Muti passing baton to youth

Why Malta? Why has one of the world's greatest conductors chosen to endorse the Mediterranean Music Academy, which is being set up next year? These questions are even more pertinent in view of the fact that a recent press conference in Rome to mark the setting up of the project produced headlines stating that half the world, and its greatest orchestras, was wooing Mro Riccardo Muti, yet he was opening a music school in Malta!

But Mro Muti has been there... done that! It is time to "enjoy a moment of absolute freedom", dedicating himself to a few of the world's major orchestras, with whom he has a long-standing relationship, and sharing his wealth of experience with youths. When he was young, he had the opportunity to work with the likes of Soviet pianist Sviatoslav Richter, who passed their knowledge on to him... Now it is his turn.

Although he could be doing it right now, he has no intention of "flooding the world with my books and biographies," he jokes.

Mro Muti is dedicating as much time as he can, given his busy schedule, to youths. "I feel that the passage of the testimony of the past is absolutely fundamental. You cannot keep things to yourself. What has been learnt from the great ones has to be transmitted to the young. It is the moral duty of an artist."

His is not an egoistic gesture, spurred by the will to leave his mark - "that comes naturally... This is like the passing on of the Olympic torch".

Mro Muti adds another question to the above, heightening the curiosity. "Music festivals and seminars," he acknowledges, "are mushrooming everywhere, so why create another?"

The answer: "The Mediterranean Music Academy has a profound significance because Malta is a particular island, which, in a moment of tension and effort on the part of Europe and the Middle East to find a meeting point, represents a possibility to achieve this goal... through music."

His answer has a geographical, sociological, historical, political and philosophical basis - as is always the case with Mro Muti, for whom music transcends its sphere and has the power to cross borders and go beyond...

The fact that Malta is interested in Middle Eastern music and any musical experiences that hail from "the other side", while being united to Western culture, offers a possibility that does not exist in any other part of the world, he maintains.

The fusion between Europe and the East through music would be the idea behind the academy. But, of course, "in the beginning, you have lots of ideas; then you have to see what route to take," he says.

"A country is not important because of the number of its inhabitants, but when important things are done. Malta is at once a small and a great state."

Mro Muti uses as an example the fact that another of the world's greatest composers and conductors, Leonard Bernstein, had created an international festival of young orchestras in Sapporo, in the north of Japan, where youths from all over the world converge.

"If it can happen there, then Malta has even more reason to be able to do it!"

Mro Muti is convinced that foreign music students would flock to the academy, projected to be a centre of music activity, embodying every aspect of it - from education to research and performance - and considered to be one of Malta's most important cultural projects.

Not only would they be attracted by the big name associated with it, but also by the major musicians from the world's greatest orchestras, who have already expressed enthusiasm to conduct top-scale master classes.

"...More and more as they get to know about it," he claims. "Of course, my name is international and everyone knows it, so yes, it could be a reason for the attraction. But I believe that the moment the musicians realise how we are working and what it would mean to spend two weeks, or a month in Malta, it would be a further attraction."

Few artists are as expressive and eloquent with their tongue as they are through their art - in this case, his waving baton. At his press conference, Mro Muti strings his words together in the form of a lecture, explaining the technical subtleties of a single note and heightening in his listeners the understanding of how little they understand of this intriguing art form, which is more of a philosophy of life.

He captivates his audience, which augurs well for the "soft opening" of the academy - a seminar on Italian opera by Mro Muti himself at the beginning of next month, whereby anyone can watch the master in action during rehearsals with his Luigi Cherubini Youth Orchestra.

The musical director is known for his exigent standards, and his rehearsals are a spectacle in themselves, even to the untrained ear. He admits that his severe attitude can be misinterpreted as "tyrannical", but it is merely a search for perfection. "Nothing can be achieved without the price of hard work!"

But apart from that valuable lesson, how would musicians benefit from watching him in action? "It is hard to say, at this point, what they would learn. What is important is that these seminars are conducted in such a way as to reach out and explain to these youths the secrets of music - not just from the technical point of view; not how to blow into a horn; but the secrets of musical interpretation in a historical, literary and artistic context... Playing an instrument is one thing; being a musician, in the sense of expression, is another..."

Mro Muti's orchestra, which performed its debut international concert at the Mediterranean Conference Centre in 2005, has come a long way since, and he is grateful for the belief that Malta and Salzburg had in it. He does not exclude that it could one day include a Maltese musician - being Italian is not a must, he says, and the plan is to expand that concept.

While in Malta between August 29 and September 5 for a series of musical events to introduce the project, Mro Muti is also conducting two concerts - one (Pergolesi's Stabat Mater and Porpora's Salve Regina) in the "marvellous" St John's Co-Cathedral on September 5. During his first visit two years ago and when he later returned to start talks on the Academy, he had visited and spent hours in the Co-Cathedral, emerging besotted.

"At that point, it was not in my mind in a concrete sense to conduct a concert there. But when I entered it, I felt it would be beautiful to make music in it. There is such an incredible harmony in it; symbolically, it gathers together the whole of Europe."

Even the Manoel Theatre had left a lasting impression on the maestro, who has travelled the world and its most prestigious theatres, but promotes it as an "extraordinary jewel".

He left Malta "fascinated" by its civilisation and people, as well as its natural beauty, and shared with international journalists his amazement about the "stimulating" passion for opera even in Gozo, where the capital is "home to two rival theatres, located at a distance of 200 metres, which are actually fighting for prime position".

Occasionally, Mro Muti's profound thoughts give way to hilarious anecdotes and the human element behind the intimidating man flows out. Dropping his guard, he goes back in time to the age of six, admitting that his music teacher told his father he had no talent whatsoever!

"For some reason, my mother instinctively suggested that I carry on for one more month; those words were to change my life..."