"We have to stop obsessing about modernity".

The Franco-Swiss artist is one of those who assert the importance of pulsation and harmony. Interview.

Karol Beffa, you studied at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (ENS), the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris and the Hochschule der Künste Berlin. What drew you to music and the piano at an early age?
I couldn't say whether I would have taken up music if my parents, and especially my mother, hadn't urged me to do so when I was a child. I don't come from a musical family, and I didn't necessarily show any interest in music. But there was a piano at home, and my mother played a bit at the time. So my brother and I had no choice.

You compose not only with notes, but also with words, and are the author of several books. How did you get into composing?
I've been composing ever since I could lay my hands on a keyboard. From the age of six, I was improvising and composing... Back then, of course, it was relatively simple little melodies with a lot of naivety. But I already had a certain sense of obstinacy, and a fascination for repetition and a certain form of hypnosis, for the hypnotic power that comes from repetition. When I was seven, I wrote a little dance in the spirit of Bartók. As it happens, I also write articles and books. It's something I enjoy doing.

You also master an instrument, which is not necessarily the case for every composer today...
No, that's not the case, and I think it's a real problem. Composers sometimes write things they can't hear, or don't hear. So sometimes they write against the instrument, perhaps because they don't master it well, which is damaging. This can also have an impact on orchestral musicians, who in this case may be driven not to play what is written... For me, it's essential to really write for the instrument. I think that, overall, the craftsmanship of composers today is very weak, whereas at the beginning of the 20^e century, and especially in the Romantic era, it was unimaginable for a composer not to also be a performer or singer. This has largely disappeared, and I don't really feel that we're returning to this trend. On the other hand, today it's often the case that composers take up conducting and vice versa, which is a good thing.

Are we living in an age when composers must necessarily be versatile and able to do everything - compose, perform, publish their own music? Is this what teaching should be aiming for?
I don't think that teaching composition should include playing an instrument at all. But a composer should normally practice an instrument, even if it's normal for the two things to be separate. On the other hand, I do think that what tends, unfortunately, to make composers' craft on average far too weak today, is that studies in counterpoint, harmony and orchestration are still too rudimentary, and they should be far more selective.

Who were your great teachers, and what do you remember of their teachings?
There are many more to mention. Pascal Devoyon was one of my teachers in Berlin, a very good pianist and teacher. I also started piano with Marthe Nalet, a teacher at the Conservatoire du 5^e arrondissement in Paris, who was herself a pupil of Nadia Boulanger. She had this concept, which I think was very wise, and inherited from Nadia Boulanger herself, of considering music as a whole. And so very early on, from the age of eight or nine, she got me and my brother working on harmony, and encouraged us to compose.

You teach music history and orchestration at the ENS. Education is an important part of your activities, both within institutions and through your books. Do you see any particular challenges in the transmission of contemporary music?
Contrary to what you might think, we've put an enormous amount of time and money into transmission. Many institutions have done a great deal to try and transmit contemporary music. It works for some contemporary music, but not for others. I don't think it's a problem of transmission or musical competence, or a question of habit for that matter. Taste, perhaps? In my opinion, you certainly shouldn't force the public to listen to contemporary music, just as you certainly shouldn't force instrumentalists to play it. It sometimes happens in French conservatories that a work of contemporary music is imposed on instrumentalists even though they may not want to work on it or play it. I think we should stop imposing contemporary music, and realize that there may be a problem of language rather than transmission.

How do you explain the fact that on 21^e century ensembles specializing in contemporary music are not commonplace, even though there are many living composers?
I'm not at all sure that there aren't enough specialized ensembles. There are many, but some contemporary music ensembles, both in France and Switzerland, are extremely sectarian, and sometimes reluctant to program, for example, so-called tonal contemporary music, even though there are a great many talented composers. The London Sinfonietta is an example of a much more eclectic group, open to the diversity of contemporary music. I'm generally rather sceptical about the desirability of specialist ensembles, because, in my opinion, they're going in the wrong direction. Ideally, I think it would be better if there were no longer any specialized ensembles, but rather "generalist" performers and "generalist" orchestras playing, and possibly being encouraged to play, contemporary music, which would then perhaps be a little more attractive music to the public. At present, the specialized ensembles that perform in concert generally play a contemporary repertoire, much of which does not attract a large audience, except for a specialized one, which is reduced to a small number of people. Once again, I think there's a real language problem here.

What is today's music, and what is your relationship to tonality?
Today's so-called contemporary music is obviously diverse. I would say that the music I write is tonal in the broadest sense of the term, based on pulsation. Contrary to the Darmstadt dogma of the 50s, which, in line with the idea of the tabula rasaI claim the importance of pulsation, and I think that harmony is absolutely essential. Even if I don't attach excessive importance to thematicism, I do sometimes deploy themes, develop them, and play them on contrasts, etc. In short, alongside the music itself, I'm also interested in the theme. In short, alongside today's so-called atonal music, you can make music that's just as accomplished with a relatively traditional harmonic vocabulary.

And yet modern?
I think we need to stop obsessing over the question of modernity, which will never be settled and will always give rise to debate. If a composer has a strong stylistic identity, if he has a rich inner world, then that world will reveal itself. Above all, he must not ask himself what he must do to be modern and innovative. Because if he decides to ask himself this question at all costs, he will, in my opinion, be sure to hit a dead end.

Which composers have left their mark on you and inspire you? There's Ligeti, of course, for whom you published a thesis on his Etudes pour piano, but there's also Reich, Messiaen, Ravel...
Yes, I first discovered Reich when I was maybe fifteen or sixteen. It's a rather divisive piece of music, which I've personally always appreciated, because I like its mosaics of sound, both playful and immediately seductive. But I'm not sure Reich has any direct influence on my compositional style, except perhaps a certain taste for pulsation, repetition and sonic bewitchment. And a certain sense of systematism, even if I think it can be dangerous when taken to extremes. Reich is much more systematic than John Adams, for whom I also have great admiration. As for Messiaen, he is a great inspiration to me, as he is to many other French composers of my generation. In fact, most of my teachers were Messiaen's students or students of Messiaen's students. I'm quite sensitive to the harmonic dimension, as he was for the most part. As for Ravel, I'm a great fan of his music. He's a composer of impeccable craftsmanship who can be recognized by just a few measures of listening, even though he's capable of writing in very different styles of register and for very different ensembles. I think Ravel's music is a perfect compromise between accessibility and sophistication.

Your piano piece Night and Day was commissioned by the Sommets Musicaux de Gstaad festival, which this year gave pride of place to the piano. It's a work dedicated to the competition, and one on which you worked with the seven young pianists competing for the two prestigious prizes, Thierry Scherz and André Hoffmann. What do you gain from this close relationship with the performers?
The fact of being able to hear the piece several times and work on it with the pianists, before the final edition, has obvious advantages for me, because as a composer you're always uncertain, whatever the music, whether you're satisfied with a piece. As it happens, all the pianists had worked on the piece more than conscientiously and had therefore grasped it very well. After several listenings, I can obviously form a more precise idea of it, and decide on any nuances that need to be fine-tuned.

You began improvising very early on in your career, at the age of 14... in fact, you've recorded several improvisation albums. What role does improvisation play in your work?
I started improvising as soon as I could get my hands on the piano. But improvisation doesn't necessarily play a role in my compositional work. Sometimes an idea comes to me after I've let my fingers run over the keyboard. But it's rather rare for an improvisation to have developed into ideas that I then try to develop in a composition. I see composition and improvisation as two quite different activities.

Today, is it essential for a musician to know how to improvise? And in your opinion, is improvisation sufficiently valued by academic institutions?
There are some great performers today who don't necessarily know how to improvise. We shouldn't impose anything, but improvisation can only be beneficial for a whole host of reasons - it stimulates the performer's imagination, it enables them to find a way out if they're faced with a memory lapse, it develops creativity... In France, there was virtually no interest in this discipline until thirty or even twenty years ago. Today, there is a certain initiation to improvisation in conservatories in France, including Geneva.

You've composed three operas, most recently in 2014. What was the experience like and do you plan to do it again?
I'd love to compose an opera again, it was a great experience, and there's no shortage of ideas. Extremely different types of subject matter would appeal to me, as would writing an opera for children, because there's a desperate shortage of operas for children. I'm also tempted by very different genres, such as musical comedy, which would be a step aside in my production. But today, I would only write an opera if I had a commission, and if I had the assurance that it would be performed and, if possible, recorded, so that it would have a chance of being revived. My previous operas have been widely performed and partly revived. I imagine that most composers dream of writing an opera, but unfortunately there aren't yet enough opera houses to commission them...

What's your next project?
There are several... The musical tale I composed based on a text by Mathieu Laine, "Le roi qui n'aime pas la musique", will soon be performed in Switzerland, notably in Vevey, Bienne, Neuchâtel, Verbier, then also in Evian in France, Belgium and Luxembourg... I'm also about to complete an orchestration for woodwind orchestra in pairs of this same musical tale, for the Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire (ONPL). Mathieu Laine is in the process of imagining a sequel, which could be "Le roi qui aimait Joséphine", probably with a nod to Joséphine Baker... There are also plans for me to write a concerto for trumpet and string orchestra for trumpeter Lucienne Renaudin Vary and the Orchestre des Pays de Savoie. Then I'll probably write a piece for violin and piano for violinist Fanny Clamagirand. I'm also preparing a fifteen-minute piece for the Biel-Solothurn Symphony Orchestra, to be conducted by Yannis Pouspourikas. It will be performed in May 2025.