Philippe Jaroussky: «Schubert is an Everest that all singers want to climb»

He is one of the great countertenors of our time, and his voice has been said to be supernatural, transcendent. The voice of an angel. With a great career behind him, the countertenor visits the National Auditorium of Madrid today to perform, together with his pianist Jérôme Ducros, a very particular program that is part of the Impacta Cycle, ‘Vienna-Paris’, with works by Haydn, Mozart , Schubert, Hahn, Faure and Debussy. It will also be at the Palau de la Música in Barcelona at the Kursaal in San Sebastián. “It is always special to return to Madrid because I have been singing here for more than fifteen years.” The program that will be executed is something intimate, different, and complex. «It is something very different from a concert with an orchestra. It is a meeting between two musicians, specifically with Ducros, with whom I have been working for 20 years. This recital also coincides with the release of his new album with music by Franz Schubert. «Schubert is an Everest that all singers want to climb. It’s not about virtuosity, but about color, articulation and phrasing. It is a repertoire that demands absolute control, but at the same time you have to free yourself to find emotion, a moment in which time stops. A job that has taken a lot of time of introspection and perseverance. «It has been a project that has asked a lot of me because it is a repertoire that is more distant from what I usually perform. Although I speak German, I have had to go a lot deeper. It’s a dream to sing Schubert. It has always been said that he is an angel. There are composers like that, angelic like him, and others more on earth like Beethoven or Brahms. People sometimes say that I have the voice of an angel, so let’s see if they work together,” he confesses, laughing.

The works he must perform are very varied and it is a challenge for both him and the audience. «I like to make people forget the type of high countertenor voice I have. For me the most important thing is to make the audience travel with music through feelings. I have to interpret a poem, not something baroque. The opera is a slightly hysterical world while what is in the program is poetic. It’s very difficult to change from one song to another so different in four minutes. Each song is a world and it is also difficult to get the audience into each song.

Music is universal, but the way you feel it is not so much. At least, that’s what Jaroussky believes, who has toured the world to the best operas and theaters. «Culturally, Spain is closer to Italy for the repertoire, but everything changes when we talk about staging. The taste of Berlin is not the same as that of Madrid, Paris or London. We artists have thought a lot about whether people were going to return to theaters after the pandemic. The season after Covid was very complicated for everyone. Now it seems like everything is better, but the battle is never won. I find it interesting to show younger people that going to the theater or the opera is a way to enjoy time in a different way. I am the first one who is always on the phone listening to audio or watching something. Theater is an amazing thing; “There is not only music, there is also silence.”

Maestro Gianandrea Noseda said in a recent interview with ABC that when the inner life of an artist is solid, it translates into interpreting a score, whether singing, playing an instrument or conducting. For Jaroussky, the inner life and the starting point of the career is also key to this. «When I was younger, I felt like I was discovering the world. You live with the energy of youth, you recognize the flexibility of the voice. Everything is very easy, it is something very natural. But after a few years, when I started to have a little success and started to be invited to sing in big venues, the fear appeared. I felt the pressure, I held back the feeling a lot because I did not yet have the ability to master all the technical points. I was very tired and at the same time I had to work harder than ever. After 25 years, all this has disappeared. There is stress, but I am much calmer.” This transformation of his voice is what allows him to face programs as complex and changing as today’s at the National Auditorium.

The voice transforms, the countertenor assures that every six months he notices changes in his register. There are things that he can no longer do as he did in the past, but he recognizes that there are other things that are more interesting to him. «One thing I didn’t know when I was young is that the voice is worked on even more later, especially to maintain flexibility. Now I enjoy the work more because working on the voice means introspection. It’s knowing yourself better. I think I know myself better than when I was 25. At that age we are interested in getting to know others, but there is an age, mine right now, when I am more interested in my own company than that of others. When I was young I talked about the voice as something foreign to me. There was a disconnect between what I thought I was and the voice. Now I can talk about my voice.

When Jaroussky talks about his instrument, the emotion that flows through his words is inevitable. «Many phoniatric doctors tell me that there are still many mysteries about how the vocal cords work. The spoken voice is already a miracle, that ability to connect directly with the mind. Although I think mine is not because each voice is unique. I do believe that the ability to connect the voice with the audience is a miracle. “I have always thought that my body is an antenna that receives the signal of music and that through my instrument I transfer it to the public.” All these years of work and introspection have helped him not only grow in his career as a countertenor, but also as a teacher at his school, the Jaroussky Academy, in Paris, where he teaches young people with limited resources and introduces them to the world of music. music and lyrics.

Attract young people

It is increasingly common to see small screens lit in the stalls while the artists perform an opera. The inability to pay attention during a four-act play increases more and more. One of the challenges that artists like Philippe Jaroussky have is to keep the viewer’s attention without distracting them from all the stimuli that one can find in the seat with the mobile phone. Also, to attract new generations to the auditoriums, which have a majority of more mature audiences. «Now I think differently than I did a few years ago. I think the richness of opera is telling the truth. Opera is a sacred world. It’s interesting to say it because there are young people who come to the opera to listen to a Mahler concert or symphony for an hour and a half because they have understood that it is a totally different way to spend a night and not watch a Netflix series. It is to be silent and enjoy time in a sacred way. If you tell young people that it’s a ‘cool’ thing, you don’t help them. We must teach that opera, ballet or a concert is a matter that requires effort, sitting down and being silent. “Opera attracts good people.”

In addition, he recognizes that there is so much variety within that genre and in others such as classical music that it is very difficult to determine if the viewer likes what they see or not with just one performance. «It is very sad to make the decision not to return to the opera after having seen it for the first time. It’s a shame because the staging is so different… Classical music is so rich that there are those who only enjoy Vivaldi and the baroque world, others who are moved by contemporary music and can listen to ‘Don Giovanni’, by Mozart, 20 times because it never sounds the same.

The artist assures that not only is work being done to attract the younger generations, but also to reduce ticket prices, which although it is not applied in all theaters in the world, this reduction is appreciated as well as the promotions and offers so that young people can access it more easily. “They are already beginning to realize that going to the opera can be cheaper than going to a pop concert by their favorite star.” And although he is optimistic about this matter, he recognizes that there is still much to do. “We must not take the battle for granted because society changes.”

The countertenor, who takes on this task as his own, not just as a challenge for theaters, tries to attract new generations with his Paris school, the Jaroussky Academy, where he has two hundred young people without resources on scholarships to study music for free. . “I think that when you study music and learn to play an instrument, you appreciate music in a different and more special way.” Many children and young people with a musical vocation put aside the idea of ​​studying it because it involves a great expense. Jaroussky created the school precisely to “democratize the study of music” so that any talented young person can access it whether they have resources or not. His students pay a symbolic amount of 20 euros. «After 20 years of career, I felt the great need to give others the opportunity that was given to me. When you don’t have a musical background, it’s difficult to encourage a six or seven year old to start playing an instrument. “So a lot of talent is being lost.”