oops!

news : in person : concerts : recordings : Presskit : language

forum : contact : teaching : Repertoire : mp3/jukebox : main menu

  artist pictures
  Bio
  Interview
  Bodos
  Links
  fotogallery
  Oops!
  Oliver's charts
  film
  ifaq


Oops!
Here, Oliver tells of all manner of amusing and curious matters in connection with his life as a musician:
There was a strike in the city - we only expect very few people in the audience this evening, I'm afraid', said the Intendant in Milan, who greeted us thus - the violinist Stefan Tönz and me - during our final rehearsal in the concert hall on the afternoon of the concert. When we then arrived a quarter of an hour before the beginning of the concert in the Centro Culturale, the hall was completely sold out, quite contrary to expectation. The audience had all taken their places in happy anticipation of their musical evening, when they spotted Stefan and me in their midst, furtively looking for the artists' dressing room, still dressed in our everyday clothes. Once when I was a teenager, I had to play Chopin's 'Black Key Etude' in a student concert. I came, saw, sat at the piano and set off into the first bars… and suddenly, I landed in the recapitulation instead. The piece thus lasted - to the surprise of the audience and myself - just a few seconds, and was followed by my flabbergasted bow (I'm not interested, however, in an entry in the Guinness Book of Records!)... Hong Kong, Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto, a sold-out concert. After the end of the concert, a fire breaks out in the restaurant above the huge hall. My concert was thus the last for a long time to take place in the concert hall of City Hall. The Director of the Hong Kong Sinfonietta wrote: 'It must have been your fiery playing! PS: No one was hurt in the fire - except, perhaps, the insurance companies.	Hong Kong City Hall
For those who read the hefty, slating review in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, I have this story: The review by all accounts caused the young critic some problems. With the benefit of hindsight, the title and the closing words of his riposte should probably have been omitted. But we always meet twice in a lifetime: three years later, this CP rang me up in order to arrange an interview for the Bavarian Radio. When the highly sympathetic young man then turned up with his microphone, and we chatted about Benjamin Britten's Piano Concerto, I admitted to him that I was perfectly able to remember him. Well, I was able to offer some strong coffee. Since then, we've developed a really good relationship. As proof that we can today both have a laugh about Swiss cheese: when he invited me to eat at his place, the menu included 'Chäschüechli' - traditional Swiss cheese quiche! Sunday, 30 June 2002, the Zurich Radio Studio. We're recording Haydn's C Major Sonata. The first movement is soon 'in the can'. It's the day of the World Cup Final between Germany and Brazil, and I assume that my wonderful recording engineer, Andreas Werner, unlike me, is hardly interested in football. And a certain professionalism, coupled with my concern about my reputation, forbid me rom suggesting to Andreas that we watch the match. He seems to think the same, but then summons up the courage… and so we land in front of my TV at home and indulge ourselves wickedly in the football game. Fauré, Mussorgsky and the rest of the Haydn Sonata can wait. The fact that Andreas is German, and yet still puts his hopes on Brazil, makes my astonishment at the situation all the greater.