INSTINCTIVE PERFORMER

Steven Isserlis used the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021 to work on a trio of projects: a companion to Bach’s Cello Suites, a new performing edition of Dvořák’s Cello Concerto and a recording of British solo cello music – as the cellist tells Charlotte Smith

British cellist Steven Isserlis isn’t ‘just’ a musician; he’s a scholar too. While some of us failed to put the lockdowns of the past two years to good use, Isserlis completed several projects, without which, he admits, he would have gone into a ‘complete depression’. The first of these is his companion to Bach’s Cello Suites, recently published by Faber (and reviewed next issue): a highly readable pocket-sized volume, cleverly featuring important detail and advice for professional musicians while also providing clear, accessible and, above all, interesting insights for novices.

Key to the companion’s success is the great affection and reverence that Isserlis himself has for the Suites. Famously reluctant to perform the works in public for fear of memory slips – ‘I should shut up about that really; I’ve now managed to make my friends Thomas Demenga and Mischa Maisky petrified about it too!’ – Isserlis is entirely committed to investigating the intricacies of the four existing manuscripts. Not one is written in Bach’s own hand, which makes the quest to find a definitive version all the more compelling – and no doubt accounts partly for the otherwise venerable and confident musician’s fear of performing the works for an audience. ‘Basically, I practise the Suites from memory,’ he says. ‘But then I want to continue studying the manuscripts – and remembering the notes is one thing, but remembering all the articulations in four different versions is another!’

That the lockdowns afforded Isserlis the chance to devote his keen investigative talents to the Suites is great news for audiences and musicians – for although it’s unlikely the majority of us will be treated to a public performance by him any time soon, the companion presents his attitude to the works in an equally compelling form, especially when enjoyed in conjunction with his recording of the works released on Hyperion in 2007. And in fact, it was lockdown’s ability to strip performing of all its usual anxieties and expectations that enabled Isserlis to perform Suites nos.1 and 3 for the first time in years for small audiences at the Fidelio Cafe in London in July 2020. ‘At Fidelio, the audience comprised just 25 people and their mindset was different from usual,’ he says. ‘People hadn’t heard live music for so long, and were so happy and grateful for the experience, so there wasn’t any pressure.’

There is something innately ‘comforting’ about these works, Isserlis continues, which made them particularly appropriate repertoire for the pandemic. Similarly, Pablo Casals, their first great advocate, had turned to them under the looming threat of World War II, and as the Spanish Civil War tore apart his homeland. ‘There is such wisdom behind them. They’re very soothing – exciting though they are, and funny and tragic. But there’s something reassuring about their simplicity and intimacy,’ he says. As such he approaches them in an ‘instinctive’ way, as ‘all great music is natural’. This is not to say, though, that one shouldn’t also treat them with interpretative rigour. ‘I educate myself as much as I can,’ he explains. ‘I study and analyse them. But I never try to go against my instincts. Instead, you should keep educating your instincts.’

I get the impression that the extremes of historically informed performance don’t sit easily with Isserlis, though he’s particularly withering about those who adopt Baroque instruments and bows yet continue to perform the works on steel strings – something he would never do on his ‘Marquis de Corberon’ Stradivari, on loan from London’s Royal Academy of Music: ‘I see colleagues who tune their cellos down to Baroque pitch, and maybe use a period bow, but they’re playing on steel strings, so I give them a hard time. These are my friends, of course!’ he laughs. ‘But for me, the sound world is very different with steel strings. There are many more layers and so much more depth from gut. I’m not saying that I wouldn’t ever listen to a performance of Bach on steel strings – I would, and I might enjoy it a lot – but I can’t imagine playing Bach on steel myself. It has to be gut.’

‘At the Fidelio Cafe, the audience comprised just 25 people and their mindset was different from usual’

MAIN IMAGE NICK RUTTER. CIRCLE IMAGE ALEXEI MOLCHANOVSKY

‘I’M NOT SAYING THAT I WOULDN’T EVER LISTEN TO A PERFORMANCE OF BACH ON STEEL STRINGS –I WOULD, AND I MIGHT ENJOY IT – BUT, FOR ME, IT HAS TO BE GUT’

Vibrato, too, is another bugbear – though again, Isserlis prefers to use his intuition more than to be dogmatic. ‘I’m not conscious of playing with less vibrato in Bach, but it just happens; and in Haydn, too. I find myself using less vibrato because that best conveys the emotions I want to express,’ he explains. ‘I certainly don’t play senza vibrato. That’s ridiculous, as there’s so much evidence that vibrato was used in Bach’s time – and it does drive me mad to see modern players using steel strings, switching off vibrato and thinking they’re playing authentically. Apart from anything else, you need to know how to use the bow properly. It can sound just awful if you don’t know how to make the strings vibrate properly with the bow. It’s about shading.’

But, as with all the cellist’s pronouncements, there’s a self-deprecating caveat at the conclusion: ‘Occasionally, I forget and vibrate too much,’ he admits. ‘I remember playing Haydn with Christopher Hogwood and the Academy of Ancient Music. At one point he turned to me and said very gently, “Is it Shostakovich?” Sorry! Sometimes I do get nervous or overexcited and vibrate excessively.’

That Isserlis can be so modest about his abilities is endlessly disarming – and it’s a thoroughly British trait in the traditional sense. Speaking to him, one can easily forget the fearsome reputation he has forged during a long and highly successful career that has encompassed multiple acclaimed albums ranging from early recordings of Fauré, Haydn, Strauss and Tavener to an ongoing partnership with Hyperion which includes recordings of Thomas Adès, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Dvořák, Elgar, Saint-Saëns, Schumann, Shostakovich and Walton, all featuring illuminating and impeccably researched booklet notes by Isserlis himself. Alongside an array of chamber and solo appearances each season, plus his artistic direction of IMS Prussia Cove’s seminars for talented young musicians, he’s published two in no uncertain terms that the cello concerto (Musical Pilgrimage) by composer-in-residence Alexey Shor which he was to perform there was children’s books on composers and lent his sharp insights to numerous essays and musical editions.

Performing at InClassica in Dubai

When I met him in September 2021 at Dubai’s InClassica festival, he told me in no uncertain terms that the cello concerto (Musical Pilgrimage) by composer-in-residence Alexey Shor which he was to perform there was ‘quite difficult’. When I asked what aspects were challenging, I was met with his dry reply, ‘The notes.’ When we speak again a month or so later for a follow-up interview, that sardonic wit is very much in attendance, and it seems particularly fitting that he should be talking about his new album of solo cello music by British composers (again for Hyperion) – the second of his three major lockdown projects.

Isserlis performs Schumann’s Cello Concerto with the Philharmonia at London’s Royal Festival Hall for a streamed concert in April 2021

PHILHARMONIA ORCHESTRA

Among other smaller works, the recording (reviewed last issue) features Britten’s Third Cello Suite, Walton’s Passacaglia, and Suite in the Eighteenth-Century Style by Isserlis’s great friend and mentor Frank Merrick, who gifted the forgotten work to the then teenage cellist upon rediscovering it in a box. Although Isserlis notes in his introduction that initially he saw little to connect the works on the album beyond nationality and century, he now believes they are linked by ‘a very British trait: a respect for the past’.

‘Britten’s Third Suite includes a Barcarola, a Passacaglia and a Fuga, so he’s looking back to the past. Frank Merrick is obviously looking back, and the Walton, again, is a Passacaglia – it’s a very ancient form,’ he muses. ‘Thomas Adès, whose Sola I also include on the album, has told me that essentially he’s a Baroque composer living in the 21st century. So, I guess I see more and more connections. And, in fact, as the planning and recording process went on, I remembered that I have personal connections with almost every piece. I was there for the first performance of Britten’s Third Suite by Rostropovich at Snape Maltings, and I was also there for the first performance of the Walton Passacaglia, again by Rostropovich, but this time at London’s Royal Festival Hall. And, of course, I knew Frank Merrick.’

Considering that Merrick’s work is another suite, how does it compare with Bach’s set? ‘Merrick probably heard the Bach Suites and was inspired by them,’ says Isserlis, ‘but then again, he had completely forgotten about writing the work, so we can’t date it except to say it was written before 1936, as its title page announces that it was fingered and edited by the cellist W.E. Whitehouse, who died in 1935. That was before Casals recorded the Bach Suites, so they weren’t well known at the time. But there’s very clearly the influence of Handel on the work, too.

‘What I can say, though, is that the Merrick needs to be played in a heavier style than the Bach. I remember playing the work to him and he was asleep for most of it! But at one point he woke up and told me not to double dot in his Siciliano. If I was playing Bach I would definitely double dot.’

Isserlis notes with some regret that he is unable currently to publish Merrick’s work, which remains in copyright. But there is no such issue for Dvořák’s Cello Concerto, the first classical piece with which he fell in love as a child, and to whose new Henle edition he has made editorial contributions – his third lockdown initiative. Although he previously worked on the Bärenreiter edition with editor and conductor Jonathan Del Mar, this is the first time that Isserlis has contributed his own fingerings and bowings (not to mention another astute introduction), though he stresses that these are suggestions rather than directives. ‘My markings are just ideas, from which each player can take as much or as little as they choose,’ he cautions.

‘AS THE PLANNING AND R ECOR DING PROCESS FOR THE BRITISH SOLO ALBUM WENT ON, I REMEMBERED THAT I HAVE PERSONAL CONNECTIONS WITH ALMOST EVERY PIECE’

MAIN IMAGE ALEXEI MOLCHANOVSKY

‘I SEE MORE HUMOUR IN MUSIC THAN WHEN I WAS A YOUNG MAN. BEETHOVEN MAKES ME L AUGH SO MUCH MORE THAN HE USED TO’

Again, the question of editions looms large, especially considering the number of revisions the work underwent during the compositional process, and the contributions of Dvořák’s cellist friend Hanuš Wihan, who boldly added his own amendments to Dvořák’s autograph manuscript. Isserlis grew up with ‘an old Czech edition, based more on the manuscript’, but he fully supports Henle’s decision to base their new printing on the first published edition – ‘because as far as we know, those were Dvořák’s final thoughts’. But in order to acknowledge and honour some of the original passages, Isserlis ‘has added a few footnotes of major differences – alternative options from the manuscript – that were lost or changed in the first edition’.

He admits ruefully that he has been performing the work in public for almost 50 years – and that 2021 marked 50 years since he started learning it. ‘I first played the piece for an audience when I was 14, and my father was very disapproving, because my teachers Jane Cowan and John Gwilt had started taking me through it when I was 12. When I offered to play it to him, my father said, “That’s a terrible idea.” But I was very proud. I said, “Listen, Daddy.”

A younger – but no less passionate – Isserlis

And he said, “Ugh! It’s so out of tune!”’ His first public performance of the work duly took place in Austria, in the great chapel at Altenburg Abbey in 1973, an event that was recorded for posterity by Isserlis’s friend using a tape machine ‘at the back of the echoey hall’.

‘My performance of the concerto must have changed and changed, and I love it even more now,’ he enthuses. ‘I think the way that I play it has probably become a bit sadder over the years. It talks to me in a more melancholy way. Certainly, there’s also great joy in it, but overall it is sadder for me. One does have to be careful with balance, of course, because it’s not just a cello concerto, but also a symphonic work. It’s probably the only piece in the repertoire that might be slightly easier if I played on steel strings, which I do have on my 1740 Montagnana cello. But I can’t stand macho performances of it – “I’m going to make my cello sound like a trombone” – because that’s not what the piece is about. It’s very heroic, but it’s also an intensely personal and inward-looking statement.’

Does he believe our interpretations veer more towards the melancholy as we become older? ‘Perhaps. But I also see more humour in music than when I was a young man. Beethoven makes me laugh so much more than I used to. Jane Cowan taught me to see it, but now I understand it so much more.’

As is the case with all significant artists (and scholars), Isserlis’s thirst for knowledge and insight knows no bounds. I sense that more companions and editions may well be on the horizon – but for now, it is the return to performing in a post-pandemic world that occupies him most. And of one thing we can be certain: at no point will he be idle.