11 Apr 2023  |   03:29am IST

The maestro at the captivating piano

The first Indian to enjoy the honour of being a Steinway Artist, British-Goan pianist Karl Lutchmayer, enjoys his visits to Goa as he gets to share his love for Western Classical music with young musicians. With his concert today at Menezes Braganza Hall, Panjim, he will also have a pre-concert talk for aspiring musicians
The maestro at the captivating piano

Dolcy D’Cruz

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noted British-Goan concert pianist, lecturer and writer, Karl Lutchmayer feels at home in Goa especially visiting his ancestral home and bringing back the knowledge he gains from his global concerts to share with a young generation of pianist. He has performed at several venues across the world yet playing in Goa feels special for him.

“I often come to Goa to give classes at my home in Candolim, where young musicians from all over India come to study in convivial and very friendly circumstances. However, this trip is just a quick trip to visit my family, but I always offer to give a charity concert for Child's Play when I'm here, and it's a great pleasure to play here, in my second home,” says Karl.

Child’s Play India Foundation will present a piano recital by Karl with a pre-concert talk at 5.45 pm at Menezes Braganza Conference Hall, Panjim on April 11, followed by the concert at 6.30 pm. At the concert, Karl will be performing ‘Hungarian Rhapsody no. 13’ by Franz Liszt, ‘Barcarolle’ by Frédéric Chopin, ‘Festin d’Aesope’ by Charles-Valentin Alkan, ‘Sonata op.90’ by Ludwig van Beethoven, ‘Ondine’ by Maurice Ravel and ‘Totentanz’ by Franz Liszt.                

Explaining his focus for the pre-concert talk, Karl says, “My main focus in India for the last fifteen years has been music education. It was for this that I was awarded the Bharat Gaurav (Pride Of India) Lifetime Achievement Award in 2015, and before Covid-19 pandemic, I was here for about four months a year offering courses to support music teachers and their students. As a result, I have written some academic papers on the issues surrounding music education in India and delivered them at conferences internationally. As such, Dr Luis Dias has invited me to distil some of that knowledge into a short talk. Essentially, I will be aiming to discuss how music students and teachers can adopt the best music learning strategies that are available, adapt them for use here, and get access to support for further study, whether here
or abroad.”

Currently working on his PhD at Cambridge University, Karl is exploring the ways in which 19th century pianists, such as Liszt re-wrote the compositions they were playing to make them more relevant or effective, and testing the viability of such an approach in the internet age. On one of his previous visits to Goa, Karl auditioned two students, who would be selected for the post graduate level scholarship to study at Trinity Laban Conservatoire. “Although I have now left Trinity Laban, so that I could perform more and do my PhD, the programme I started in India continues to grow from strength to strength and each year. A few wonderful students are found who are ideal for international study. Additionally, it has now been possible to create some scholarships only for India
which makes a great deal of difference,” he says.

Speaking about his view of Western Classical musicians in India now, Karl is much more optimistic about their education and performance. “I almost cannot believe the energy here in this field. Everywhere I go, from Kohima to Trivandrum, I see amazing communities of students and teachers embracing Western classical music, and because of this increase at the grassroots level. The peaks of attainment are very much higher than usual some years ago. There are also now many teachers in India with a full conservatoire training (both Indian and foreign), and especially the young scholars who return from Europe and America because India is a land of opportunity at the moment, unlike the west,”
he opines.

However, the pandemic did have an adverse effect on children learning music. “Music is a human and communal activity and to do it without the physical presence of others rather undermined its important nature in the needs of humans. We were, of course, lucky to have new technologies in order to be able to carry on some musical activities, and perhaps there were even some advantages in being able to travel less, but ultimately, it was a poor substitute. Moreover, it was very difficult to correct physical and technical things over Zoom,” explains Karl.

As a widely travelled concert pianist, Karl on the other hand, had a new learning experience during the pandemic. “It was a very curious time. On one side, in the year before, I had taken 62 flights, and I was thrilled just to be able to stay at home and live a 'normal' life, cooking and studying and gardening. However, as all my concerts were cancelled, I had no income, and so I went and worked in a supermarket for minimum wage filling the crates for online deliveries. I absolutely loved it. It was the first 'proper' job I'd ever had and I loved that feeling of doing something physical with clear targets and goals. But the real revelation was how well-trained their managers were. In the arts sector and particularly at universities, it's usually the wrong people who are the managers and they seldom seem to be well-trained. This job was such an eye-opener, and I learnt so much about what really good management is, and what a difference it makes. Indeed, I was a little sad to leave,” he shares.

Karl lives in his ancestral home in Candolim that he inherited from his late grandparents, violinist John Baptist and Philomena Secco. He first visited Goa in 1974 as a child and now plans to move here while continuing to perform and teach internationally. “My home in Goa is the only home I have known for the entirety of my life, and indeed this year marks 50 years since I first visited. I don't think anyone could have imagined the changes since then. I'm very excited about moving here after my PhD. As it happens I'm fortunate that my aunt still lives at our home, but yes, I have a few cousins who haven't left for the UK, Canada or Australia,” says Karl, whose cousins include Prof Julietta Procop Andrade, an expert in the Portuguese language and Nora Secco de Sousa, a noted Goan author.

Being the first Indian to enjoy the honour of being a Steinway Artist, a title that is conferred upon only the best pianists of his or her time, and is a program handled by Steinway's very own Concert and Artist Department, Karl led the way for other Indian pianists. “Thankfully, many other Indians are now Steinway artists or Young Steinway Artists, and I was just the first. That already, in about 12 years, shows the acceleration of western music here,” he says.

What are his upcoming concerts across the globe? “I have consciously reduced my concert activity over the next year in order to focus on my PhD. But I will be in the US, France, the UK and possibly Spain and Hungary,” he concludes.

IDhar UDHAR

Idhar Udhar