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Interview- Ion Bogdan Ștefănescu and 'The Golden Flute'
The idea of this project belongs to me - I thought that, if my colleagues and friends had had national tours in which they had presented a particular brand of piano or violin, the instrument that I played, a Muramatsu golden flute - Muramatsu is the most important and famous flute manufacturer in the world - should enter in the elite of worldwide famous musical instruments brands. I took into consideration that collaborating with exceptional pianist Horia Mihail- my friend and study colleague in America- would be fruitful, because he has already had great experience in national tours of this type.
What are the period and the itinerary of this tour?
The tour will take place between 25th April and 7thMay. We will go to all the important cultural centers in the country - Brașov, Sibiu, Timișoara and, of course, București - but the unique thing comes from the fact that we will play in Caracal, where we found a wonderful theatre - a real architectural gem - a theatre which has been recently restored and has already entered in the national theatre circuit. Caracal has caring people, Maecenas I could say, people who wanted very much this tour, because the public is already familiar with the theatre's play, but to whom classical music has never reached to them by now, and were very happy about this opportunity.
Which are the works that you will play and what made you think of such program?
I chose the program as well and I thought about the impact it should have, as our public is known to be usually of conservative nature and usually reluctant to some proposals. The flute is an instrument with a fulminatory soloist career in the 20th century, but less present in our concert halls. I thought that a program starting with the baroque period would be welcomed, because I knew people loved very much this period in the history of music. For example, we had a concert in Mogoșoaia in which we played Händel's complete sonatas, and this fact brought together hundreds of people. Hence, together with Horia Mihail, we will go forth with Bach`s sonata - a very beautiful and balanced one - that is always well received by the public; then we get tot Mozart, playing a unique sonata for flute and harpsichord, that belongs to an opus of six pieces that he composed at 8 years of age, in London. We will finish the night with Sonatina by Dvoűák, that was primary composed for viola, but which sounds good on flute as well and is always well received by the public.
In the second part we will have pieces from the standard repertoire of the flute- Poulenc's Sonata, full of humor and sensibility, that I am sure the public will greatly enjoy. A unique sonata for the Romanian musical scene is Otar Taktakishvili's Sonata; the latter one is in the repertoire of the flute players, but in Romania, I think I am the only one who has played it. It is a very well written score, but it makes you think about movie soundtrack, with accents for both the pianist as well as for the flute player - so this will also be an attraction for the public. We will finish the concert with an 'easy' piece, so to speak, with great knowledge of composition, by Mike Mower, who is a very well known and current British composer worldwide. The piece is entitled Sonata Latino and it is composed from beats and themes of jazz and Latino music - rumba, samba - a very complicated piece that we hope to play well for the enjoyment of the audience.
Translated by Vlad Bîrsan and Alinda-Gabriela Ivanov
MTTLC, Bucharest University