Latest / Erstklassisch mit Mischke - Klassik hautnah / Anna Lapwood: „Mit Taylor Swift Orgel spielen - das wäre cool!“
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- Ich glaube, ich war ziemlich schlecht bei der Gitarre. Ich glaube, ich war extrem cool. Ich ging durch eine Phase, wo ich die Schule von Rock gesehen habe und das erste Mal habe, dass ich ein Zukunft als elektrisches Gitarrepieler hatte. Und ich glaube, diese Phase dauerte ca. 2 Wochen. Und ich war sehr cool für diese 2 Wochen und habe sehr viel Spiel. Erstklassisch mit Mischke, der musikalische Podcast des Hamburger Abendplatz. Schönen guten Tag zu einer neuen Folge. Ich habe heute einen ganz interessanten Gast dabei. Vor einigen Wochen in Köln wollten 13.000 Menschen in ihr Konzert im Kölner Dom. Die Schlange war ungefähr einen Kilometer lang. In der Schule hat sie sich, soweit ich weiß, mal so vorgestellt. Hi, I'm Anna Lapwood and I play 20 instruments. Übrig geblieben ist vor allem eins, das deutlich mehr wiegt und mehr Lärm machen kann als alle 20 zusammen, die Orgel. Sie hat in der Royal Albert Hall für Benedict Cumberbatch georgelt und sie hat Tom Cruise gezeigt, wie impossible diese Mission ist. Am 22. Oktober ist sie wieder in Hamburg, dann in der Elbphilharmonie, aber jetzt ist sie, glaube ich, in London. Sie ist Britin und es ist Anna Lapwood. Also, hello and lovely to meet you. I did understand a little bit of that, actually. I was very proud. Okay. Wonderful. That's a good way to start. Und übrigens, falls Sie jetzt schon neugierig geworden sind, während diesem Podcast noch so alles da war und von sich berichtet hat, Sie finden Erstklassisch mit Mischke auf abendblatt.de und bei allen anderen guten Podcast-Adressen, Bewertungen von fünf Sternen aufwärts nehmen wir gern. Das freut uns und das hilft uns. Aber jetzt fangen wir erst mal an und wir machen auf Englisch dann weiter. So, first of all, thanks for having me. Sie haben jetzt schon seit Jahren gearbeitet, so es ist ziemlich kompliziert zu finden, zu finden in Ihren schedule. So, thanks. Sorry! Ich fand eine interessante Quote. Du sagst, oder nein, die Guardian wrote über dich, dass bei der Jahre 18, sie hat die Grade 8 auf den Piano erreicht, die Violin, Viola, Harp und Organe und sie hat sich ein paar andere Instrumenten gespielt. Was ist das eine, die du nicht gut gemacht hast? Was ist das Schlimmste? Oh, that is a very good question. I think I was pretty bad at guitar. I like to think that I was extremely cool. I went through a phase, I'd watched School of Rock for the first time and decided that I had a future as an electric guitar player. And I think this phase lasted about two weeks. And I was very cool for those two weeks and played Eye of the Tiger a lot. But I don't think that that had a future for me. So I'm going to say, yeah, guitar was not my not my strong point. Okay. An organ is not something you come across easily. They don't lie around in the living room. You don't meet an organ in school normally. How did you come across having the idea I have to play the organ? Well, my dad was a priest, so I grew up in churches a lot. And I obviously heard the organ played quite a lot. But interestingly, I don't remember kind of being struck by it as an instrument as a child. And I have been obviously thinking about this a lot now that I am an organist and wondering why I wasn't taken by it straight away, given that I did love sort of taking up as many instruments as I could. And I think it's something about the fact that I could never see the player. Und so ich nicht als ein Instrument das ich konnte weil ich einfach hörte es ich nie sah und es nicht bis ich war ein Teenager und mein mum turned around zu mir und sagte habe ich gedacht ich habe gedacht ich habe. Und ich habe gesagt ich bin verdiculous mum die organ ist ein awful instrument warum ich ever want to take up the organ, und dann sie told me organ scholars at Oxford and Cambridge get grand pianos in their rooms at university and I confessed that was, Ich habe mich auf die Organe in der ersten Place, weil ich wirklich wollte, die Grand Piano. Aber dann, als ich angefangen habe, zuerst fand ich es wirklich, wirklich, wirklich hart. Und ich hated es, weil ich es so hart fand. Und dann habe ich angefangen, mit der ganzen Welt, das die Organe opens. Und es war wie ich zu wissen, die Welt der Choral-Musik war. Und es war mein gateway into das. Und ja, so jetzt bin ich sehr dankbar, zu meinem Mutter, für mich zu beenden, für mich zu beenden, all diese Jahre zu gehen. Whenever you read an article over here, at least, there's always mentioning a quote that you're supposed to be the Taylor Swift of organist. Is this rather a blessing or a curse being compared in this way? You know what? I love Taylor Swift and I have a lot of respect for her. I think she is an incredible artist and also incredible at creating a community around her music. And I am very inspired by her and try and take a lot of inspiration from her in how I approach creating a community myself. So I see that quote as a huge, huge honour. I do find it funny how that sort of quote seems to stick. Once someone says anything like that once, it follows you around for years. And I think it is this thing, media often loves to put people in boxes, doesn't it? And so I think that's another box. But you know what? I just am full of admiration for everything she's achieved with her music. And the fact that people follow her musical journey and follow whatever music she decides to focus on in that particular season because it's the music that feels authentic to her at that point in time. They are drawn because they follow her as a person. They then go on this musical journey with her and follow her changing preferences. And I think we can learn a lot about that in the classical world, dass wir einen mit uns mit uns auf der journey können wir mit uns all sorts of different musical discoveries along the way. Ist es possible that playing the organ is sort of helpful to, Achieving a career like yours, because it's such a complicated instrument and nobody really knows how this is done, how this is working, what's possible, what's impossible on an organ. It's easier to find out whether somebody is a good piano player or a good violin player or a good singer, because that's rather obvious and popular. Organ is very exotic in a way and I guess it might be easier to to just get ahead and to to just become famous more easily because nobody knows whether this what you're doing is at the top of the level it's just mediocre or it's just below mediocre so how do you think about this, Yeah, I think the exotic nature of the instrument has certainly been a big part of the appeal on social media, because a lot of people just don't understand how it works. And so I've sort of seen my part of my job as trying to explain to people how it works and trying to kind of demystify it a little bit and say, oh, yeah, this is how we use our feet. This is what we use our feet for. I know what you mean because it's less famous it's harder to know what is difficult what's not difficult but also I think as with any instrument, there can be this illusion of playing things with loads and loads and loads of fast notes is the hardest thing you do on the instrument but actually some of the hardest things we do on the organ it's about playing something really really slow but creating that sense of musical line because. It's not like other instruments in terms of how you create emotion in the playing. The only way you can create emotion is by these tiny changes in articulation. And so actually the things that sound hard, as with any instrument, the things that sound hard are often easier than the things that sound easy. And it's making everything sound easy that is one of the challenges. Yeah. The fun part is, on my side at least is you're playing two instruments that I don't understand totally I have no idea how you play a harp and I have just vague ideas about how to play an organ, and it's so complicated and you're playing both of them. Ja, ich immer sagen, ich denke, mein Harp Training wirklich hat, wenn es kam zu den Organ hat, denn als Harpist, du benutzt deine Füße ein viel. So du benutzt die Pudels, die die Kiefer verwendet, in der Fall ist, aber du hast zu werden, dass du dein Füße moving, aber ohne dich zu denken über deinen Füßen. Und da ist ein Entzündnis, das hat sich entwickelt zwischen den Füßen und den Füßen, wie natürlich dann sehr gut mit der Organ hat, when you have to just let your feet do their thing and trust that they know where they're going to go. And interestingly, I don't play the harp anymore, but I sat down and I still have my harp. And I played it for the first time in a couple of years, I think maybe a month ago, two months ago. And my hands had no idea what they were doing. My feet just shot to the right place straight away. And I couldn't remember this piece, but my feet remembered the pedals. And it was a very surreal thing because there was no brain activity Ich war sicher, dass ich die Feet, wo ich gehen. Aber die Muscle Memory war immer noch da. Du spielst ein Organ, oder zumindest ich weiß, dass du spielst die Organe und du spielst ihn während du ein Teenager war. Und ich glaube, es gibt zwei oder drei Dinge die sind eher cool als ein Argen, als du ein Teenager-Girler bist. You know, not for me, because I, the coolest thing in my mind was playing musical instruments and spending my whole time, all my spare time, trying to figure out how to play more musical instruments. And it just, it was my sort of safe place, I guess, as well. It was my refuge from the world. It was my most natural means of communication, or at least music more generally, was my most natural means of communication. I am secretly an introvert I might not seem it but I am massively introverted and there's something about music where it just feels like you can say, whatever you want to say in the most authentic terms when words sometimes fail you so yeah that's how I just love spending my time as a teenager and it took a bit longer for me to feel that same emotional connection with the organ I think I felt like it took a while before I figured out how to communicate through the instrument and longer than it had taken for the other instruments that I played, but now I sit at the organ and it just feels like an extension of my body. Are you able to feel the audience like other musicians are able to do this because of the distance you have between yourself, the position you are and the audience is more or less half a kilometer away if you're in a church what's that like to play for people you can't see, even if you look in your rear mirror you can't see them so it's just like being alone but it's not like that and I wonder what this feeling is on stage or during a concert, It's an interesting question, actually. I mean, it varies a lot depending on the specific venue, because, I mean, I've just been playing in Trondheim in Nidaros Cathedral, and there the organ console is on the ground. I had kids sitting, I don't know, a metre behind me on the floor, and audience all around me, so I did feel much more kind of in the middle of things. But as you say, often we are hidden away in Cologne Cathedral. I was up on this gallery and miles away from everyone. And I think there's something, I love the feeling of performing and feeling like I go into my own whole world sometimes and it can feel like it's just me and the instrument and I kind of forget that the audience is there and I quite like that because for me, as I said, music is such a deeply personal thing and it feels like a conversation between me and the instrument. And the way I play a piece will change based on how I'm feeling that day because I'm trying to just put the current emotional state into that piece and so sometimes forgetting about the audience can be quite a good way to, achieve that kind of conversation but then I also love trying to incorporate moments that very much remind me that the audience are there so I often will say in Cornfield Chase from Interstellar I will ask the audience to get out their phone torches And that is actually largely so that I am reminded that every Phone Torch represents a human being who is sitting there in the audience. And similarly, I always check the comments on social media before any concert and just check if there's anyone with a birthday or someone celebrating a big moment or just some story to remind me of the people who are sitting in the room listening. Weil die Community, die sich über die Organe entwickelt hat, und meine Konzerts in den letzten Jahren. That is very much my inspiration. That's why I make music. And being reminded of that just before you go on stage and reminded of the human stories behind every single person sitting there, I think it makes it mean more for me for every concert, if that makes sense. Sure. I found a quote you said once, if you're going to bring classical music to another audience, we've got to do it on their terms. Und sie sind da, sie sind da auf Social Media der ganzen Zeit. Das ist ziemlich obvious und ziemlich logisch, aber es ist kompliziert, aber es ist schwierig, aber es ist schwierig. Was ist deine Explanation für die Situation, dass so viele von deinen Kollegen nicht arbeiten und nicht wirklich interessiert und nicht in diesem Bereich arbeiten und nicht mehr arbeiten, ist es wichtig, dass die Zuschauer in eine neue Weise zu denken, to get them to get a full house and to get them to hear music which they might have never heard before. Yeah, I mean, I think everyone has a right to make music. On their own terms, and to engage with their audience in the way that feels most natural for them. I think the point I was trying to make with that quote is I feel as if we often say, oh, how do we get a young audience into classical music? They just don't care. And this is where I think that that is just totally wrong. They do care, but it's just finding the right way to get them hooked. And I think it can be a little arrogant of us to assume that they would want to just walk into a concert hall, to just assume that as a basic thing, to say, yeah, they don't seem to want to walk into a concert hall. They're wrong. This is awful. I think that's a little arrogant of us. Whereas actually, the thing that I have found is that just sharing what we do on the platform that all these young people are using the whole time, which they understand and which they use to encounter the world, if we make classical music something that they stumble across on that platform, then we're not having it as this other thing that they have to engage with in a totally different way. It's something that just feels part of their normal life to encounter. And what I have found is that putting that music in front of them on that platform, they start to ask questions about it. They want to know more. They want to learn because that's what they use social media for. They use it to learn. And then they come to the concerts and they are there because of TikTok and Instagram and Facebook, mostly with the younger generation, TikTok and Instagram. But they really do then come to the concerts and then they keep coming back. And that's what I find really exciting. So I find often, perhaps colleagues will say, oh, well, she has loads of followers, but it doesn't really mean anything. I mean, it's just people online. Das ist nicht richtig. Es handelt sich zu Menschen in den Konzert Hall zu kommen, und dann zu anderen Konzerts, bei anderen Organisten, oder zu anderen Konzerts in der gleichen Konzert Hall. Und das ist wo ich, dass wir in such einen spannenden Zeit leben können, weil wir können die soziale Medien nutzen können, um diese neue Einwohner zu machen und sie excited haben. And I feel like just trying to encourage anyone who's happy and willing to use it to just explore what might be possible with social media. And you don't have to play film scores. I play film scores because it's the music that makes me the most happy and where I feel I have the most to say. But I know plenty of other organists who are achieving huge success on social media playing the classic repertoire too. And that's really exciting. How complicated and how tough is it to resist the urge to not blast away on a big organ beast like the one in royal albert hall just doing everything you can and playing as loud as you can and playing so that i don't know books fall from shelves and uh you have an organ if you if you play organ then you have so much physical power more or less under your hands and i guess this must be really exciting and tempting to just let it all go and not play soft and not play quiet and not be nice and kind on an organ like this where you feel your teeth shaking whenever you're doing a real forte. Oh, it's interesting. I mean, yes, I love the feeling of playing when it really is shaking the walls and you know that it is sort of audible from the offices as well as in the hall itself. It's an amazing feeling, but I've always loved the soft side of the organ almost more, I think. And I think the loud side wouldn't have the impact without the soft side, right? Some of my favourite playing to do is when you're playing so quietly that you can barely hear it and having that as the contrast to that wall shaking thing so actually in the most recent concert I did in Trondheim, I was playing something from Inception and it gets extremely loud and then the next moment it is the quietest you can possibly play and in Trondheim you can play with some pipes that are up in the tower so they're even quieter because they're so far away and it was so quiet that you really could you had to strain to hear it you were like is the organ still playing? But the feeling of a thousand people sitting in total silence and total focused concentration, all with their ear kind of to one side trying to hear this very very very quiet sound that is such a special thing and I never get bored of it Even if it's just me playing, I never get bored of that contrast and that range. You're more or less 30 now, as far as I know. And you had a career, you're having a career, which is really impressive. And you ended jobs that many others had. When they were quite a lot older than you are now and you've been the youngest music director in an Oxbridge College you even have an MBA since 2024 like a big order, and aren't you scared somehow that maybe all this comes too soon and it's not too easy to achieve all this but, I wonder whether there's some sort of fear about oh am I really that good Am I really that good at that age? What's next? What can come next if I've achieved so far so many things already? How does this feel? We all have that fear, I think. We all have that little voice inside that goes, oh, but I'm not good enough. I can't do it. Why? What is happening? It's all going to come crumbling down. And in a way, That's why I chose to leave my job in Cambridge when I did, because I have been spreading myself extremely thinly for the last few years, doing a full-time job and then sort of trying to do full-time touring on top of the full-time job. And I know that I've been pushing my body to its limits I know that I haven't been really sleeping much for the last couple of years and I know that every now and then I have felt like I haven't been able to do the music justice in the way I want and I also feel like I have been on the verge of letting my students down on occasion because I have been too tired to notice when they need my support, Und ich habe die Entscheidung, dass ich wollte, zu stoppen, zu spüren, dass ich mich nicht mehr als auch, bevor diese Dinge entdeckt haben. Und ich weiß, dass Touring ist ein sehr intensiver Ding, auf deinem Körper und deinem Körper. Und ich weiß, dass ich nicht mehr Touring will, für mein entire Leben. Aber jetzt ist es etwas, das ich sehr, sehr, sehr, sehr, sehr, sehr, sehr, sehr, sehr. And I feel like my heart sings when I'm on stage in a way that I can't ignore, and so this is the time for me to try it and experiment and see where it takes me I mean it's a new, it's sort of the start of a very new chapter for me I've got 85 concerts in the next 12 months so it's a huge number of concerts. It's completely insane but I'm really excited about it And what I want to do is do this for 12 months, see how it feels, keep taking stock at every step and keep having the conversation with my manager and with my team and say, what's feeling right? What's feeling less good? And just try and listen to what what is making my heart sing, because it's. Kind of a voyage of discovery for all of us. We're not quite sure what's going to happen. I want to make sure that whatever choices I make, it's choices that are sustainable, that hopefully allow me to have a long career, if possible. But it's, yeah, it's just an exciting time to kind of see what is coming next. And I'm just very grateful to the audiences who have kind of made it possible. I mean, most of my next shows, I think the next sort of 20 shows, most of them are sold out, which is mad. I never thought that would have been a thing that I would be encountering as an organist. But it just it shows that the demand is there. And I find that the audiences are the ones who shape what I what I play. And they they're the ones who inspire me the whole time. And I'm excited to have the chance to take that to the next level over the next couple of years, I guess. Since you mentioned the word madness and touring and all this, the concert in Cologne, where 13,000 people came and you had to play extra concerts. When you were in Hamburg a few days later, I was there. It was okay, sold out, but it wasn't that frenzy that you experienced in Cologne. Any idea how many T-shirts you sold afterwards? Because you had these T-shirts where the money from selling them went to an organization for supporting live music. So it's not go to you, but it went to this organization. Any idea how many T-shirts you've sold and how crazy this is, more or less, being an organist and selling T-shirts after a concert that was so crowded that people stood in line for a kilometre. I have no idea how many t-shirts we've sold because, yeah, I haven't been keeping an eye on it. But it was, it was, I still can't believe that whole thing happened. And I knew it was going to be busy. They, I think they often have sold or sort of basically sold out concerts there. And I had sort of said to them in advance, I'd said, I'm just a little bit nervous about the fact that we aren't doing tickets for this. Is it worth us doing tickets? They said, there's no way it will be more than 4,000. There's just absolutely no, it's fine, don't worry. And I kept saying, I'm just worried. Like a lot of people seem to be saying they're coming online, but obviously it's really hard to tell based on online comments. It's hard to know who will actually come. And then in the days before the concert, I was sharing quite a lot of my practice sessions. And I mean, that organ is so inspiring. And I was just sort of saying, this is kind of the most inspired I felt in terms of the pairing of instrument and repertoire. And these videos started going viral and getting kind of 50,000 likes and loads of comments. And again, I said to the team, I was like, I'm just, I'm seeing more and more comments from people flying from all over the world coming to this concert. And I'm a bit nervous. And we were still like, it won't be more than 4,000. And then it got to two hours before the concert and the queue was already a kilometer long. And I said, this is not going to work. We have to do two concerts because it's more than 4,000 people. They'll never all get in. So we did two concerts and I thought we'd got everyone in. I honestly thought that I didn't know that there was anyone else outside. Turns out there were still 5,000 people outside trying to get in. And by the time I knew it was too late. But yeah, I mean, the police were involved because none of us were expecting it. Und es war, es war, es war, ich bin sehr glücklich, dass niemand wurde hurt und dass die Leute so... Und sehr courteous zu uns und looked after in den queue. Und ein paar Leute said sie turned up, realised sie never going to get in und dann stayed für den Erfahrung von queuing und being there. Und was ein crazy Ding! Was ein amazing Ding! Und was ein Privilege to have been at the heart of it. Was about stage fright? Does es rise exponentially in this situation? Or is it just the same whether you play for 200 or 4,000 because you can't see them anyway? What's your situation when you're having to play in a frenzy like this. I didn't feel an ounce of nerves on that occasion. It was really, I mean, we all have an interesting relationship with nerves, I think. I used to get really bad stage fright. And I think it's only since I've really felt like I found what I want to say with what music I want to play. That's when my stage fright went away because it felt like I wasn't trying to prove anything anymore. I was just sharing what I loved. Und certainly in the case of Cologne I kind of thought I might get a little bit nervous but it was just the most incredible energy, I mean I shared a video of what it looked like from the gallery and it looked like, you know the scene in Lord of the Rings where Sauron goes out on the gallery and there's this army spread out in front of him it looked like that from up there, it was just crazy because there were just people everywhere and I knew it was going to look busy but I had no, sensed that it was going to be that crazy and they were just cheering and shouting and whooping and it was honestly just the craziest thing to watch and there was no way I could feel nervous in that moment because it was I just felt so kind of touched that people were there and, particularly in the context of it coming just as I was leaving the job in Cambridge and obviously there was a lot of, swirling emotions in my brain about that decision and that voice saying maybe you're making the wrong decision maybe you're leaving the comfort of this job maybe you're not good enough and then to see that many people there for me, to hear me play it was such a nice moment of yeah, maybe you've made the right choice, Did you contact the Guinness Book afterwards? Because you could be mentioned and entering this one with the category weirdest organ concert ever. I did. You know what? It did make me think I want to try and get a Guinness World Record for the largest audience at an organ concert. I'm doing a concert at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City next year. And I was thinking we might try because that venue can take that many people. And it is equipped to deal with that many people. So, yeah, we might see if we can get a big audience. And it would be very cool, I think, to just show people that there are that many people who want to come to an organ concert. And maybe you've even qualified for playing with Taylor Swift. Oh, one day, maybe. That's on my bucket list. I'm not going to lie. I would love that. What's more fun playing on one of these organs Das sind so groß wie eine Aircraft Carrier und nur so loud. Oder spielen auf diese kleine, kleine Organs. Wenn du nach Hamburg kommen, was du in Oktober kommst, haben wir alle Baroque Organs stehen hier. Was ist mehr Spaß? So for the repertoire that I play, it sort of needs to be one of the bigger organs, because the music that I adore playing is orchestral transcriptions, and you just need a larger instrument to play it, not just the kind of the sounds, but also in terms of the compass, the number of notes on each keyboard, and the playing aids as well. You need um i i hate having a page turner and i hate having a registrant because i like going into my little worlds with the organ and so i do all my registrations myself but that does mean you need the right buttons uh so i now um i'm quite strict about the organs that i say yes to um i think we turn down probably about two-thirds of the invitations we get but just because there isn't time to do everything and so i can i basically choose the organs where i know that the music that I want to play is going to work and that means that I don't play the smaller baroque instruments anymore and I do every now and then when I'm if I'm just practicing for fun I love going and playing them and just playing through some Bach but for the concerts that I'm giving and for the music that I know my audience wants to hear as well it does need the bigger aircraft hanger style organs. Okay one thing I found interesting is that you've started a Das ist eine Bewegung mit dem Hashtag PlayLikeAGirl. Und du hast diese Cambridge Organ Experience für Mädels geplant. Wie viele Mädels hast du eigentlich gebracht? Du bist interessiert in die Organe oder eigentlich spielen? Ist es eine gewisse Riesen-Success-Suche? Yeah, so when we first started the Organ Experience, I was asked to set it up by the university because they noticed that there were a sort of serious lack of female Organ Scholar applicants. And so they asked me to set it up. And the first year we did it, I think we had 20 girls coming. The last year we had 90 and I think the big difference that I noticed other than the numbers is that the first year most of them didn't play the organ and by the end most of them did play the organ already and were there to share the experience with each other and get to play these different instruments and I just find that so exciting and it's interesting obviously people can sort of say Ah, isn't it creating more gender division to do that? And to that I reply, well, when we get to a point where we have equality in terms of the number of female organists in the top positions compared to the number of male organists, then we don't have to have the conversation anymore. And my aim is to get to a point where we don't have to have that conversation anymore. I'm finally at the point where people don't refer to me as a female organist anymore, which feels like a huge win because I'm just an organist. They refer to me as the TikTok organist instead, but that's fine. But I'm not aiming to push this conversation just for the sake of having it. I'm aiming to make sure that everyone feels welcome in the organ world. And there are lots of us trying to just gently make sure that the numbers start to look more equal and that we are definitely getting there. Wir sind definitiv machen, aber ich glaube, wir sind noch nicht weit da. Ich glaube, ich bin der erste Punkt zu fragen, aber was ist es wie Tom Cruise auf dem Organe Bench oder Benedikt Cumberbatch auf dem Organe Bench? Other Menschen würden das für das leben. Und utterly surreal, I think, is the best way to describe it. I think in both cases, I was pinching myself a lot afterwards going, did that really just happen? But, you know, it sort of reflects the more general thing I've been trying to do of just show people that the organ is such a cool instrument and it's an instrument that people find incredibly exciting if they get to get up close and try it themselves. Because I think at the beginning of my career, I was told so often nobody likes the organ I mean I kept trying to pitch ideas for radio shows and TV shows about the organ to show people how great it was and I was met over and over again with this response nobody likes the organ sorry it's not interesting people won't find it exciting, and so to then be able to take people like Tom Cruise and Benedict Cumberbatch and say hey do you want to give it a go and to see their excitement, I think number one helps prove all those people wrong who said that no one likes it but number two. It's kind of helping use their power and energy and be like, look, they like it, you might like it too, and yeah, I love getting anyone I can up close, to give it a go at the Albert Hall if there's a cleaner who wants to have a go or if there's some of the crew who want to have a go I will always try and give them the chance Wenn es in der Mitte der Nacht ist, dann ist es Tom Cruise und Benedikt Cumberbatch, das war ziemlich cool. Wer ist besser als organ? Welche von ihnen? Definitely Benedikt Cumberbatch, ich bin afraid. Sorry, Tom. Weil Tom Cruise nicht spielen, als Benedikt das. Und so er spielt Zimbach, eigentlich. Und er war okay, dass das? Ja, er hat die C-major. Okay. Ja. Du hast die Idee, dass niemand die Organ mag. Ich studierte Musikologie und wir haben Organ-Scientists, die ich studierte. Und sie waren etwas weir, zu sagen. The least so it's hard to to come by the idea of organists being organists and just, seeing that they're normal people that's music as well and that's an instrument how tough is it even now for you to explain to people even after all what happened to you and with your career that this is something to be taken seriously and or to just have fun with as well. Yeah, I think obviously organs are such complex machines and such extraordinary machines. And I think a lot of the narrative around the organ in the past, not all of it, but a lot of it, has been focused on the fact that they are extraordinary machines. And I think that is incredible and it is something to be celebrated, of course. But I also think there's a limit to how far people connect with that on a human level. And I think what I've found is that people connect with it more if they feel an emotional. Draw and so I guess I've been exploring that a lot in the music that I play and seeing that film scores have this huge emotional draw to people and they do for me as well I have found that that is the music that allows me to create that emotional connection with audiences. Most easily and then that provides a gateway into the other repertoire as well. And so, yeah, I think it's trying to kind of respect the fact that they're incredible machines, but then think, okay, but that's not enough to get an audience interested. People don't go to piano concerts because they think that the piano is an amazing work of art. They go to piano concerts because they want to be moved. And I think we can learn a lot from other instruments with the organ. And perhaps we need to work even harder Es ist ein unglaublicher Maschinen, aber es ist, ich denke, zu machen, es zu machen, es zu machen, als viele andere instruments, weil es der Binary auf und auf einer Organ-Key ist. Du hast die gleiche degree, wenn du ein Harp bist. Es fühlt sich wie du... Pour emotion into the music so much more quickly because it is so much more responsive. With an organ, you do have to work that little bit harder. Did that make sense? Of course, yeah. Since you're doing soundtracks in your concert or film score stuff in your concerts, did you ever get in touch with a guy like Hans Zimmer or Portman or whatever to just tell them, if you have an idea of an organ, just call me. I might be interested or did they contact you? Yeah, I'm in touch with Hans and we keep trying to work together and then the dates never work but we are still hoping to work together one day. And Rachel Portman, I've had many conversations with her, she actually plays the organ herself, John Powell I was lucky enough to meet as well and with all these people I keep trying to say to them. Maybe you should write a soundtrack which is just the organ to show people quite how versatile this instrument is um and no one's done it yet but i hope that someone might because i think it could be quite a cool way to demonstrate the sheer range of the instrument uh to have a soundtrack that is entirely the organ particularly if it's one of those big organs in america that has percussion instruments in and it really has everything you could possibly want in terms of sounds um but yeah i mean i i just think someone Hans in particular, has done so much for the organ by writing that soundtrack, the Interstellar soundtrack, showcasing the instrument. I think that has been one of the greatest advancements in interest in the organ. Everyone wants to hear the Interstellar soundtrack whenever I turn up anywhere. Even if they have no idea who I am, they want to hear Interstellar. And I think that's something to be celebrated. I know that some people can roll their eyes and say, oh, it's basic. People who want Interstellar, it's basic. I think that is... Number one, wrong. Number two, reductive. And number three, insulting to the people who really love that music and who find that it moves them. It moves me whenever I play it. And so, yeah, I just am very grateful to people like him for thinking of the organ. Do you have a sort of organ bucket list, organs you absolutely want to play in your life? I don't know, maybe the new one or the quite new one in Paris, Notre Dame, or whatever other organs, that every organist in the world wants to get their hands on and it's really tricky to get in there. Yeah, I did. I had a long bucket list and I feel very lucky that I've now ticked off most of the ones on the bucket list, which is exciting. I mean, Boardwalk Hall, the largest in the world. That was the top of the list for a while and now I've got to play there and that was incredible. Disney Hall, again, I get to go and play there this year, later this year for the second time. Um, I think the other ones on there, there's the new organ in Helsinki, which is the 3D printed organ pipes, and it looks and sounds incredible. So I'd love to play that. The Mormon tabernacle organ that is vast and has so many cool colours. So I'd love to go and play that one. But there are just so many exciting instruments out there. This is the thing. You can write a bucket list and then you could write a whole other bucket list that is just as exciting. And I guess that's why I feel so lucky at the moment that I'm basically just ticking off my bucket list as my job, and realising how all of the music that you play can take on totally different meaning on all these different instruments. So you can play the same piece on 10 different instruments and it sounds totally different every time. And so a lot of my audience now, they want to tick off every concert because they want to hear how the pieces sound different in different places. And I think that's quite cool. I wonder whether organ playing might not be the only slightly weird thing in your life that you're doing. Because I've seen a video online, you at the edge of Victoria Falls, which is not as bad as it looks, but it's interesting. I've been there as well, not where you live, but I've done rafting at the Zambezi Rafa. But I didn't have the guts to go there. You have to do it. No, thank you. No, no, I really mean it. It's not scary. And it is just, I work in Zambia every year teaching music. And it's sort of like, I always think of it a bit like my new year. Because it happens at the beginning of the academic year every time. And obviously that's sort of been the structure of my life for quite a long time. And at the end of this trip, every single time I will go and swim on the edge of the waterfall. And it feels a bit like a baptism each time. It's like a fresh, clean slate after I've done that swim. And it's just this reminder of how small we are in the context of the universe. And yeah, I don't know. It just, it feels like this reset every time. And particularly in the context of just having been teaching music und be reminded how ridiculously lucky we are to have careers as musicians. I mean, there are so many musicians I work with in Zambia who are just as talented as musicians I know here in the UK who have careers. And in Zambia, it's not yet a career path that's viable to be a musician. So all of these people are doing it for fun. Working other jobs alongside and being reminded of the fact that we cannot take it for granted, that music is a viable career path. I think it's a really important thing. And so the waterfall is kind of the symbol of that at the end of those trips every year. Because to me, it looked like this is some sort of antidote against all the weird things you're doing all year long and playing and practicing and being reasonable. And in contrast to that, you just stand on the edge or you're swimming at the edge of a waterfall in Africa just to see what else is possible in your life. Yeah. And I also think it's the time each year where I really am very strict about taking at least a couple of days as a proper holiday as well. Because I think so often as a musician it's really tricky taking holiday because if you do take a holiday you feel a little bit guilty about not practising, and when I say a little bit guilty it tends to be very very guilty about not practising but when I'm in Zambia at the end of the trip I will always take a few days and just do nothing and then swim on the edge of the waterfall, and somehow it's easier it feels a little bit easier doing that in that amazing place with the landscape around you. And yeah, it is very much an antidote to everything else going on, I guess. Now I have some really tough questions, if it's okay for that. Yeah. Short ones, shorties. What are the things you spend an enormous and completely unreasonable amount of money for? Oh. Apart from saving for an organ, maybe. I have no idea. Yeah, um... You know, the one that really, that I find ridiculous every time is visa fees. The fees to get a blumen visa to the United States, it's so expensive. So that's always something that annoys me. And then, yes, the cost of a practice organ is not insubstantial. Yeah, I guess. And then sheet music, I guess, is also quite expensive. Oh, organ shoes. They are weirdly expensive and you get through them quite fast, actually. It's a bit like a ballerina. The more you use them, the more they die. And so I always try and have a couple of pairs of organ shoes, but you do get through them quite fast. That's even like you've just been looking at my papers, because the first organ player I talked to in this format was Iweta Apkalna. Sie hat gesagt, dass Organisten einen wunderschönen Wunderschönen haben, wenn es zu Schuhen kommt. Ja, so there are shoes called Organ Masters, and they have a heel that's sort of perfectly designed so that you can rock between your toe and your heel easily on the keys. They also have suede soles so that you can slip between them easily. And I always say to young organists, they will feel weird when you first wear them. But then once you get used to them, you will never look back. And now, I mean, if I didn't have my organ shoes, I would probably say I couldn't do a concert. Like if my shoes got lost, they are that essential. They protect your feet as well. Sometimes you're having to hit buttons really quite hard and very, very fast. And without a shoe, every now and then I've done it without shoes and it's really painful. So it protects your feet and protects the muscles. So, yeah, we do have weird taste in shoes. I have some gold ones at the moment, which I rather love. Is there something you couldn't care less for in your life? Vielen Dank. The opinions of some other organists. I think people, I mean, I would say most days I will accidentally see someone being rude about me online. And it is often other organists. And it used to really bother me. I think it's still, I still, I try not to let it get under my skin. Sometimes it does. um but i'll yeah i would say i now try not to care less because i think. We all do our own thing and we all as musicians we can only do what feels most authentic to us and that's what i'm doing at the moment and some people will like it and some people will not like it and you have to be okay with that because you're not doing it for other people you're doing it for what feels authentic to you and what feels right for your audience um so yeah Okay, good advice you'd give to your 20-year-old self, which is not too far away now, but anything that would have been really helpful when you were 20. I guess linked to that, my answer for the last one, stop trying to please everyone. Because I think you tie yourself in knots as a musician if you're trying to please everyone and you're not being authentic. And I sort of wish I'd had that realisation a little bit earlier, because I think I spent many years time myself in knots and hating performing as a result. And the other advice that I always pass on which I actually picked up from a singing teacher, he was talking about a pupil who was struggling with performance anxiety and he said they just need to realise that they have to learn to be happy with their 60% and make sure their 60% is good enough, and that was the biggest lightbulb moment for me and I apply it in every concert now And since I started applying it, I would say I very rarely feel like I give a concert that's not 90% or above, but I'm no longer expecting it to be 100% the whole time. And I'm learning to be sympathetic to the fact that I'm a human being and that sometimes you have a headache or whatever it is, and you might just not give 100% or that you are giving 100%, but 100% might not come out the other side. And the moment you realise that as a performer it's quite liberating and I think you actually your percentages are higher across the board when you start to be kinder to yourself and when you start to not expect it to be perfect, Your favourite instrument and the organ doesn't count in your case it's quite complicated but is there anything, My favourite instrument that isn't the organ Yes, so you have a wide range to pick from, I would say either the harp, for obvious reasons, or the cello. I've always wanted to play the cello. I said if there was any other instrument I would take up, it would be the cello. I just think it is such a soulful instrument. And yeah, I love listening to it be played. Okay. Any ideas what you've done or what you had done with your first professionally earned money? Did you... No, because I first earned money when I was a child because I used to do, I did stage school and I did a film when I was a child. It was an educational film to teach people English. And I think I earned something like 300 pounds and I have no idea what I did with it. I have a feeling it got put in a savings account till I was 18. So that's probably I think I was very responsible and saved it Beer or champagne? Oh, definitely champagne I hate beer What's the most typical thing for an organ player, for an organist apart from wearing weird shoes how could I always really recognise easily that you can't be anything else but an organist, I think we all carry around tote bags because I think we all carry around a tote bag with our organ shoes and with probably some Bach. So if you see someone with a tote bag, they're probably an organist. Not necessarily, but often. Your favourite superpower you'd like to have? Time travel. And the most impossible thing on your bucket list, you'd wish that it would come true eventually. Playing the organ with Taylor Swift. Maybe she's not big enough for you in a while and you could pick the world. I would love to play with her. I do. I know you joked about it earlier on, but I think it would be so cool. Und ja, wir sehen. Ich werde versuchen. Okay, danke sehr viel. Ich habe gelernt viel. Und ich freue mich sehr, dass du in der nächsten Nacht in Elbphilharmonie bist. Und vielleicht, ich weiß, es ist auch, vielleicht ist es ein langes Queue in der Elbphilharmonie. Und wer weiß, was wird passieren. Aber, nevertheless, stay weg von Waterfalls. Und we'll see here. Thank you very much then. Oh, thank you so much. Thank you for the brilliant questions as well.