieces are quite linked in a way: I’m sure Telemann was inspired by Vivaldi’s playing. How did you first hear about Tafelmusik? I actually heard Tafelmusik live a long time ago, when I was in Chicago. I can’t remember what year it was — between 1990 and 1995. I think it was at the University of Chicago. There were not many period concerts in Chicago, and I think Tafelmusik was probably the first one I attended. It was one of the concerts, together with another by Musica Antiqua Köln, that really inspired me to explore this repertoire. What excites or interests you about working with Tafelmusik? When I saw The Galileo Project DVD, it really triggered something inside me, because there was something new, fresh, spontaneous — not just about the playing of the musicians, but also the concept of combining images, music, and movement. You can see that there was a strong concept and that’s something I like with any kind of music, not just early music — presenting the music in a new light. That immediately fascinated me, and of course one can see that the level is very high. One can also see that the musicians are not afraid of exploring new ideas — there is a sort of freshness to the music making. That made a great impact on me. Most of my work is with early music, but I don’t feel any conflict between music written three centuries ago and music written today. Music with other art forms, these connections with new technologies, visual, dance — anything — I think it’s very important to integrate this if one has the chance. If you could travel back in time, what musical moment would you like to have witnessed? I don’t know if I could choose one … there are so many moments I’d like to have witnessed! But I would have loved to be in Leipzig during Bach’s time. He gave these concerts at Café Zimmermann. I would like to have not just witnessed the playing, but also to see how Bach related to his colleagues, perhaps over a cup of coffee. Of course, I would love to have been in Paris during the first performance of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, or in Vienna during Mozart’s time. So many moments … But with Bach in Leipzig, in my mind I see a “normal” scene: a musician performing a piece with the ink still fresh on the paper … this note’s wrong, let’s do it again … probably a few people not paying attention … To have the opportunity to see him working with his colleagues, that maybe more than any great event.

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