FINDING HER PATH the Eclectic Musical World of Lucia Micarelli
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FINDING HER PATH The eclectic musical world of Lucia Micarelli By Greg Cahill SOLAIMAN FAZEL SOLAIMAN 16 September 2018 / Strings StringsMagazine.com 17 sk Lucia Micarelli about her knack for As time has passed, I’ve eclectic programming and the soft-spoken, realized that Treme really classically trained blew open my musical world. violinist ofers a char- acteristicallyA modest response. “I don’t think it’s a big deal anymore, because so many peo- ple are playing around with all these difer- ent styles,” she says, during a phone call from In 2009, she appeared on Botti’s popular song that you liked the best?’ And they’ll say, her Los Angeles home. “Even people who are PBS-TV special Chris Botti in Boston—the ‘I like the Ravel duo.’ It’s like, wow! It’s amaz- well-established in classical careers are video excerpt of her star-turn solo on plain- ing. And I think it helps that it’s not pre- exploring other types of music. Te younger tive Botti ballad “Emmanuel” has netted sented in this sort of pretentious fashion. generation of soloists is much more open and more than 7.6 million views on YouTube. “It makes it more interesting to the audi- interested in other genres, even more so than Landing a starring role in 2010 as a New ence.” ten years ago. Tat’s exciting to me.” Orleans street musician on the hit HBO Strings caught up with Micarelli earlier Tat’s all true, but few other musicians can series Treme proved fortuitous in unexpected this summer to discuss her new album, her lay claim to being an ambassador of eclecti- ways. Initially, Micarelli’s management had eclectic musical taste, and her desire to use cism with a global media platform. received a call from a New York casting direc- the universal language of music to connect Earlier this year, PBS-TV debuted An Eve- tor looking for a violinist to fill the part. with a diverse audience. ning with Lucia Micarelli, a 60-minute show- Micarelli had no acting experience (creator case that found the 35-year-old violinist David Simon often uses amateurs to add You acknowledge Treme on the new album. performing everything from a triple-fddle authenticity to his projects), but the violinist How did your experience on the show affect Irish jig and Ravel’s rhapsodic Tzigane to began considering the ofer after watching a you personally and professionally? Gershwin’s “Someone to Watch Over Me” and video interview with Simon (whom Esquire I’ve been thinking about that lately. I didn’t Led Zeppelin’s rock powerhouse “Kashmir.” has dubbed “the greatest man in television expect that experience to be so musically Jazz, folk, Cajun, classical, rock—it’s all part writing”) and being impressed by his challenging. I just thought, ‘OK, I’m gonna try of Micarelli’s musical world. Te music from intelligence and serious nature. Ten, on the to act and that will be a lot to do.’ But as time that broadcast will be released in October on a Fourth of July, Micarelli tripped and landed has passed I’ve realized that Treme really blew 16-track live album. And in her frst nation- on a wine glass, severing several nerves in open my musical world. It exposed me to a lot wide solo concert tour, the violinist is set to her left hand and leaving her worried that of styles that I didn’t know about previously. perform 24 dates, beginning in July. she would never again be able to play profes- But also there’s an amazing musical commu- It’s already been a long road. Micarelli, sionally. (She still has only partial feeling in nity in New Orleans and the musicians have who is half Italian and half Korean, was born three fngers.) this amazing spirit that’s expressed through in Queens, New York, and began playing vio- She went into physical therapy and decided their music. Tat really infuenced how I feel lin at age three. She studied at the Juilliard to pursue Simon’s ofer. about music because there’s an attitude in School’s pre-college division with legendary Her experience during four seasons on the New Orleans about music just being so violin teacher Dorothy DeLay and then at the show helped to expand Micarelli’s musical enmeshed in people’s lives. When the family Manhattan School of Music for a year with horizons and is refected on the new album, gets together, they fix meals together and Pinchas Zukerman. which includes a rendition of Treme co-star while food is cooking they’re playing music. But she left school before graduating. Steve Earle’s ballad “This City.” Yet, she When there’s a funeral, they gather in a “I felt like I needed to fgure out how to remains committed to classical music and is second-line to play music to honor the dead. apply all the technique and skills I learned in excited about introducing it to the uniniti- It’s a part of everything. a real way,” she told Strings in 2010. “School ated. “I’m aware that the majority of my audi- That’s really different from the musical felt a bit myopic.” ence isn’t your typical classical listener, so I world that I came from, in which you practice She soon built a reputation as a go-to rock feel more motivated to bring classical music in private and work hard to get something and jazz violinist, touring with the popu- to them,” she says. “I present it in its natural down perfectly and then you perform it. lar progressive-rock band the Trans-Siberian state alongside jazz and other styles. Tere’s a preciousness about that approach to Orchestra, pop singer Josh Groban, classic- “One of the things that’s so exciting to me music—growing up in a conservatory envi- rock artists Jethro Tull, and pop-jazz trum- is that consistently what audiences are most ronment can make you feel that the music is peter Chris Botti, among others. She also drawn to are the classical elements of the all about performance. It’s a recital. Obvi- released two major-label solo albums: 2004’s show. Even little kids. After the show, I’ve ously, that part of my brain isn’t going to Music from a Farther Room and 2006’s Inter- had people come up to me with their seven change entirely, since that’s how I grew up. lude, both of which combine pop, tango, jazz, year old and I’ll ask the child, ‘Did you like But seeing musicians incorporate music into and classical selections. it?’ And they’ll say, ‘Yes.’ I’ll ask, ‘Was there a their everyday lives and seeing them use it to 18 September 2018 / Strings connect with people socially makes you real- that I would think only about the music that to what I’m playing. It doesn’t feel like I’m ize that there’s so much more to it—music I really love. As a result I came up with this switching genres at all, it’s more like telling a can be about joy, it can be about celebration, crazy, seemingly incohesive list of jazz and lot of diferent stories. So, in performance I it can be about history. classical and Cajun and folk and rock. It was don’t think about those challenges. And Treme shifted my perspective, so I all over the place and I just went for it. A little Technically, I’m more aware of it when I’m have more intention now with the music bit eclectic. [Laughs.] practicing. For example, when I practice classi- I play. I now have a diferent understanding But these songs all have meaning for me— cal music, I do more technical work: string about what music means to people. I’m more you end up taking a journey through my crossing exercises, fow work, and stuf with focused on connection, on sharing, on feel- musical life. It makes me feel that I am con- the metronome. It’s more about cleaning things ing that we’ve come together to share this necting with the audience—it’s more inti- up so they’re more precise. And when I practice moment. Now I feel that performances are a mate than anything I’ve done in the past. jazz or folk, I just focus on slightly diferent communal experience in which we’ve come things. I’ll spend a lot of time just getting slides together to create a beautiful evening. Tere’s As a player, what are the technical to sound the way I want them to or fussing over more joy that way—it’s more fulflling. challenges of shifting from classical what kind of turn I want to do—is it a turn to Cajun to rock and so on? above the note or a turn below the note? Or do Did that perspective inform the First of all, I have so many challenges to begin I do a little weird stop-bow thing someplace? programming for the PBS special with [laughs]—the instrument is a challenge, But in performance, it doesn’t feel like I’m and the new live album? the music is a challenge. I was worried ini- shifting genres. Te bigger challenge is shifting When I frst sat down to program a solo con- tially that it might be difcult to switch back from playing my instrument to singing. Tat’s cert, I knew that I didn’t want any fller.