Classical Guitar, February 2002
Interview by THERESE WASSILY SABA
The Greek guitarist Antigoni Goni won the First prize at the GFA International Competition in 1995. She had given her New York debut concert at Carnegie's Weill Recital Hall the year before that in 1994. In 1997 she was appointed Associate of the Royal Academy of Music, London.
She has been Director of the Guitar Department of the Julliard School precollege division since 1995.
In. September 2000 she joined the faculty of Columbia University in. New York as Associate Professor of Guitar.
I spoke with her when she was last in London, where she gave a recital at the Royal Academy of Music.
First of all I asked her about her life in New York...
Antigoni Goni: It has changed a lot since I first arrived there. Back in 1992 I entered Juillíard as a student and now I enter as faculty. Back then a trip to one of the NY airports meant a trip back home for Christmas or summer vacation, and now it is the beginning of a national or an international tour. So a lot of things have happened in the span of these years. Exciting and wonderful things, but let's go back a little. Initially I went to NYC as an exchange student from the Royal Academy. I had studied here at the RAM for two years in the Post-Graduate Programme and towards the end when I was close to graduating,
I realised I did not want to return to Greece.
First of all I didn't feel that I had completed my studies, and secondly I felt I was not ready yet to enter the guitar world as a professional, pursuing my dream which was clearly a concert career.
Therese Wassily Saba: But after two years could you have gone back? Did you have your degree?
AG: I could have gone back, absolutely. So, I remember when the Deputy Warden asked me if I had any ideas, I said: 'How about an exchange with the Juilliard School in New York?' They had never done that before, but they arranged it and supported me through, both academically and financially. It was fantastic! Without the exchange it would have been simply impossible to afford studying in America.
TWS: You were paying the Academy fees?
AG: Actually I had a full scholarship from here, so it was a free ride.
TWS: What sort of a scholarship did you have here
AG: I had an Onassis scholarship from Greece and the rest was covered by the Academy. When I look back I feel very fortunate because right from the beginning the Academy was like family to me. My winning of the Julian Bream Prize, among others, must have shown them that I was both serious and hard working. As a result they were very supportive and encouraging. The time I spent in London has stayed with me as one of the richest and most productive times of my life. Two years full of new experiences, knowledge and culture.
Anyway, back to NY. I went to Juilliard and right from the beginning I knew that I was not going to leave the School without the Masters degree. At the end of my first year there I came back to give my graduation recital here in London. Then back to NY to finish my Masters.
TWS: And when you went back did you have to fund that yourself?
AG: Not really, it was scholarships again. A Rose Augustine Scholarship was added to the one I had from the Onassis Foundation. Then eventually I had a Greek private sponsor. Sharon Isbin actually introduced me to him in Greece, and he has since become a really good friend of the family.
TWS: How did Sharon manage to do that?
AG: Sharon had performed in the concert series he held in his house in Athens. Both he and his wife are music lovers and enthusiastic supporters of young talents. Sharon introduced him to my parents when she visited Athens. I met him a few months later when I went back for my summer holidays. I remember he invited us over to his house for coffee. We chatted for a while, and then he said flat out: 'I would be honoured to sponsor your studies at the Juilliard School.' It was simply a wonderful and unexpected gift. He never wanted to be acknowledged. He's never wanted to be part of my biography, or to have his name mentioned.
He is just like a guardian angel. Dear friends still, they belong to that very small group of people that along the way have helped me become who I am today. Leo Brouwer is another one.
When I was 18, Leo came to give a series of master classes in Athens. So I enrolled in his class. It was the first professional master class I attended or played for. I remember I played Sueno en la Floresta by Barrios for him. At the end of the course he invited me to go to Cuba in May that year, 1988. He said: 'You should come and compete in the Havana Competition.' When you are 18 years old you don't really think too seriously about these things. So I just went, not really expecting to make it to the finals, but I did and I won the special prize for Latin American interpretation. It was an incredible experience as well as my first real contact with the international guitar world. Everybody that was somebody was there: Gareth Walters, Colin Cooper, Robert Vidal and Maria Luisa Anido, to just mention a few.(It was kind of Antigoni Goni to remember the British contingent as well as a couple of big names from France and Argentina. Perhaps I could add a few more: Leonardo De Angelís, Costas Cotsiolis, Flavío Cucchi, María FarandouU, Jiro Hamada, EU Kassner, Timo Korhonen, Wolfgang Lendle, Griselda Ponce de León, Isaac Nicola, Apostolos Paraskevas, Danielle Ribouillault, Jürgen Rost, Xangay, Raúl García Zárate. The guest of honour at that notable international gathering was the great soprano, Víctoria de los Angeles.- Ed.)
When the competition was over, we had a coffee with Leo. My father was sitting next to me without being able to understand a single word of English. So Leo just leaned over and said slowly: 'What can I do for you? How can I help you?' He said, 'If you want to do something with your guitar, you have to leave Greece.' He was saying that to an eighteen-and-a-half-year-old. What do you answer? So to make it clearer, he said, 'Well, whom would you like to study with?' And I said Julian Bream. He was the only idol I ever had; for my brother it was the Beatles, for me - Julian!
Leo smiled and said: 'Julian does not teach, but the only school that he's associated with is the Royal Academy. An old friend of mine, John Mills, starts teaching there this year, so I will write the recommendation letters. I'll call John, and he'll expect you to call him.' And that was it.
Without Leo I don't know what would have happened. I think I was ready for it but he was the major push. It was very encouraging to have somebody like Leo Brouwer take a personal interest in you.
Rose Augustine was there too. She has been a good friend ever since, and is another person who has supported me through the years. Rose still says: 'Oh, dear! If you had just won that competition! If you were not so nervous!' But 3/4m really glad I did not win first prize then. It was too much, too soon. I was not ready for it. I was ready for what happened after, and the way it happened. I know now that everything happens at the right time and in the right way. You have to be ready to go with the flow but you cannot force things to happen. So it was the Royal Academy and then Juilliard and New York City. Now we are coming to your first question, actually!
TWS: Is it hard to survive?
AG: In New York? I wouldn't recommend any of the big cities if you go just on your own. It is much easier to go as a student. This way you are protected and supported at least for a little while. You get to know the city through a more relaxed attitude, which is the student's attitude. You can concentrate on your work, and at the same time get familiar with the new environment, slower. You also get to meet a lot of people, and make the right contacts. You have the advantage of having a well-known name behind you that people can recognise. They might not know your name to start with, but they can at least say: 'Oh, she is from the Juilliard School.'
TWS: Who did you first study with before coming to London?
AG: In Greece I was lucky to start with a very good teacher from the Segovia school, Evangelos Assimakopoulos, from the duo Evangelos and Liza. I was ten. He taught me until 19, so he was basically my main teacher. But it was actually at the Royal Academy that I started building my self-confidence. There I had the time to focus, practise seriously and methodically and basically develop a lot of the things that I am doing now.
TWS: And you started there with John Mills. . . .
AG: He taught me a lot but he was especially wonderful for my sound. I always had a good sound but I never really thought about it. John taught me that. Then I took master classes with Julian Bream. I wish now that I had videotaped them. I was so nervous that I couldn't remember a thing he said. I learnt a tremendous amount though, by watching him teach others. I always loved his playing. As a student I listened to a lot of Julian Bream and Andrés Segovia recordings. I really appreciate John Williams's playing more now that I am mature and older. But during my late teens and early twenties the subtlety and sophistication of his art clashed with my temperament. I was a lot freer back then and although I used Williams's recordings as a reference, it was in Bream's and Segovia's interpretations that I found my inspiration. I never attempted to copy Julian Bream, but I was always amazed with the way he manipulated time. It was incredible listening to him teach the Britten Nocturnal, The Walton Bagatelles as well as Villa Lobos Suite Populaire, simply because of the way that he would talk about rhythm and time. It was during those classes that I realised that all the magic and the illusion that you create on the instrument comes from the way you manipulate sound and silence through time.
TWS: And then Juilliard. . . .
AG: My lessons with Sharon Isbin at Juilliard were like master classes: an exchange of ideas. She was brilliant in not trying to change me much. We are after all very different players. She did not insist on me copying her ideas. What she actually helped me with, was to complete my technical and artistic formation. Sharon is very organised and methodical with very clear ideas on what she wants. And that was exactly what I needed at the time. I was all over the place. I had really good ideas, but they were not always well organised, fully developed or well presented. At the beginning we would sit down with a pencil and study the score, write in the phrasing marks, decide the colours and the dynamics. This is something I never really follow on stage, but having done this work in my practice room, having explored all the different possibilities, having experimented with different ideas helped me create my own means of expression. I felt more confident and secure. I knew what worked and what didn't. When I was going on stage before, it was like walking on a tightrope without a net. A fall was a crash.
What was also very motivating in studying with Sharon was the simple fact that she was a successful young woman in a male-dominated field.
I admired her determination and strength, and that gave me the strength to go on. In addition she was my first female teacher. As a result I would refuse to go to my lessons without being prepared 1000 per cent ready. Whatever she was going to say, I felt I should have thought of it already.
TWS: Did you feel that way with John Mills
AG: No! I guess I was more competitive with Sharon than I was with John. My male teachers were never really tough with me. Sharon on the other hand was very demanding, clear-cut and straightforward. She would not play with words. She was very direct and I loved that.
She is fastidious about her technique. Did she work you through ideas of hers
Not really. Technique was something I asked her for. I had never had a technique 'workout. I always had good hands, and as a young student I would refuse to do any studies or exercises. I had a particularly good right hand, but it was my left hand that I always felt less confident about.
It's just too jumpy. I remember in one of the very first classes I said to Sharon: 'Look, it's about time I deal with this, what do we do?' So she gave me a set of slurs, scales and arpeggios, and that 14 was the only set of technique exercises we ever worked on.
TWS: What pieces did you work on with Sharon
AG: I worked on a number of different pieces. We worked on some Bach, a lot of Brouwer as well as Rodrigo. El Decameron Negro, for example, was one of the first pieces we worked on and with which I experimented a great deal on different ideas on colours and dynamics in the way I described earlier.
At Juilliard, my closest friends were pianists, violinists and composers. They would talk about their music in direct relation with life. They would talk, for example, about a piece in sonata form. They would say: 'In the A section you present the theme for the first time, in the recapitulation, when it comes back; it's simply not the same any more. The same way you're not the same person anymore. You are not the same musician, you are ten minutes later in your life, and you are ten minutes later in the piece. You have been on a journey.' Those ideas, in combination with Sharon's more methodical ideas and other more philosophical approaches for life and music, influenced a great deal my approach in interpreting music. Another great influence was theatre.
Apart from my musician friends, the rest of my friends at Juilliard were actors. Spending time around them was truly a new experience. Through their activities I had the chance to follow the 'making' of an art I absolutely adore.
TWS: Did you do any acting classes while you were at Juilliard
AG: I didn't, but I followed some through my roommate, who was studying acting at Juilliard's Drama Division. I heard every single piece of the plays that she ever rehearsed. I would help her with her lines, reading the other part with my strong Greek accent. I religiously attended every workshop, every Alexander technique session, every play they presented.
TWS: Do you make a point of having images as you play, or does it come naturally now
AG: Most of the time it comes instinctively and naturally, but there are times when I don't have a clue what the hell the problem is and why I just cannot make a piece work. Then I consciously try to evoke a feeling, an atmosphere and an image.
One time I remember I was desperate. I was on the bus to the airport on my way to record the Suite Compostelana by Mompou. For the life of me, I could not get the last movement right, the Muòeira. Julian Bream is the best with it. I've heard him play it live and his timing is exquisite, his articulation is fantastic, but I could not get it.
I just was not happy with the articulation at all. Then all of a sudden, words came to me. So I sat down and put Greek words to the music, and that did it. That was IT. Sometimes you have to do that, or something like that so that music becomes one with your body. A lot of the times the problem is that the music is here and you are there, and the gap is not actually being filled. I think that in the same way actors make a role part of their life, the same way musicians should work to get a piece of music part of their body. Then it becomes natural communicating through it, and it's not a different alien medium.
TWS: You say that when you were younger you were a lot freer.
AG: No, I didn't mean it in a good way. I am very free now but in that good old jazz way. When I was younger I thought that rubato is stealing and not giving back, a very capricious sort of approach indeed. I credit Oscar Ghiglia for ridding me of that. If Sharon put an order in my ideas, Oscar just came and actually put my two feet into one shoe. He said: 'Well, you can't just do what the hell you want with a piece of music just because the composer is not around.' Oscar is a fantastic teacher; he gives exquisite coaching. I found he was very tough, and I left his Siena class many times in tears. I learnt so much though that I don't think twice about leading students to tears myself now! It worked for me!
So yes, I was free in a way that was capricious. It was not based anywhere. And now I am free within the piece's frame, parameters, and heartbeat. You know, you can't bend rhythm to no return. I think it was good I was very adventurous when I was younger. I was not afraid to take risks and I didn't let technique limit me. So I would just grapple with it; I would miss the notes, but I would not sacrifice the music for clarity or accuracy. Then I went to the other extreme and became very fastidious. Now I think that having tried both worlds, I am more in the middle, I hope. Well, sometimes I am still capricious!
TWS: Are you tough with your students
AG: I'm very tough.
TTWS: Tougher than all your teachers
AG: I think I am as tough as Oscar is. At the beginning I was very nervous about teaching because most of the time I was younger than the people who would come to take lessons. One year I taught at the National Guitar Workshop, and I remember I had to coach an amateur chamber group; they had to learn and perform that work in five days' time. The first rehearsal went by, and it was a disaster. The second rehearsal was an absolute horror. So I sat down with them - they were adults - and said: 'Look, I'm not going on stage to play the first guitar part with you and I am not putting my name under this group unless you go out there and you play guitar. I mean. This is just not guitar. So why aren't you ready?' And they said: 'We don't have time to rehearse.' I said, 'What time do your classes start in the morning?' They said, '8.30 am.' I said 'OK, tomorrow morning at 5.30 am I will be opening the room for you to rehearse for two hours, then I will coach you and then we will start.'
It takes some sacrifices to go on stage. Do it well, or just don't bother.
So a year later somebody from Los Angeles called me because he wanted some coaching. It was then that I realised how small the guitar world is. He said, 'I need somebody to kick my ass! I heard what you did at the National Guitar Workshop, would you be willing to teach me?' It was very funny.
I try to be very clear in my teaching. There were many times in my life as a student where a teacher would have a brilliant idea, but I would leave the room and wouldn't be able to put it into action. Simply because we didn't have enough time for me to try it out and actually get it, or because he was not clear enough. So when I teach I try to leave a student with no grey or shady areas. If I suggest something, I say: 'Just give it a shot, it might not work with your personality or your approach, you can just have it as an alternative. I don't mind if you don't like it but don't erase an idea before you are able to do the best you can with it.' When you are trying to do justice to music, there shouldn't be egos involved and students shouldn't get offended. It's not a matter of proving that you're able, or talented, or intelligent. It is just that we are here to do the best we can with a piece of music and the only way to achieve that is by working as a team. Now if you come with a big ego, I can give you a big ego too, and then we'll go nowhere. So just leave the ego outside the door, and let's see what we can do together. That's my attitude to teaching.
TWS: Tell me about the new John Duarte recording.
AG: John is a good friend. Last year I had just finished recording the Barrios CD when Naxos decided to record a selection of John's music on the occasion of his 80th birthday. I had a great time recording the CD. It was wonderful not only because I discovered music I wasn't familiar with but because I also got the chance to record music I grew up listening to, the English Suite and the Catalan variations for example. I have to say I am pleased with the result. The non-guitarist friends who listened to it commented that after they finished listening to it through, they put it right back on. I am very happy for John; he deserves it 100 per cent.
You play a lot of music inspired by Greek mythology, such as Three Greek Letters by Sergio Assad, ...Eridos by Stanley Silverman, and the Duarte arrangements. I imagine that Greek mythology, which you were brought up with from an early age, plays an important part in your approach to life. Do you have strong images of figures that mean a lot to you
Well, it is true that I grew up with Greek mythology, with Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey. And before I read any fairy tales my grandparents and my parents read mythology and the Greek Classics to us. I think what I loved about it is that the Greek myths are cut down to human dimensions and human levels. Our Gods committed sins, they were witty and funny and very 'human'. They had weaknesses and disadvantages. The main thread that ran through them, though, was that they were very fair. Sometimes in a very funky way, but they were fair and direct. If there was an injustice done, there was also punishment. There was always a very human code of practice. You take the risks, you live, you sin, and you pay the prize at the end, here in this life. This approach has definitely influenced the way I experience life
TWS: What about being called Antigoni
AG: Antigoni. Well, I guess I was always and everywhere the only Antigoni.
TWS: Didn't she dig the grave for her brother with her own hands
AG: She did. She was a very hard, headstrong woman. She was also very fair. She followed the moral codes and was a figure of justice. So it was a heavy name to grow up with.
TWS: Did you feel that from a young age
AG: The only problem was that when I was quite young I wanted to be called Maria, because there were a thousand Marias and as a young child I didn't want to stick out. I went through that stage fast, and now I am proud of my name. The fact that I was the only one after a while didn't matter. Simply because it got overshadowed by the fact that I was the only classical guitarist. Playing Bach instead of Led Zeppelin made me clearly different from my hard-rock loving classmates. So, yes, I was different! My name was different, my interests were different and what I was doing was by very definition different.
She has been Director of the Guitar Department of the Julliard School precollege division since 1995.
In. September 2000 she joined the faculty of Columbia University in. New York as Associate Professor of Guitar.
I spoke with her when she was last in London, where she gave a recital at the Royal Academy of Music.
First of all I asked her about her life in New York...
Antigoni Goni: It has changed a lot since I first arrived there. Back in 1992 I entered Juillíard as a student and now I enter as faculty. Back then a trip to one of the NY airports meant a trip back home for Christmas or summer vacation, and now it is the beginning of a national or an international tour. So a lot of things have happened in the span of these years. Exciting and wonderful things, but let's go back a little. Initially I went to NYC as an exchange student from the Royal Academy. I had studied here at the RAM for two years in the Post-Graduate Programme and towards the end when I was close to graduating,
I realised I did not want to return to Greece.
First of all I didn't feel that I had completed my studies, and secondly I felt I was not ready yet to enter the guitar world as a professional, pursuing my dream which was clearly a concert career.
Therese Wassily Saba: But after two years could you have gone back? Did you have your degree?
AG: I could have gone back, absolutely. So, I remember when the Deputy Warden asked me if I had any ideas, I said: 'How about an exchange with the Juilliard School in New York?' They had never done that before, but they arranged it and supported me through, both academically and financially. It was fantastic! Without the exchange it would have been simply impossible to afford studying in America.
TWS: You were paying the Academy fees?
AG: Actually I had a full scholarship from here, so it was a free ride.
TWS: What sort of a scholarship did you have here
AG: I had an Onassis scholarship from Greece and the rest was covered by the Academy. When I look back I feel very fortunate because right from the beginning the Academy was like family to me. My winning of the Julian Bream Prize, among others, must have shown them that I was both serious and hard working. As a result they were very supportive and encouraging. The time I spent in London has stayed with me as one of the richest and most productive times of my life. Two years full of new experiences, knowledge and culture.
Anyway, back to NY. I went to Juilliard and right from the beginning I knew that I was not going to leave the School without the Masters degree. At the end of my first year there I came back to give my graduation recital here in London. Then back to NY to finish my Masters.
TWS: And when you went back did you have to fund that yourself?
AG: Not really, it was scholarships again. A Rose Augustine Scholarship was added to the one I had from the Onassis Foundation. Then eventually I had a Greek private sponsor. Sharon Isbin actually introduced me to him in Greece, and he has since become a really good friend of the family.
TWS: How did Sharon manage to do that?
AG: Sharon had performed in the concert series he held in his house in Athens. Both he and his wife are music lovers and enthusiastic supporters of young talents. Sharon introduced him to my parents when she visited Athens. I met him a few months later when I went back for my summer holidays. I remember he invited us over to his house for coffee. We chatted for a while, and then he said flat out: 'I would be honoured to sponsor your studies at the Juilliard School.' It was simply a wonderful and unexpected gift. He never wanted to be acknowledged. He's never wanted to be part of my biography, or to have his name mentioned.
He is just like a guardian angel. Dear friends still, they belong to that very small group of people that along the way have helped me become who I am today. Leo Brouwer is another one.
When I was 18, Leo came to give a series of master classes in Athens. So I enrolled in his class. It was the first professional master class I attended or played for. I remember I played Sueno en la Floresta by Barrios for him. At the end of the course he invited me to go to Cuba in May that year, 1988. He said: 'You should come and compete in the Havana Competition.' When you are 18 years old you don't really think too seriously about these things. So I just went, not really expecting to make it to the finals, but I did and I won the special prize for Latin American interpretation. It was an incredible experience as well as my first real contact with the international guitar world. Everybody that was somebody was there: Gareth Walters, Colin Cooper, Robert Vidal and Maria Luisa Anido, to just mention a few.(It was kind of Antigoni Goni to remember the British contingent as well as a couple of big names from France and Argentina. Perhaps I could add a few more: Leonardo De Angelís, Costas Cotsiolis, Flavío Cucchi, María FarandouU, Jiro Hamada, EU Kassner, Timo Korhonen, Wolfgang Lendle, Griselda Ponce de León, Isaac Nicola, Apostolos Paraskevas, Danielle Ribouillault, Jürgen Rost, Xangay, Raúl García Zárate. The guest of honour at that notable international gathering was the great soprano, Víctoria de los Angeles.- Ed.)
When the competition was over, we had a coffee with Leo. My father was sitting next to me without being able to understand a single word of English. So Leo just leaned over and said slowly: 'What can I do for you? How can I help you?' He said, 'If you want to do something with your guitar, you have to leave Greece.' He was saying that to an eighteen-and-a-half-year-old. What do you answer? So to make it clearer, he said, 'Well, whom would you like to study with?' And I said Julian Bream. He was the only idol I ever had; for my brother it was the Beatles, for me - Julian!
Leo smiled and said: 'Julian does not teach, but the only school that he's associated with is the Royal Academy. An old friend of mine, John Mills, starts teaching there this year, so I will write the recommendation letters. I'll call John, and he'll expect you to call him.' And that was it.
Without Leo I don't know what would have happened. I think I was ready for it but he was the major push. It was very encouraging to have somebody like Leo Brouwer take a personal interest in you.
Rose Augustine was there too. She has been a good friend ever since, and is another person who has supported me through the years. Rose still says: 'Oh, dear! If you had just won that competition! If you were not so nervous!' But 3/4m really glad I did not win first prize then. It was too much, too soon. I was not ready for it. I was ready for what happened after, and the way it happened. I know now that everything happens at the right time and in the right way. You have to be ready to go with the flow but you cannot force things to happen. So it was the Royal Academy and then Juilliard and New York City. Now we are coming to your first question, actually!
TWS: Is it hard to survive?
AG: In New York? I wouldn't recommend any of the big cities if you go just on your own. It is much easier to go as a student. This way you are protected and supported at least for a little while. You get to know the city through a more relaxed attitude, which is the student's attitude. You can concentrate on your work, and at the same time get familiar with the new environment, slower. You also get to meet a lot of people, and make the right contacts. You have the advantage of having a well-known name behind you that people can recognise. They might not know your name to start with, but they can at least say: 'Oh, she is from the Juilliard School.'
TWS: Who did you first study with before coming to London?
AG: In Greece I was lucky to start with a very good teacher from the Segovia school, Evangelos Assimakopoulos, from the duo Evangelos and Liza. I was ten. He taught me until 19, so he was basically my main teacher. But it was actually at the Royal Academy that I started building my self-confidence. There I had the time to focus, practise seriously and methodically and basically develop a lot of the things that I am doing now.
TWS: And you started there with John Mills. . . .
AG: He taught me a lot but he was especially wonderful for my sound. I always had a good sound but I never really thought about it. John taught me that. Then I took master classes with Julian Bream. I wish now that I had videotaped them. I was so nervous that I couldn't remember a thing he said. I learnt a tremendous amount though, by watching him teach others. I always loved his playing. As a student I listened to a lot of Julian Bream and Andrés Segovia recordings. I really appreciate John Williams's playing more now that I am mature and older. But during my late teens and early twenties the subtlety and sophistication of his art clashed with my temperament. I was a lot freer back then and although I used Williams's recordings as a reference, it was in Bream's and Segovia's interpretations that I found my inspiration. I never attempted to copy Julian Bream, but I was always amazed with the way he manipulated time. It was incredible listening to him teach the Britten Nocturnal, The Walton Bagatelles as well as Villa Lobos Suite Populaire, simply because of the way that he would talk about rhythm and time. It was during those classes that I realised that all the magic and the illusion that you create on the instrument comes from the way you manipulate sound and silence through time.
TWS: And then Juilliard. . . .
AG: My lessons with Sharon Isbin at Juilliard were like master classes: an exchange of ideas. She was brilliant in not trying to change me much. We are after all very different players. She did not insist on me copying her ideas. What she actually helped me with, was to complete my technical and artistic formation. Sharon is very organised and methodical with very clear ideas on what she wants. And that was exactly what I needed at the time. I was all over the place. I had really good ideas, but they were not always well organised, fully developed or well presented. At the beginning we would sit down with a pencil and study the score, write in the phrasing marks, decide the colours and the dynamics. This is something I never really follow on stage, but having done this work in my practice room, having explored all the different possibilities, having experimented with different ideas helped me create my own means of expression. I felt more confident and secure. I knew what worked and what didn't. When I was going on stage before, it was like walking on a tightrope without a net. A fall was a crash.
What was also very motivating in studying with Sharon was the simple fact that she was a successful young woman in a male-dominated field.
I admired her determination and strength, and that gave me the strength to go on. In addition she was my first female teacher. As a result I would refuse to go to my lessons without being prepared 1000 per cent ready. Whatever she was going to say, I felt I should have thought of it already.
TWS: Did you feel that way with John Mills
AG: No! I guess I was more competitive with Sharon than I was with John. My male teachers were never really tough with me. Sharon on the other hand was very demanding, clear-cut and straightforward. She would not play with words. She was very direct and I loved that.
She is fastidious about her technique. Did she work you through ideas of hers
Not really. Technique was something I asked her for. I had never had a technique 'workout. I always had good hands, and as a young student I would refuse to do any studies or exercises. I had a particularly good right hand, but it was my left hand that I always felt less confident about.
It's just too jumpy. I remember in one of the very first classes I said to Sharon: 'Look, it's about time I deal with this, what do we do?' So she gave me a set of slurs, scales and arpeggios, and that 14 was the only set of technique exercises we ever worked on.
TWS: What pieces did you work on with Sharon
AG: I worked on a number of different pieces. We worked on some Bach, a lot of Brouwer as well as Rodrigo. El Decameron Negro, for example, was one of the first pieces we worked on and with which I experimented a great deal on different ideas on colours and dynamics in the way I described earlier.
At Juilliard, my closest friends were pianists, violinists and composers. They would talk about their music in direct relation with life. They would talk, for example, about a piece in sonata form. They would say: 'In the A section you present the theme for the first time, in the recapitulation, when it comes back; it's simply not the same any more. The same way you're not the same person anymore. You are not the same musician, you are ten minutes later in your life, and you are ten minutes later in the piece. You have been on a journey.' Those ideas, in combination with Sharon's more methodical ideas and other more philosophical approaches for life and music, influenced a great deal my approach in interpreting music. Another great influence was theatre.
Apart from my musician friends, the rest of my friends at Juilliard were actors. Spending time around them was truly a new experience. Through their activities I had the chance to follow the 'making' of an art I absolutely adore.
TWS: Did you do any acting classes while you were at Juilliard
AG: I didn't, but I followed some through my roommate, who was studying acting at Juilliard's Drama Division. I heard every single piece of the plays that she ever rehearsed. I would help her with her lines, reading the other part with my strong Greek accent. I religiously attended every workshop, every Alexander technique session, every play they presented.
TWS: Do you make a point of having images as you play, or does it come naturally now
AG: Most of the time it comes instinctively and naturally, but there are times when I don't have a clue what the hell the problem is and why I just cannot make a piece work. Then I consciously try to evoke a feeling, an atmosphere and an image.
One time I remember I was desperate. I was on the bus to the airport on my way to record the Suite Compostelana by Mompou. For the life of me, I could not get the last movement right, the Muòeira. Julian Bream is the best with it. I've heard him play it live and his timing is exquisite, his articulation is fantastic, but I could not get it.
I just was not happy with the articulation at all. Then all of a sudden, words came to me. So I sat down and put Greek words to the music, and that did it. That was IT. Sometimes you have to do that, or something like that so that music becomes one with your body. A lot of the times the problem is that the music is here and you are there, and the gap is not actually being filled. I think that in the same way actors make a role part of their life, the same way musicians should work to get a piece of music part of their body. Then it becomes natural communicating through it, and it's not a different alien medium.
TWS: You say that when you were younger you were a lot freer.
AG: No, I didn't mean it in a good way. I am very free now but in that good old jazz way. When I was younger I thought that rubato is stealing and not giving back, a very capricious sort of approach indeed. I credit Oscar Ghiglia for ridding me of that. If Sharon put an order in my ideas, Oscar just came and actually put my two feet into one shoe. He said: 'Well, you can't just do what the hell you want with a piece of music just because the composer is not around.' Oscar is a fantastic teacher; he gives exquisite coaching. I found he was very tough, and I left his Siena class many times in tears. I learnt so much though that I don't think twice about leading students to tears myself now! It worked for me!
So yes, I was free in a way that was capricious. It was not based anywhere. And now I am free within the piece's frame, parameters, and heartbeat. You know, you can't bend rhythm to no return. I think it was good I was very adventurous when I was younger. I was not afraid to take risks and I didn't let technique limit me. So I would just grapple with it; I would miss the notes, but I would not sacrifice the music for clarity or accuracy. Then I went to the other extreme and became very fastidious. Now I think that having tried both worlds, I am more in the middle, I hope. Well, sometimes I am still capricious!
TWS: Are you tough with your students
AG: I'm very tough.
TTWS: Tougher than all your teachers
AG: I think I am as tough as Oscar is. At the beginning I was very nervous about teaching because most of the time I was younger than the people who would come to take lessons. One year I taught at the National Guitar Workshop, and I remember I had to coach an amateur chamber group; they had to learn and perform that work in five days' time. The first rehearsal went by, and it was a disaster. The second rehearsal was an absolute horror. So I sat down with them - they were adults - and said: 'Look, I'm not going on stage to play the first guitar part with you and I am not putting my name under this group unless you go out there and you play guitar. I mean. This is just not guitar. So why aren't you ready?' And they said: 'We don't have time to rehearse.' I said, 'What time do your classes start in the morning?' They said, '8.30 am.' I said 'OK, tomorrow morning at 5.30 am I will be opening the room for you to rehearse for two hours, then I will coach you and then we will start.'
It takes some sacrifices to go on stage. Do it well, or just don't bother.
So a year later somebody from Los Angeles called me because he wanted some coaching. It was then that I realised how small the guitar world is. He said, 'I need somebody to kick my ass! I heard what you did at the National Guitar Workshop, would you be willing to teach me?' It was very funny.
I try to be very clear in my teaching. There were many times in my life as a student where a teacher would have a brilliant idea, but I would leave the room and wouldn't be able to put it into action. Simply because we didn't have enough time for me to try it out and actually get it, or because he was not clear enough. So when I teach I try to leave a student with no grey or shady areas. If I suggest something, I say: 'Just give it a shot, it might not work with your personality or your approach, you can just have it as an alternative. I don't mind if you don't like it but don't erase an idea before you are able to do the best you can with it.' When you are trying to do justice to music, there shouldn't be egos involved and students shouldn't get offended. It's not a matter of proving that you're able, or talented, or intelligent. It is just that we are here to do the best we can with a piece of music and the only way to achieve that is by working as a team. Now if you come with a big ego, I can give you a big ego too, and then we'll go nowhere. So just leave the ego outside the door, and let's see what we can do together. That's my attitude to teaching.
TWS: Tell me about the new John Duarte recording.
AG: John is a good friend. Last year I had just finished recording the Barrios CD when Naxos decided to record a selection of John's music on the occasion of his 80th birthday. I had a great time recording the CD. It was wonderful not only because I discovered music I wasn't familiar with but because I also got the chance to record music I grew up listening to, the English Suite and the Catalan variations for example. I have to say I am pleased with the result. The non-guitarist friends who listened to it commented that after they finished listening to it through, they put it right back on. I am very happy for John; he deserves it 100 per cent.
You play a lot of music inspired by Greek mythology, such as Three Greek Letters by Sergio Assad, ...Eridos by Stanley Silverman, and the Duarte arrangements. I imagine that Greek mythology, which you were brought up with from an early age, plays an important part in your approach to life. Do you have strong images of figures that mean a lot to you
Well, it is true that I grew up with Greek mythology, with Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey. And before I read any fairy tales my grandparents and my parents read mythology and the Greek Classics to us. I think what I loved about it is that the Greek myths are cut down to human dimensions and human levels. Our Gods committed sins, they were witty and funny and very 'human'. They had weaknesses and disadvantages. The main thread that ran through them, though, was that they were very fair. Sometimes in a very funky way, but they were fair and direct. If there was an injustice done, there was also punishment. There was always a very human code of practice. You take the risks, you live, you sin, and you pay the prize at the end, here in this life. This approach has definitely influenced the way I experience life
TWS: What about being called Antigoni
AG: Antigoni. Well, I guess I was always and everywhere the only Antigoni.
TWS: Didn't she dig the grave for her brother with her own hands
AG: She did. She was a very hard, headstrong woman. She was also very fair. She followed the moral codes and was a figure of justice. So it was a heavy name to grow up with.
TWS: Did you feel that from a young age
AG: The only problem was that when I was quite young I wanted to be called Maria, because there were a thousand Marias and as a young child I didn't want to stick out. I went through that stage fast, and now I am proud of my name. The fact that I was the only one after a while didn't matter. Simply because it got overshadowed by the fact that I was the only classical guitarist. Playing Bach instead of Led Zeppelin made me clearly different from my hard-rock loving classmates. So, yes, I was different! My name was different, my interests were different and what I was doing was by very definition different.
Swiat Gitary Magazine August /September 2004