Gerard Schwarz

Gerard Schwarz

SCALING THE HEIGHTS
Gerard Schwarz Traverses Hovhaness's "Mountain" Symphonies
Few conductors have done so much for American music as Gerard Schwarz. Music director of the Seattle Symphony since 1985, he has made 65 recordings with the orchestra, focusing on neglected works by Paul Creston, David Diamond, Howard Hanson, Walter Piston, William Schuman, and other great American masters. Yet perhaps the composer he is most closely associated with is the mystical Alan Hovhaness. Now, as the newly appointed music director of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra in England, Schwarz, 56, is carrying a wealth of American symphonic riches across the Atlantic. His first recording with that orchestra -- and his first recording for Telarc -- is devoted to Hovhaness's music, including new interpretations of the "Mysterious Mountain" and "Mount St. Helens" Symphonies. At the same time, the budget label Naxos has negotiated the rights to some of Schwarz's Seattle records and is reissuing them. Barnes & Noble.com's Andrew Farach-Colton spoke with Schwarz about his love for Hovhaness's music and his work on behalf of American composers.

Barnes & Noble.com: How did you first come to Hovhaness's music?

Gerard Schwarz: I was trained as a trumpet player and pianist, and when I was in junior high school, I played a very beautiful and not terribly difficult piece for trumpet called The Prayer of St. Gregory. I then discovered that Hovhaness loved the trumpet and wrote many solos, so I got to know a lot of his work.

When I was about 16, I played with Keith Brion, who was band director at another high school, and Keith was a great Hovhaness fan. He put together a wind ensemble, and we did a lot of Hovhaness, including a recording of Return and Rebuild the Desolate Places and a few other brass pieces. I got to meet and know Hovhaness at that time. He was living on 52nd and Broadway in New York City, right above the shop that I used to go to for my brass repair work.

B&N.com: Then Hovhaness moved to Seattle, and you eventually became music director of the orchestra there.

GS: Yes, we played a lot and recorded a lot of Alan's music, and I got to spend a lot of time with him. In fact, I was very involved helping him with some health care issues later in his life [he died in 2000 at the age of 89].

B&N.com: There are 67 Hovhaness symphonies, and not all of them have been recorded yet. Why re-record "Mysterious Mountain" and "Mount St. Helens"?

GS: Bob Woods at Telarc is probably one of the greatest producers that ever lived, and he really wanted to do a mountain record. Of course, in our world, we're not only interested in recording wonderful music; if you're working for a commercial recording company, you have an interest in the record selling, too. Bob believed that this mountain theme -- which was so much a part of Alan's life, too -- would be viable commercially. Also, the version of "Mysterious Mountain" and "Mount St. Helens" that I had previously recorded is now out of print. He put together the program with Hinako [Hovhaness's widow].

Hovhaness was an important composer, and I certainly don't mind doing these works for a second time. I didn't study the earlier recordings, and I haven't even gone back to compare them. But I think I've grown as an artist over these years, and I hope I brought something new to the music.

B&N.com: Does the Liverpool orchestra play Hovhaness differently than their counterparts in Seattle? I assume the music was new to the English musicians.

GS: You would think it was new to the Liverpool musicians, but it turns out that the musicians are extremely familiar with my Seattle records, and so they're familiar with Hovhaness. This is true of the public, as well. When I first came to Liverpool, I got many requests from the audience to program Alan's music, and American music in general, which was very touching. There was enormous excitement in Liverpool when we played this music. Sure, the sound of the two orchestras is different, particularly the winds and brass, but they have a similar approach and attitude. Both orchestras love to play, and they give it their all. It's a wonderful trait and creates a wonderful working atmosphere for me.

B&N.com: Hovhaness was something of an outsider, wasn't he? It would not be fair to call his music naďve or primitive, but it's entirely lacking in the cynicism or edginess that is common in so much 20th-century music.

GS: I agree. Absolutely. Alan was his own man. He looked at the music around him, but the influence he found was not from Schoenberg or Babbitt or Copland. He was influenced by folk music -- our folk music, Armenian folk music, Japanese and Korean music. This sets him apart from most of the second generation of the American school, the generation beginning with Gershwin and Copland. Americana was not his thing. He found a kind of spiritual grounding which was important to him. He was such a peaceful, wonderful, sweet, docile human being -- among the nicest people you ever met. I can never remember seeing him upset or angry, and he was always supportive of everyone around him. He was aware of the fact that he could write great fugues, and that he was an important composer, but also that he wasn't mentioned in the music books or talked about in the music schools. The fact is that if you want to study fugue, you can study Alan's fugues as well as Bach's fugues, because they're so brilliantly done.

B&N.com: As this Hovhaness disc is released, some of your Seattle recordings, originally on Delos, are being given a second life on Naxos.

GS: Yes. I'm thrilled about that.

B&N.com: Why haven't more American orchestras taken up music that should be an essential part of their repertoire?

GS: You know, working in England I see so clearly that there's tremendous support for native composers. And because composers like Vaughan Williams, Elgar, Britten, and Walton have received such steady exposure, there is now a real public for that music. The English love American music, German music, French music, of course, but they really support their own. If you look through the programs of our major orchestras, you'll rarely find a piece of Hanson or Diamond. Our orchestras here in the U.S. are doing pretty well with premieres, and that's wonderful. But to do the great American masters of the middle of the 20th century -- well, it's almost never done.

B&N.com: That's why your recordings are so important. They introduced so many of us to the music of Hanson, Piston, Diamond, Schuman -- the list goes on and on.

GS: And we never finished. There's so much more to do!

April, 2003 Andrew Farach-Colton