This is the edited video of the 7th interview of the series “A Coffee With…” This time, my guest was the Romanian music & artist manager Andreea Butucariu. The original “A Coffee With…” session took place via Zoom and was posted unedited on the Facebook wall of Music Without Quarantine.
Andreea Butucariu was born in Romania where she started her musical studies. Then her family moved to Canada. There she continued to study violin and became a profesional violinist. Very early in her career as a violinist, she decided to dedicate herself to the music management. She is the director of the agency EAS Musikmanagement and the label music EaSonus. Among the artists she currently represents you can find the pianist Elisabeth Leonskaja, the violinist Tai Murray or the pianist Kristian Bezuidenhout.
My intention with these “virtual coffees” is to create an environment where people get to know a bit more about the artists and professionals I have my coffee with.
This is the edited video of the fifth interview of the series “A Coffee With…” This time, my guest was the American bass singer, lutenist and early music specialist Joel Frederiksen. The original “A Coffee With…” session took place on Wednesday June 17th 2020 on my Facebook wall. It was simultaneously transmitted on Music Without Quarantine. That live interview is just a bit longer, because it includes waiting moments until we could start with our “virtual coffee”. If you wish, you can see the original interview HERE.
Joel Frederiksen was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota (USA) in 1959. In this conversation over coffee, Joel and I speak about his music projects of the past with the Waverly Consort and the Boston Camerata, about his discography and projects with the Ensemble Phoenix Munich. Among his many recordings, we speak about Orpheus, I am (2004), The Elfin Knight (2007), O felice morire (2008), Rose of Sharon (2011), Requiem for a Pink Moon (2012), which is a homage to singer-songwriter Nick Drake, Oswald von Wolkenstein (2013), with Sabine Lutzenberger and Bernd Fröhlich, Tell Me True Love (2016), Bis an der Welt ihr Ende (2017), with Per-Sonat, Marc Lewon and Baptiste Romain and Un niño nos es naçido (2018).
This is the edited video of the fourth interview of the series “A Coffee With…” This time, my guest was the British composer, journalist, blogger and lecturer Robert Hugill. The original “A Coffee With…” session took place on Wednesday June 10th 2020 on my Facebook wall. It was simultaneously transmitted on Music Without Quarantine. That live interview is a bit longer, because it includes waiting moments until we could start with our “virtual coffee”. If you wish, you can see the original interview HERE.
Robert Hugill was born in Cleethorpes (UK) in 1955. Mainly a self-taught musician, Robert has spent over 30 decades singing and conducting choirs. He writes music reviews for several newspapers and music magazines. He also runs a highly regarded internet blog on music: Planet Hugill. In this conversation over coffee, Robert and I speak about his origins, about the choral tradition, about opera and his music writing, not only as a critic but as a composer as well. So far, Robert has premiered four operas: Garrett, When a Man Knows, The Genesis of Frankenstein, and The Gardeners. Among his CDs, I recommend to listen to The Testament of Dr Cranmer and Quickening.
Previous guests of the “A Coffee With…” series were the conductor Marco Antonio García de Paz, the music critic Arturo Reverter and the accordionist Iñaki Alberdi. Robert is the first guest of this series whom I don’t know in person and I take this “virtual coffee” as an attempt to discover who Robert Hugill is and what he does…
This is a bonus interview of the series “Music connects People” on “Music Without Quarantine”, a project which has lasted for two months and a half while the 2020 COVID-19 confinement in many countries in the world. This is a very special one. The pianist I’m talking to is the youngest of all the artists participating in this project. By the time we recorded this interview, Varvara Kutuzova was 16 years old. I don’t speak Russian, and Varvara started learning English recently. However, I decided to go on with the interview because she is a very talented musician. May it remain as a document for the future and, who knows, maybe in 10 or 20 years time, when Varvara looks back, she’ll get a good memory of her first interview in English.
Everything as a start and an end. This is the 10th and last interview of the series Music connects People of the project Music Without Quarantine. Here you are the list of the previous nine interview that you can see on this blog and on my YouTube channel as well:
Finally, it’s the turn of the father behind this idea of Music Without Quarantine, the amazing Spanish-Russian Mikhail Pochekin. Misha, that’s the way family and friends call him, came over to Madrid to celebrate his 30th birthday by the begining of March 2020. Hardly four days later, the confinement and quarantine due to COVID-19 came to many countries in the world. Misha was in Salzburg when it all started. I was in Móstoles (Madrid). He was preparing his concerts later being cancelled. I remember he called me saying he would like to keep playing and he was thinking about the possibility to do some online concerts on the Internet. Both of us saw this situation as an opportunity to put into practice something we had been talking about for some time: get music closer to people and viceversa. It all started a bit like a homemade experiment. We created the Facebook page Music Without Quarantine and, ever since, over 27 musicians from 12 countries playing 17 different instruments have taken part in this project. This fantastic experience has helped us show that music really connects people: musicians with musicians, audience with musicians and, ultimately, people with people. For over two months now, Wednesdays at 19:00 CET became the weekly meeting point for all of us, artists and the audience.
The Long Night Of Music will be our final concert. It will take place on Wednesday, May 27th at 19:00 CET and 20 artists will be playing on Music Without Quarantine.
This is the 9th interview of the series “Music connects People” on Music Without Quarantine. The eight previous interviews were with the Spanish harpsichordist Diego Ares, with the American bass & lutenist Joel Frederiksen, with the German cellist Benedict Klöckner, with the Peruvian pianist & bandoneonist Claudio Constantini, with the sisters and pianists Danae & Kiveli Doerken, with the Ukrainian pianist Anna Fedorova, with the Mexican composer based in BostonJosé Elizondo and with the great violistDana Zemtsov. And now it’s the turn of the coolest double bassist on the planet: Nicky Schwartz. Nicky is currently playing for the Concertgebouw Orchestra. But more than a double bass player, Nicky is a great musician and communicator in every way. Besides his career as a musician, Nicky is an avid sportsman. Before he decided to go professional as a classical double bassist, he had won several skateboard and snowboard competitions. Nicky has been trained in jazz music as well as classical music. He started his musical education in the United States, where he was born. He joined the prestigious Berklee School of Music and he also took part in the Tanglewood program of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Then he continue his international education in Berlin, at the prestigious Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. Married to the great pianist Anna Fedorova, Nicky has played with internationally renowned artists. Apart from the double bass, Nicky plays many other instruments. You can learn about all these things and more in the following interview:
This is the edited video of the 7th interview of the series “A Coffee With…” This time, my guest was the Romanian music & artist manager Andreea Butucariu. The original “A Coffee With…” session took place via Zoom and was posted unedited on the Facebook wall of Music Without Quarantine.
This is the edited video of the fifth interview of the series “A Coffee With…” This time, my guest was the American bass singer, lutenist and early music specialist 
This is the edited video of the fourth interview of the series “A Coffee With…” This time, my guest was the British composer, journalist, blogger and lecturer 
Everything as a start and an end. This is the 10th and last interview of the series Music connects People
This is the 9th interview of the series “Music connects People” on 