Gilles Apap – Everything I Do is From The Heart
Credit: Gilles Apap
AN IMPRESSION of GILLES APAP’S MARCH 8 CONCERT in SANTA BARBARA is included at the end of this article and provided by Miroirs CA’s roving correspondent.
Violinist Gilles Apap is enjoying a second season as Artist in Residence of Camerata Zürich, but that’s just a fraction of what this incredibly versatile artist is all about. Born in Algeria and raised in France, he studied at conservatories in Nice and Lyon, the Curtis Institute of Music and was concertmaster of Santa Barbara Symphony, Apap’s rise began after receiving the contemporary music prize at the Menuhin International Competition. What developed was an artistic relationship with Yehudi Menuhin and a global career as soloist of classical and crossover repertoire with leading orchestras and music festivals in the US and Europe, including an artistic directorship of the Nordic Chamber Orchestra and teaching stints at the Menuhin Academy in Gstaad, Switzerland and Menuhin School in London.
Bruno Monsaingeon, the director of aesthetic films about classical music artists produced three about Apap: The Unknown Fiddler of Santa Barbara (1993), Gilles Apap and Friends (1993) and 3rd Concerto by Mozart played by Gilles Apap and the Sinfonia Varsovia (1999) – of which he wrote a cadenza for this concerto. Apap frequently collaborates with high-profile jazz, bluegrass, old time and folk musicians such as Roby Lakatos and Kevin Burke. He is the founder of Apapaziz Productions and Transylvanian Mountain Boys, of which the group can be heard on Sony as well as live - in an upcoming concert on March 8 at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara. In conversation, Apap says, “It will be kind of a rollercoaster, bipolar concert.”
The distinguished musician Yehudi Menuhin said of Apap, “For me, you are the example of a musician of the 21st century. You represent the direction in which music should evolve…” His comment is a reflection of the creative and inventive programming Apap brings to concert programs with titles like East Meet West. Apap comments, “I never thought about using what I do to attract audiences. It’s all about curiosity over the years, and I think living in California for quite a long time and being exposed to a lot of different genres of music. So when I go back to Europe, this curiosity is still very much alive and I’m sixty-two years old.”
The Santa Barbara concert includes a range of eclectic repertoire to satisfy a palette of musical tastes. Inna Faliks will perform Liszt’s La Campanella so-called Paganini Etude (she is a concert pianist and faculty member of UCLA) and collaborate with Apap in works such as Faure’s Berceuse, Op 16, Kreisler’s Praeludium and Allegro, Piazzola’s Escualo (Shark) and Enescu’s Impressions d’enfance, Op. 28. Apap will join erhu virtuoso Xiaoli Cioffi in a sampling of Chinese and Tibetan folk music as well as jam with the Transylvanian Mountain Boys. The program will also feature the Gap Tooth Mountain Ramblers and Phil Salazar Bluegrass Band.
Impressions d’enfance is an unusual work by Enescu, a brilliant but rather neglected Romanian composer except for perhaps his Romanian Rhapsodies, opera Odeipe and incredible third violin sonata in historic recordings with the composer and Dinu Lipatti, Menuhin with sister Hephzibah and more recently with Patricia Kopatchinskaja. “For me, this composition has to be the most elaborate, difficult, interesting piece of music ever written for violin and piano. There is absolutely no rhythm in this music and it’s about twenty minutes long.” The work, based on Romanian folk tales, should offer a cosmic listening experience of which an encore performance can he heard in Apap’s recording (Solo Musica, 2022).
Apap says he has been interested in and bonded with Romanian folk music for many years because of Menuhin. “He was from my childhood until now a source inspiration as a musician, and his teacher was George Enescu. I’ve done a lot of research on the music of this composer as well as on Transylvania.” He adds, “I just got back from Romania and learned so much in seeing all the villages and so-called Gypsy {Romani} rituals of folk musicians from this region. It’s all an open world for me and I learn so much from other people, still interested in different types of music and still learning as much as I can. It’s not really about what attracts audiences. Everything I do is from the heart.”
GILLES APAP - THE GREATEST HOMECOMING EVER in SANTA BARBARA
Gilles Apap was concertmaster of Santa Barbara Symphony and everyone in the town claims him as their own. So, tonight’s concert at the Lobero Theatre with Apap and friends was like the best high school reunion ever - as the entire audience came together. It was music to fill your heart with joy and love, and the roof literally came off with interludes from the Gap Tooth Mountain Ramblers and Phil Salazar Bluegrass Band. It’s been said that Apap defies categorization; in addition to extreme and refined talent, he is a musician of joy, loves what he is doing, and as such, the audience has a great time, whether he’s playing serious classical, folk or bluegrass music.
Apap opened the first half with Faure’s Berceuse, an exquisite account where everything that projected from his violin was so sweet, tender and all embracing. By contrast, Kreisler’s Praeludium and Allegro was a knuckle buster, a Maserati in terms of the speed and technique he drew out of the piece. It was absolutely breathtaking. The Enescu and Piazzola works sounded like a full orchestra and Inna Faliks tore the roof off in La Campanella with unbelievable technique and power finger work that makes this piece a tour de force. It was an electrifying performance.
The program’s second half featured Apap in solo works and collaboration with Transylvanian Mountain Boys and ehru specialist Xiaoli Cioffi - a big standout. Apap brings a sense of joy and enthusiasm to genres other than classical, which is why he can’t be classified or put into a musical box. Cioffi and Apap were having a wonderful time fiddling together furiously and introducing this kind of music to the audience - who were having the greatest time listening to it. Phil Salazar’s bluegrass band closed the show and did it all with instruments like banjo, mandolin, double bass and guitar. The performance was an onstage musical party as Salazar and Apap were going at it with an intense display of harmonic improvisation and love for the moment. The entire concert was like a festival of joy and the packed audience took it all in.
CLICK THE LINK TO READ ABOUT GILLES APAP’S CONCERTS