Giancarlo Guerrero

Hi, Michael, always a pleasure to talk to you.

Nashville is a beautiful sunny day, but it's in the upper 20s. So yes, it is very cold. Definitely, this is when I miss Costa Rica the most.

Yes and no. In many ways, first of all, like you said, I was born in Nicaragua. I ended up moving to Costa Rica in my teenage years because, you may remember, the civil wars in Central America especially, in the late 70s, and my family was caught in the middle of it. And we ended up moving next door to Costa Rica, which opened their doors when, because Nicaragua literally became a communist country overnight at the height of the Cold War.

And, and had we stayed in Nicaragua, there is no way I would have become a musician because there were really no programs there. I mean, Nicaragua was mostly a dictatorship and culture and music were not important, unlike Costa Rica, which, you know, a country without an army that supports education and they had a national symphony orchestra which had recently started a youth symphony program. So by us moving to Costa Rica, it gave me the opportunity to at least have access to a musical education. But I came from a non-musical family. My parents or my siblings did not even know how to read music. Nobody in my immediate family, even as of today, doesn't even know how to read music except for my daughters.

You know, and but they love music. In my household, my father listened to mariachi music, and my mother listened to Julio Iglesias. So listen, Beethoven was completely nonexistent in my household, but they did feel that I had an ear for music. My father apparently said that I used to sing when I was a child. And arriving in Costa Rica, having basically lost everything, we basically left with our clothes that we had on, arrived as refugees. And they wanted to keep us busy, the kids, you know, and a good way to keep us busy after school to hopefully stay out of trouble. And for me, they saw an ad on the newspaper that the youth symphony had, you know, auditions to let people in. So they brought me in and somebody played a note on the piano, "la la la," and they're like, "Oh, you're in." And that's really where my musical training started, and like most kids, it was a hobby. It was something to do after school, but eventually, you know the drill, it becomes something more passionate and here I am.

Don't you love that? And you should have loved my percussion audition. They gave me a pair of sticks and they went, "Go, click click click click, you're in."

Simon Rattle.

Claudio Abbado used to play timpani.

Oh, yeah, no, there's—this is a little-known secret. Yes, there's quite a few of us closeted percussionists that, in my case, I just dropped the stick and moved to the front of the orchestra.

Roman Carnival.

Absolutely. You have to remember that as a percussionist, which I don't play anymore, it's been, you know, over 30 years that I performed, and I miss it terribly, by the way. What I miss the most is the camaraderie, hanging around. Conducting is a very lonely profession. But playing is something that I love to do and I miss it every day, the older I get. But you know, ever since I was in the youth orchestra, I was very lucky to be surrounded by just really fabulous musicians in all of the instruments. And as I've gotten older, one of the greatest joys is my relationship with some amazing soloist musicians, orchestra musicians from not only in Nashville, but all over the world.And you know what? There is something about what we do, and you know exactly what I'm talking about, that there is this influence that just being around them, you think differently. You start to approach music in a different way. When you're close to a great musician and they do it so naturally, there's something that inspires you to say, "Well, how do I need to see this in a different way?" Another thing that was very important to me is that, my God, even to this day, it's always been about the music. I listen to music—I cannot help myself—every day. I need to have music in my life.I to this day attend performances like crazy. When I'm on the road, I go listen to my colleagues. And I will especially love it when if I go to a big city like Frankfurt or Berlin where there's five or six orchestras or opera houses, I will go listen to them. And I was lucky enough when I went to Northwestern in Chicago that it was the Solti years, and it was magical to go every week to hear that rock band, as I called it. Great soloists, and all of course the touring orchestras that came through.So yes, what we are is a collection of watching all of these incredible ensembles and just basically getting inspired of how they approach it, how they do it, and how to think beyond what's actually on the page. But more importantly, there's also something that comes from years of experience. As you know, as a conductor, it's podium hours. And I look at myself at, you know, when I started 25, 30 years ago, and I'm not the same person I was even a year ago. And that has shaped my music-making. It has changed the way that I think about it.I always buy a new score, by the way, which also is very helpful. Whenever I conduct a new piece, whether it's Beethoven 5, I always get a brand new score and try to approach it as if I've never seen this piece ever, which is difficult, as you know, because you come with baggage. But then after studying it like from nothing, I always compare it to my old scores. And it's so interesting to say, "What the heck was I thinking back then?" that, you know, nowadays I would never do it the same. So to me it's great how music evolves, and phrasing and all that, I think of it in the same way. Something that I do on a particular day, I'm always open to change it the next day.And when you work with great orchestras like Galicia in Spain, it's a truly amazing orchestra, and you might come with an idea, but then the English horn player, who has one of the biggest solos, does something interesting, you go, "I'm gonna go with that." And then you basically say, "Oh, I like that," because that's a much better idea, whether to take a breath or holding one particular note. So really, I mean, it's just enjoying the ride and being open to new and wonderful ideas.

Well, getting to know the composer really helps when I do the contemporary music, whether it's Jennifer or Roberto Sierra or Jonathan Leshnoff or Chris Rouse, God rest his soul. I have to tell you that getting the fact that I know these people and I've gotten to know them over many years, and now that I champion their music, really makes me understand where they're coming from, you know? And it always has been probably the driver of this. The whole reason for me to do this is to hang out with my friends, to hang out with my colleagues. Whether it's working with Yo-Yo Ma or Gil Shaham or Hilary Hahn or whoever, yeah, the music is great, but really we just want to sit down and after the concert go out and have a wonderful dinner and catch up on our own lives.

And the same thing is with these composers. Maybe it's also the fact that I am a very, very, very curious person musically. There's very few composers that I will not do, and it's just basically because their music just doesn't connect with me. It's not that there's something wrong with them, it's just that over the years I have come to understand that there is there is repertoire and the same way that there is literature and there is art that speaks to me because of my upbringing and because of where I've come from. And there's other stuff that just doesn't do it for me, and there's nothing wrong with it. Something that you may think may be the greatest thing ever, for me may not be as interesting. And I've had to learn to be honest about it. I have had to learn that whenever I stand up and I do a piece that I may not feel completely devoted to it, the musicians will know and more importantly, the audience will know. They're not—I mean, there is a certain something in the telepathy of what we do that you can tell. And because of that, over the years I have learned to basically leave some stuff—that's what guest conductors are for, by the way. You know, the music director should not be able to do everything. I mean, who can do everything? Nobody. So I focus on the stuff that I do well and then the other stuff, you know what, let them come. But at the same time, I keep an open mind that hopefully someday that there'll be that spark in my mind. Perfect example, Messiaen. To me, Messiaen, I would have never done his music, and then because of Jean-Yves Thibaudet, the great pianist, who was basically, you know, telling me, "You need to do Turangalîla. This is your piece. You need to do it, you need to do it."

And I said, "No, I'm not gonna do this. I covered for it when I was in Minnesota as associate conductor. I didn't like it. It was a pain in the neck." And then two years ago I did it, and I can now tell you, there is in my life before Turangalîla and after Turangalîla. It has become a revelation, and I will forever be grateful to Jean-Yves Thibaudet for for pushing me for it. And so yes, I'm open that maybe someday some works that I may not have an affinity for, all of a sudden become attractive.

But you know, it again, it's all about about, you know, where how you were introduced to it. I was lucky enough in Minnesota that I got to work very closely with Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, who was perhaps the greatest Brucknerian until he died a few years ago, and he was like a father figure to me. And also in Chicago with Solti, which was also a very special place. So since then, I do all of the symphonies, all of them. I am a huge fan. But I agree with you, it's not the easiest to program.

Oh, and I do all of them. I've done most of them by now. And I have to tell you, my favorite, the First Symphony.

And the reason going back to style. Right. When you think of like when you hear like something by Philip Glass, like you immediately know, oh, that's Philip Glass. Whether you like it or not, but you can recognize it immediately. Yeah. It is exactly the same with Bruckner. When you listen to the First Symphony, yeah, you know where he was coming from. You may not agree with it, but the guy already had an idea of what he wanted to write. And you put the First Symphony next to the last one, the Ninth Symphony, the unfinished. And yes, there is a connection. The man knew exactly what he was writing and he stuck with it, and God bless him.

You know, there are two things that that that you have to understand with the connection of these two composers. Of course, we have the letters, you know, which are very fascinating to read. But with Bruckner, Bruckner and Mahler, there's one particular difference, and that's God. Yeah. With Bruckner, there was no question. Devoted and faithful, and even his pieces he would write at the end, "To the memory of, you know, to the glory of the Lord," or "To the Holy Spirit," or even to the Virgin Mary, who of course he was also a very, very devoted. So for him, the idea of God was not a question. It was settled. He was completely faithful and devoted. With Mahler, God was a source of conflict. A huge source of conflict. Beginning with the fact that, what is it, eight siblings that died in infancy? Being him being the oldest and watching this happen.

Suicide, you know, his roommates in the conservatory. And the whole idea of of being Jewish and then having to convert or converting to get the job in Vienna. So this was...

I mean, when you think of but when you think of the tragedy, and again, when you think of the tragedy later with his younger daughter dying, so tragically, and you know, Alma, and then himself dying at age 51. I mean, yeah, you can see why he would question even God's existence. So this is what is the key. You hear that conflict on every single note and every bar of Mahler. It's neurotic music. The man had issues to begin with, but can you blame him after the life that he led? And the professional and in the personal. And every note is is is it's like you said, it's neurosis. It goes everywhere. It's exploding. It's all these different stages in his life. And even when he is the happiest, you know, with the Sixth Symphony, he writes the Tragic Symphony with three hammer blows, one of which was removed because he gets, as he was, very superstitious. But with Bruckner, yeah, you hear these long phrases, never-ending cathedrals.

Where there is no doubt. There is no question of where he's going. There is no question where all of this devotion and love will will lead him. With Mahler, you feel sorry for the man. And I think Mahler is more accepted in many ways because that's closer to most people.

We all listen. Mahler made tragedy a a sport almost. And when you compare it to your own life, you may have your issues, but nothing like that guy had. And I think that's why his music is by far widely popular because in in in a very deep way we can all connect very easily to what he was thinking. And Mahler to me, you may not agree with this, but Mahler is the most popular composer on the face of the earth for the simple fact that every single one of his works, all what, 12 of them? That's it. Symphonies and a few songs are in the repertoire.

Court cannot say that. Beethoven cannot say that. I don't know about you, but I don't know Mozart's 14th Symphony, or Haydn's, you know, Symphony number 18.

So again, think about this. I mean, Mahler's entire work, all 12 pieces, 13 pieces...

...are in the repertoire. At some point all of these are being played all over the world. Very true. So you know, to me there's something about that that is unique to Gustav Mahler, and I think it's his personal story is incredible. Plus, it's amazing music and musicians love to play it.

Yeah, I will tell you conducting it, I always say don't take me wrong, but conducting it is by far the easiest. Yes, playing it is hard and the whole, you know, structure is difficult. But knowing when to conduct in four or in three, it's all in the score.

There's no guessing involved. He will tell you, "Rush, but stay in four," you know. "Push, eilen," but don't but don't go into two because that means you went too fast.

Nicht, well, let's face it. His favorite word was "nicht." "Don't." As a great conductor, you can almost hear it screaming when you see it in the score.

So, and I hate it when I hear performances that says "nicht schleppen" and what do they do? They schleppen. They drag. And it's not their fault. You know, he wrote that because the music makes you feel it gets heavier, and it's like, don't let it become heavy. Yeah. They fall into the trap. He's basically telling you where the minefields are, avoid it.

You mentioned Koussevitzky and he is my inspiration in many ways. He is my role model. Over the years, over the past many years now, I have had a wonderful relationship with the Boston Symphony. And I am so proud to be almost part of their family. I mean, it's a fabulous orchestra, and I've worked with them at Tanglewood and at Symphony Hall. And over the years, it's just become it blossomed into something very special that I look forward every time I'm there. But more importantly, because of the history of of Koussevitzky. And Serge Koussevitzky is really, in many ways, the guy that pushed the envelope during his lifetime in the early 20th century of championing the composers of his time. Not only in moving from from Russia and then coming to America, but he felt that it was his duty to, like you say, expand the repertoire and promote, you know, young composers. The interesting thing was, though, is that he was probably like the least equipped conductor technically to do it because, as you correctly said, changing meters for him was tricky. And I'm meaning going from 4/4 to 3/4, let alone 7/16 to 3/16. He couldn't do it. And we have the videos to prove it. I love some of those videos that he's got the long baton, the pants are like up to here, and even conducting Egmont is a struggle for him. Yeah. But you know what? That did not stop him from putting even his own money to commission the composers of his time, who, by the way, were not nearly as adored and recognized as we are today. And you like you said, you make a list of the who's who, and it's a Boston Symphony Koussevitzky commission. And beyond Bartók, Prokofiev, Shostakovich, uh, you know, Copland, you name it. What Barber, what do they have in common? It was Koussevitzky that championed them. Yeah. And the whole idea was, and and this is where my my my inspiration comes from, is that somebody has to do it. As artists, it is our duty not only to look to the to the past, which is fantastic, but to the present. I would love to say that I invented the wheel, I did not. I'm just doing what my predecessors have done, and not only Koussevitzky. I will have to go back all of the way to Beethoven and Mozart and Haydn and Bach. Because guess what? Those guys had world premieres and they had champions of their own music. When Mozart died completely penniless, we don't even know where his grave is, it needed people after him to say, "We need to play his music otherwise it's going to disappear." The same thing with Beethoven. I think of Schumann and Brahms and all the people that came after, Wagner said, "You know, we need to play his music." Yeah. And music has to evolve, and it's not like you play it once or twice, no. You need to play it regularly and get it into the system and over time it becomes what we now know as standard repertoire. So when we look back 50, 60, you know, 80 years from Koussevitzky, you know, we now say, "Wow, all of that great work that he did, now it is pretty much established in the repertoire." But guess what? If I don't do it during my time in the 21st century, we're going to gonna run out of it. So in many ways, this is what I see as our biggest mission, which is to expand the repertoire. Yes, look to the to the past, which is fantastic. But how amazing it is to hear a Beethoven symphony or a Brahms symphony, but being played right after performing a Christopher Rouse piece. You're hearing that Brahms through that prism. So that to me is the the joy of this.

And you have to also understand that as I said before, I mean, the way that Koussevitzky did it, and they say, "Oh, how do you do this with the audience?" Well, you have to make a case for it, you know? And many institutions sometimes make the mistake that they do the new music but they put it like the five-minute piece at the beginning, and they don't even mention it anywhere in their marketing. No. So it's like they're shooting themselves in the foot. "We don't even believe in it, so why would the audience buy it?" So to me, one thing that we have done in Nashville is like, no, when we promote our concerts, we promote with the same billing, not only the Rachmaninoff guy, but we also promote Jennifer Higdon in the same billing, even more importantly because she will be there. Right. Rachmaninoff won't. (Laughs) And I always tell you, and by the way, I always do pre-concert lectures before every concert. Good. I've been doing that now for 12 years in Nashville as music director, and that's a great way to connect. When we have a composer, the composer speaks. And I always use this analogy and I tell the audience, "Imagine if you were alive in the in 1808. I'll give you a date, December 22nd, the premiere of Beethoven 5, 6, the Fourth Piano Concerto, the Choral— I mean, that crazy night." That was a crazy night. (Laughs) Famous night. And I said, "If you were alive in that on that date and you were walking down the street in Vienna and you saw some ad that said that some guy named Beethoven was doing this crazy concert, and guess what? He's doing a pre-concert lecture before it, knowing everything you know now, would you miss that?" (Laughs) Of course not. If you were walking in Paris in the 1920s and you saw that some guy named Picasso was giving a a talk about his painting, knowing everything that you know now, would you miss that? There you go. So I use the same analogy in Nashville. You're walking on the street and we have Christopher Rouse or Jennifer Higdon or John Adams. Would you miss that? And you will be able to say, "I was part of history," and you can say, "I was there." And that's where the audience takes ownership. And that is the most important part. It's not about the orchestra, all I can do is perform it, but it is up to the audience to decide whether this music will remain or whether it will disappear. Because you know, there has to be a connection, an emotional connection. So that is something that makes me very proud. It's not only the orchestra, it's the audience and the community that feels that they have made an investment and they feel that this belongs to them, and they are immensely proud of that. So that is why this project, I think, has been so successful.

You know, there has to be a sense of of deeper appreciation and really understand how privileged we are to have this in our lives. Whether we're performers, or whether we are audience member, to me, I think these little things that we we used to kind of almost take for granted, for me at least has been a personal journey of appreciation and joy to think of, you know, just missing my daily life, missing the music-making, missing— I actually just sent a message to my colleagues in the Nashville Symphony, basically telling them that, you know, I miss them. That's the most difficult thing, the personal part of it. Yeah.But to me, I I hope that at the end of this, there will be a a sense of all of us kind of coming together and and understanding that first we are there for the service of the music. Yeah, yeah. And then we're there for the service of our communities as symphony orchestras. And what works in Nashville doesn't work in New York, and what works in Paris doesn't work in Amsterdam. It's not supposed to be. Different, different.That's why it's it's we have to almost tailor-make, you know, our our what we do. But the conversation started even before the pandemic, the whole conversation about inclusivity. And I think now it's even more importantly after this, because we need to expand the table, that we have to put more seats at the table. If we just keep inviting the same people over and over, you know, eventually people stop paying attention, in my opinion.So I do believe that along with that understanding of of how privileged we are, we need to also make sure that other people have access to it. As I said, I come from Costa Rica, Nicaragua, which you would never think are the great Meccas of classical music. But I ended up here because somebody exposed me to it, and that is our responsibility. We need to make sure that that we expand not only the repertoire to be beyond, you know, the usual, you know, the usual suspects, but make the audience understand that there is a reasoning behind it, that people can feel that this also belongs to them. And uh, and in many ways, uh, we we we haven't done as good a job. But I think all of these things will come together in a way that I know we're gonna come out stronger. I am absolutely certain of that.And um, and and hopefully uh sooner than later. But there's no question that this has been devastating in every sense of the word, beyond the economical, which is scary to begin with, but but professionally, um, not to be able to perform and and and as I said, spend time with my colleagues. I went to Europe to work with my orchestra in Poland over in the fall, but even performing was very challenging, socially distanced and it's not the same. I mean, for now I'm willing to put up with it, uh, but but if they tell me this is like forever, there's no way. That's completely against everything that we're taught. We're supposed to breathe with each other. So I know that that we will get over this, we will we will become stronger, uh, but uh but I I I it it it's it has been a wonderful, not wonderful, but it has been a learning lesson uh that I think uh many of us, I mean, at least in my personal...

I I have every day I I think about it and I miss it even more, so I'm my my my hands are itching already uh to for the opportunity to come back and make music again live the way that we intended.

Thank you, Michael. Be safe.