Name: Duo Gazzana
Members: Natascia and Raffaella Gazzana
Nationality: Italian
Occupation: Violinist (Natascia Gazzana), pianist (Raffaella Gazzana)
Current release: Duo Gazzana's Kõrvits / Schumann / Grieg is out via ECM.

If you enjoyed this interview with Duo Gazzana and would like to know more about their music, visit their official website. To stay up to date with them, check out their profiles on Instagram, and Facebook.



When did you first start getting interested in musical interpretation?

Once one has acquired basic technical skills, a musician must focus on musical interpretation. Musical interpretation has its own fundamental rules that revolve around flow, melodic line, lyricism - these rules are inherent to the process of learning music.

We imagine we first became aware of and then intrigued by musical interpretation when we first approached pieces by composers such as Mozart and Bach.

Which artist, approaches, albums or performances captured your imagination in the beginning when it comes to the art of interpretation?

As kids we used to listen to a lot of classical music at home. Natascia was particularly captured by major concertos from the romantic repertoire like Mendelssohn and Tchaikovsky performed by Isaac Stern, as well as the Beethoven concerto by Salvatore Accardo.

Horowitz’s performances, on the other hand, cast a spell on Raffaella.

Are there examples for interpretations that were entirely surprising to you personally and yet completely convincing?

Natascia finds Gil Shaham's interpretations of Bach very surprising, a bit out of the ordinary and therefore extremely interesting. Then there are a bunch of historical recordings, like Grieg by Karajan - impressive for the beauty of the sound and the approach to the slow pace - or Debussy Quartet by Quartetto Italiano.

Raffaella still is vividly gripped by some live concerts by Radu Lupu and Igor Pogorelich, which continue to prove intensely inspiring to her over time. Michelangeli recordings of Debussy, Brahms by Radu Lupu, Scriabin by Horowits or Listz Sonata performed by Arrau are among Raffaella's favourites.

What, would you say, are the key ideas behind your approach to interpretation? Do you see yourself as part of a tradition or historic lineage?

We find it extremely important to be as loyal as possible to the text, paying close attention to even the smallest details of musical writing.

Many of our teachers come from important traditional legacies and musical schools. Montanaro, Natascia's first teacher, has a background that can be traced back to Corelli and in more recent times to Mario Corti. Pianist Bruno Canino, a musical reference point to Raffaella, belongs to the Italian pianistic school of Vincenzo Vitali.

Could you describe your approach to interpretation on the basis of a piece, live performance or album that's particularly dear to you?

As previously mentioned, we give the text a great deal of importance. In addition, we always try to have a fresh approach to the music we are playing. For this reason, we are particularly happy to discover new music.

We have had several pieces dedicated to us by living composers (see for example Tõnu Kõrvits' Stalker Suite and Notturni on our recent album released by ECM).

When you are given a handwritten manuscript never played before, no tradition, no reference to influence your interpretation, it becomes so thrilling to try to give shape to and bring a composer’s vision to life!

What was your learning curve / creative development like when it comes to interpretation - what were challenges and breakthroughs?

Musical interpretation is always challenging, it is an exploration, an exciting discovery, and can be tackled in many different ways.

With commitment, devotion, confidence and most of all inspiration that can come from different sources such as reading a good book, seeing an inspiring film, the visual arts, the beauty of nature.

In many cases, the score will be the first and foremost resource for an interpretation. Can you explain about how “reading” a score works for you?

When starting to play a score you first take basic technical parameters into account such as rhythm, notes, nuances. But it is also very important to learn a composer’s language by getting in contact with the composer - if alive - or by listening and getting to know as much as possible of his work.

One of the key phrases often used with regards to interpretation are the “composer's intentions”. What is your own perspective on this topic and its relevance for your own interpretations?

We do our best to stay faithful to the text and to understand the spirit and the intention of the composer.

What role does improvisation play for your interpretations?

Improvisation was gradually discarded by classical music. Back in time the immediate development of a figured bass was a common practice for players. That doesn't exist anymore. So, probably, the less we improvise the better it is!!! :)

But in a broader sense of the term 'improvisation', we find it absolutely fundamental to play a piece as if it were the very first time. Every audience we perform for and interact with responds uniquely, each performance is charged with new emotions and sensations and thereby alive and in a way "quasi improvised".

Interpretations can be wildly different live compared to the studio. What is this like for you?

That is very true. When recording in a studio you are by yourself, have no contact with the public from which you normally would be receiving ‘vibes’.

During our recordings we imagined we were performing for an 'invisible' audience.

With regards to the live situation, what role do the audience and the performance space play for your interpretation?

The audience for sure plays an important role. Indeed every time we are in front of an audience, the music we are playing comes to life. And it changes according to different places and geographical areas.

There are people who are musically knowledgeable, others less so and for this reason eager to grow more familiar with so-called classical music.

The interaction mutual between the performer and the audience is always a source of reciprocal enrichment.

With regards to the studio situation, what role do sound, editing possibilities and other production factors play for your interpretation?

There are endless possibilities during a recording process. Theoretically one could produce music without really playing it. But if you abide by ethics, you want to live the music you are playing, want it to sound fresh and close as much as possible to a live performance.

A recording captures that particular moment you are in the studio. As you evolve as a person over time you would to re-record more up to date versions of the same composition, that better represent how you relate to that piece now as opposed to some years ago.

We are quite happy with the way ECM handles the whole recording process. A great deal of attention is dedicated to capturing the best possible sound quality of the instruments in the room. Great importance is given to the music itself, favouring several full takes instead of focusing on the unmusical repetition of single passages that would kill the natural flow of the music.

Some works seem to attract more artists to add their interpretation to it than others; some seem to even encourage wildly different interpretations. From your experience, what is it about these works that gives them this magnetic pull?

Right! Some compositions have a particular attraction because they are masterpieces and as a natural result performers wish to have their say.

For example, we decided to record the Franck Sonata and the first one by Schumann, being fully aware that the world was not really waiting for the umpteenth recording of these pieces.

We felt we wished to express our version and communicate the emotions we felt through these examples of “eternal” music.

Artists can return to a work several times throughout the course of their career, with different results. Tell me about a work where this has been the case for you, please.

Fortunately the interpretation of a work is always subject to a continuous and infinite process, one determined by different factors.

It can be related to the very moment you are living in, a particular state of mind, the experiences accumulated over time, the contact with the public and the recordings of the piece which have already been released.