U.S.A. (National Magazine - 5 pages) THE GUITAR IN CANADA page 1 of 5 A Series of Interviews Recorded and Transcribed by dim Forrest Michael Lauecke was born in Montreal in 1947 and received his musical education at the University of Montreal and the University of Toronto, He studied with Rolando Valdes-Blain and has participated in master classes with Julian Bream, Alirio Diaz, and Oscar Ghiglia, His second recording (RCI 457) received the Grand Prix du Disque, Canada, 1979 He is currently teaching at Concordia University at Montreal. This interview took place at Montreal on April 11th, 1979. J. Michael, 17d like to ask you first how it was you happened to become a member of GFA, IM. It’s quite interesting, you know, Many people have told me about GFA, You know how you're ‘approached when you attend these different guitar festivals, by so many different societies. | just joined recently, as you probably know. | would have joined earlier, but I just wasn't aware of how good it actually is. f'm very happy | found out about it. I found out about it first at the Guitar 78 festival and then my friend and former student, Bruce ‘Adams, who did become a member, told me exactly hhow good it was. J. You‘ee referring to the Toronto festival MM. Yes. He told me how good the GFA was, how good fiest of all the Soundboard was, and how interesting it is to be 2 member of this organization, | believe that to be absolutely true. J, Da you have any suggestions for future Soundboard issues, or any criticisms or anything you'd like to s2e that we're not producing right now? (M, Well, you seem to be doing the right things eortectly, ‘and in the right proportions. 1 think it's quite educational. | like the idea of the record reviews, which are quite abundant, I find, Then you have reviews of books, which 1 find particularly interesting, 1 also. liko the articles written by physicists and certain knowledgeable persons in | find that very interesting. 1 could it to go to your head, certain fields, probably rave, but I don't want you know! J. Just before | came up here to Canada, we received fone of your records to listen to, What record was it, your second or third?1 This was my second record with Radio Canada International. I've done the first one with guitar and orchestra. The third one is almost finished now. {t's with my trig; voice, flute, and guitar. We're doing Classical music on one side, and two modern Canadian ‘works on the other. After that there's another album 'm doing on Melbourne label in Toronto which shows two generations of Canadian composers, two different thoughts about music in Quebec. Then have another solo album that I'l be doing You've mentioned classical and modern music. Do you have any particular proference in music, either in listening oF pertorming? I might say 1 like the best of ll periods—Bach, Dowland, In modern music today it’s hard to judge: there's so. much being written, and we're actually in the middle of it. Until the period blows over @ little bit, and until we can get s more objective perspective, it’s hard to judge. All| do is enjoy the Works, the modern music that’s being written today. Some of it may or may not be considered great; only time will tll In your personal cancertizing, what might be one of ‘your representative programs? {t's usually a standard program. What | particularly tty to avoid is too many pieces, miniatures, like 2 big salad, fifty composers! From all the countries of the world! I try to have a substantial idea of the music that’s happening in a certain country. If you're doing Villa-Lobos, and | emphasize this with my students, to do 9 good group. let's say the five Preludes, or 9 good group of the Etudes, to take 8 ‘00d bite of that music, une bonne tranche. If you play Dowland, | like to play at least five pieces. If you go into modern music, a substantial work, sey eight oF nine minutes. | try to avoid extracts. We cen ‘now present programs that are as noble and as honorable as any other instrument. Bream started this, | tend to think, Here in Quebec | just happened to fall on his first album, quite by accident, and it had the Bach Lute Suites, | and I. { never dreamed that | would study with him one day. This record inspired me so much, The fact that one whole album was dedicated to Bach. Years ago, if you wanted the 20 Studies of Sor, you'd have to go and pick two ‘off one album, and pick one off another album, whereas today you have so many who have done the Villa-Lobos Preludes and Studies on one album. 1 think that this is very important page 2 of 5 J. Could you tell me what it was like to study with Bream? NM. Ho gave master classes in Ontario, and there were 60 many great moments. It was so inspiring | don know if 'd venture to single out one particular event ‘over another. It was a great inspiration for me, there's rho doubt about it, | think, actually, | owe my training te Rolando Valdez in new York, with whom | studied for six years. Of course, | studied with Ghiglia and Diaz atter that. | attended master classes with many others, but it's realy to Rolando Valdez that | ows my technique and whatever else he developed in me. When | say that to him, he says: “You owe me rothing, kia!” J. We were talking earlier, before this recording, about ‘modem music, and music of the classical and romantic periods. I'd lke you to repeat what you said about the diferent attitudes you should have towards these. M. It's basically quite simple; | don't think it's quite profound, my ideas on it I's as Rubenstein has ‘said about modern pianists. He said their technique {is superb: there's nothing to be said about them. ‘The only thing is the sound. They can do anything, cenange time signature every measure; they have 3 flexibility with chythm, It's incredible, but there is this element of sound. So, | feel that a grounding, a {900d training in classical music, aside from the tremendous pleasure you can derive from playing Bach and Dowland, helps you to develop a good conception of sound, 1 think that classical music hhelos modern music in this sense. When you play classical music there is a tendency to enjoy it almost ‘00 much, and to pull the rhythm too much out, to take too many liberties, too much rubato, and a ‘general lack of precision. With training in modern ‘music, this can help your classical training, In this sense, | think classical training helps your modern music, and modern training helps your classical J. You'te quite young but you've been playing for many yeats. Have you noticed in the last ten or fifteen Yeats 8 tremendous increase in the development of technique and in the number of people who are able to play at a level now where very few people could play in the past? M. Without a doubs. J. Why? What is the cause of this, where did it come from?Mw. think, first of all, that the publishing industry has helped tremendously. Of course, as everyone knows, 2 lot of things stem from Segovia, from his work as a pioneer in the field, It comes also, of course, from better trained guitarists, Today wa.have so many programs, In the last Soundboard there was actually 4 survey made across the United States. fascinating to see the staggering increase in guitar programs from 1971 to 1979, | think this is eeally the reason, Guitarists are becoming formed, ceally ‘complete musicians. | remember ten years ago there ‘one school in Montreal, believe it or not, one university, that had a guitar program, As a result of that, I made over 110 trips from Montreal to New York in four years to get my education in uitar. found it In other words, you commuted from here to New ‘York to get yout musical education in guitar Right. Then of course, after four yeats, I decided to {90 and live in New York for two years, and then ‘came running back! These days, it's somewhat. Right here in Montreal we have good programs it guitar leading up to @ bachelor of music degree at the university where I teach, Concordia. We have the Univeristy of Montreal, Mc Gill Unviversity, the Conservatory—they all have guitar programs. Even in the pre-universty stage, two years before the university, they have fullblooded guitar programs with basic grounding and counterpoint, solfege, harmony, and general musicianship. All these things are very important to form 3 musician. | also think that it’s important that musicians read ‘not only about guitar, but that they develop a cultrue for themselves, in whatever language they speak Of course, if they speak a few, it's so much more In fact, we know Barrios said that you wonderful. couldn't be a guitarist if you didn’t bathe in the fountain of culture, and | think that this is very true. ‘Another thing | liked about Barros isthe fact that he ‘exercised daily, and | think this is very important too, He exercised daily? Physically you mean? ‘Yes, on the high bar in the publication of his complete works. that we have his music, ia written form and also on. tapes, it would be really great if someone in the domain of history cauld dig up some more information about his life and write a nice biography. | would really look forward to knowing more about Barros, That was brought out recently Now I'd like to ask you what you think about the solo fquitar player engaging in ensemble work. known many people who have studied guitar three 127 page 3 of 5 ™, for four years and all of @ sudden they want to become soloists, and they want to become concert performers without having had the basics of performing with other people and having the discipline that people have when they perform with an orchestra or in a string quartet. You do do ensemble work, don’t you? For the last eleven years I've been soloist many times with our contemporary music society here in Quebec, which was the first contemporary music society in Canada, t've performed with them several times, and with numerous ather chamber groups, but I've found 2 more convenient way of solving the problem, {formed my own trio, in 1976. | think it’s very important, and | think it's very different, and it brings me into quite another world, You share the ‘eneray, first of all-three people are taking a piece of the movement—and it's @ thoroughly rewarding and ‘quite different experience than playing solo. I'm really quite for that; | think that guitarists should have that opportunity. Another combination I like very much is two guitars Do you have your own students perform in groups and do ensemble work? Yes, | encoucage them to do this. What I particularly like is intimate combiantions: guitar and voice; two ‘guitars; guitar, flute and voice, which is my own trio, To be continuedM, What I do with my lute music is, CONCLUSION THE GUITAR IN CANADA N| p. MICHAEL LAUCKE : A Series of Interviews Recorded and Transcribed by Jim Forrest Many guitarists have started to branch out a bit in solo work, I've noticed, playing guitar and lute combinations, and guitar, or baroque guitar and classical guitar Have you done anything lke this? {ike Bream does, or playing vihuela | merely put the ‘capo on the third fret, and tune the third string down, to F sharp, and there | have my litte lute. Of course, know all the technical details, of how it’s not really ‘an authentic lute, but | enjoy playing like that. The main consideration is a practical one, in that it's 430 hard to travel around with a lute on one hand and ‘a quitar on the other hand, and a valise I don’t know where! What do you think about the addition of strings? Some people now are using eight strings, and nine strings, and ten strings on the guitar. Do you think this is all ight? a page 4 of 5 ‘Yepes did @ concert here about a year ago on his, guitar, It was also interesting in the Soundboard, the article about one four string guitar and one seven string guitar. | found that interesting. Yes, I'm very much for this, | iked the concert of Yepes very much, When it (the ten string guitar) is exploited, it sounds really wonderful. | particularly like Si fe Jour Parait of Ohana, 2 work for ten string guitar. Do you {ike the work enough that you'd be willing to learn the techniques for ten string guitar to be able to play it? | don't think it would be too much of a problem. 1 hhave a work now that I'm doing, quite a fascinating work, Four strings are changed. The tuning is: D, A, C, F sharp, B, and D sharp. Within that, the music is tremendously dense, tremendously active, fa structure that might take you seconds, of five and six note chords, but to analyze and finger, you might ponder on for two or three minutes! The notes that you have played for the past fifteen years, as is my cease, aen’t there any more! So, when you play a six ‘note chord, the chances are you think in these terms, you know, this note is one fret lower, this note is two frets lower, this one is the same, that chord hasn't changed, this one is two frets lower, etc. People have asked me, "Why do you go through this?” The reason is very simple, The reason is that you get new sounds! That's the idea, you get all these new sounds, especially in harmonics. Also, | might say, the piece is very guitaristic; it lies very idiomatically for the instrument. What happens here is that you ‘get all these harmonics, which fall beautifully into the hand, which give totally different sounds. Also, you Won't se@ any of the conventional techniques, such as, ‘bar chords. All the structures are new. I don’t think "ve fingered any of these structures with regular tuning, There's azo another point of the piece which is very interesting, At one point you have up to four ‘capos on the guitar How can you have four capos on one guitar? ‘This is how it works. It’s a trio work, so as the singer land the flute player are performing, 1 take little breaks and | put on one capo at a time, capos which | keep in my pockets, and they're numbered; they're pre-adjusted, because if you put a capo on higher, it’s adjusted differently my upper right hand pocket, | have capo 1 (showing pockets) are capos two, three, etc. Now, 2s play, there are little breaks, and | put on these ccapos, No ane knows on a record that you're putting In this pocket, for exemple, HereJ ‘on capos, until you have the one on the eleventh fret, Now, when you have a capo on the eleventh fret, okay, that’s when | start playing, and once again I must say the composer has ingeniously exploited the possibilities af open strings, and all kinds of (uitaristic effects, even though it sounds like a mandolin now, being that the capo ison the eleventh fret, Now, what happens is that all of a sudden | have 4 capo on the eleventh fret, on the third, second, and first frets. In a fraction of a second | take off the ‘capo, while playing, 20 all of a sudden the range gous boing, boing, boing, and it gets bigger and bigger. It's quite an ingenious piece, and if you want to go through the hell of fingering it, you really get a lot for your money. I'm anxious to see how it ‘comes out in the concert I'm sure you believe the future of the clasical guitar is quite open, quite broad, no? ‘Oh yes, there's no denying that, and it seems to be getting ever more open and broad You'te part of it, and it seems to me that you're very excited about the whole prospect of the future, aren't you? | certainty am, and I'm happy to see that there are so many good things happening in the guitar world today-as far as books go, publications, records, and s0 many wonderful things happening. It’s been wonderful talking to you. Thank you. oe, the? Gs the Guitar foundation of. AMERICA 8 page 5 of 5