Turning the chamber into a crucible

One of the world's greatest pianists, András Schiff, plays in Dublinthis week. He sees the musician as a bridge between the composer and theaudience. Based on previous concerts, we can expect a spectacular crossing, writes Arminta Wallace.

Possibly the only thing worse than having to call a celebrity on the phone is having to wait for a celebrity to call you. Tick, tick, tick go the minutes as you stare at the wretched instrument, which stubbornly refuses to ring. When it does finally shriek into the silence, you pick it up and find that, incredibly, one of the world's greatest classical pianists - the greatest, some, including this writer, would say - is at the other end of the line. "Is this a good time?" András Schiff inquires politely. The voice is slow, almost hesitant, steeped in the cadences of central Europe. It is a striking contrast to his pianistic voice - limpid, playful, joyous, a thing of effortless beauty. If you've heard Schiff's recordings of Bach, Mozart and Bartók, not to mention his unparalleled readings of Schubert, you'll know the score.

But Schiff is not coming to Dublin this week to play the solo celebrity. Instead, with the help of a group of tried and trusted musical - friends - among them his wife, the Japanese violinist Yuuko Shiokawa - he will sail along the less manicured shores of chamber music.

In a series of three concerts at the National Concert Hall on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday nights they will perform a song cycle by Schubert, an all-Schubert trio programme, and an evening of Czech music featuring Dvorák, Janácek and Smetana.

For audiences, such intense music-making offers rich rewards; similar Schiffian explorations of Bach, Schumann and Mozart at Carnegie Hall in recent years were described by one critic as "some of the most revelatory concerts in memory".

"The idea is to have a certain focus," Schiff explains. "A certain concentrated effort from everyone - from musicians and from the audience.

"I just want to make musical programmes a little bit more unconventional. I think they have become too predictable. I do believe that music is more than just entertainment. Although what I'm doing on this visit is not as radical as I would do in some other instances, because I didn't want to keep it all to Schubert.

"This week in Florence, for example - where I am talking to you now from - we are doing four programmes of chamber music, and nothing but Schubert."

There'll be a fair bit of Schubert in Dublin, too, the idea being to show the way in which Schubert's gift for melodic writing made its way into his instrumental music. The song cycle Die schöne Müllerin, to be sung by the tenor Peter Schrier, is probably the ideal place to start; a series of short, simple songs which tell the story of a doomed love affair, it moves from sunshine to shadow. But not, perhaps, seriously dark shadows? "Oh, they are," says Schiff, sounding slightly shocked. "I consider Die schöne Mullerin a very tragic work. It is heartbreaking - but it does have its sunny and harmonious moments, certainly in the first half of the cycle which is about hope and love fulfilled. Then comes disappointment and tragedy, and of course it ends in death. But I think that Schubert's tragic music represents death as a friend. I do admire Schubert's way of handling this; when you listen to his music, it lifts you up and gives you a certain hope."

On Saturday evening Schiff will be joined by his wife, Yuuko Shiokawa, and the cellist Miklos Perenyi for a trio of Schubert trios; the beautiful Notturno, originally written as a slow movement, then the pair of trios in E flat and B flat which Schumann described, respectively, as "active, masculine, dramatic" and "passive, feminine, lyrical".

Does Schiff agree with this distinction? "Well, it . . ." He sighs. "I wouldn't . . ." Then he laughs, briefly. "I don't agree with that because I think it simplifies the matter. I love the way Schumann writes about music, and I adore Schumann's music, if for nothing other than that he was the first one who discovered Schubert and appreciated him.

"But, yes, these words - masculine, feminine - they do sound a bit sexist to me. We do, wrongly, associate masculine with something very strong and feminine with something rather weak - and it's not like that."

The version of the E flat trio which Schiff's group will play is Schubert's original, using the lengthy finale which the composer subsequently cut back, on the advice of his publisher. "It's gigantic," says Schiff, with some satisfaction. "It makes this into a 65-minute long trio - but to me this version is far more revolutionary and superior and we have a duty to present it as the composer first wrote it." As for the B flat major trio, he says it's "an incredibly positive and sunny work".

"I think they are two fantastic masterpieces which represent Schubert at his greatest. It's one of the most extraordinary developments, not just in music, but in art - somehow he was sensing his early death, but rather than diminishing his forces, this inspired him to hitherto unexperienced heights. I'm afraid that Schubert has become the property of psychiatrists who like to prove their theories of depression and suicide with his music - and I find that rather insulting. To me, a piece like the B flat major trio is a prime example of the contrary; that not all Schubert's pieces are suicidal and depressing and dark and about death." There is a momentary pause, then he adds, "Of course, even this is not black and white."

The point is perfectly illustrated by the programme for the final evening of the chamber music weekend. Smetana, Janácek and Dvorák: Bohemian rhapsody? Well, not quite, says Schiff.

"Both Smetana and Janácek had similar personal tragedies in their lives; they both lost a child, a daughter, very young. The Smetana trio, which is very rarely heard, is actually a recollection of the life of this lost child - and it ends with a dramatic tarantella in a minor key which depicts what they called 'the galloping fever'; the terrible virus that killed her." Janácek's sonata 1: X: 1905, meanwhile, with its eerie echoes of 9/11/2001, was written to commemorate the killing of a young Czech worker by Austrian police during a demonstration in support of a Czech-language university in Brno.

"It's one of the first political pieces of music," says Schiff. "My background is Hungarian, but despite the geographical proximity, Janácek was not part of my musical upbringing, which was very Austro-German. I discovered him much later in my career, and it was a great discovery for me - he was such an original man, and so courageous. He was a great freedom fighter; he fought for the independence of his country and for the recognition of the Slavonic languages. To me, together with my compatriot Béla Bartók, they are two of the most important musical voices in the 20th century, because they are so strong and so healthy and their roots are - and I think Irish people will understand and appreciate this - in folklore and folk music and dance and song."

For those who stay the course of the three concerts, the proceedings will finish with a flourish on Sunday night when the Panocha String Quartet from Prague joins Schiff, Shiokawa and Perenyi for Dvorák's gorgeous, exuberant A major quintet - "the perfect masterpiece," says Schiff, simply.

But if the atmosphere at the National Concert Hall over the coming weekend is anything like that created at a concert called Contrasts attended by this writer in Budapest in the early 1990s, during the course of which Schiff and another gang of top-flight musical friends including the oboeist Heinz Holliger moved from classical to contemporary works and back again with seamless intensity, it will be unforgettable. Not just for the music, but for the astonishing sight of Andras Schiff, celebrity, greatest pianist in the world, etc, etc, calmly perched by the side of a piano turning pages for a colleague.

Reminded of this, Schiff chuckles quietly. "Yes, chamber music is the opposite of the star system - but anyway the star system is not a good thing. It does not help culture and it does not help musical life. Of course, there is nothing wrong with being good, or even famous, or recognised.

"But we must always remember that we are here to be a bridge between the composers and the audiences. I could say about all my partners that I am very fussy about who I make music with. Once I find a partner with whom I can communicate, I am very loyal. I do not think it's wise to change your chamber music partners - it's like changing your friends too often."

The Andras Schiff Chamber Music Weekend is at the National Concert Hall this Thursday, Saturday and Sunday night at 8 p.m.