Passion for work best thing in life

By WILLIAM DART

One of Steven Isserlis' first pronouncements is that nobody takes music seriously enough. "It's like the story of the football manager who, when he was told that football was a matter of life and death, replied, 'No, it's much more important than that'."

The British cellist's fourth visit to this country finds him back with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, playing concertos by Dvorak and Dutilleux. "Dvorak, for example, was absolutely convinced that music was the best thing in life - and you really have to be if you're a composer."

Isserlis admits he hasn't played Dvorak's Concerto that often, even though he first tackled it at the age of 12. "It's so wonderfully written - a big symphonic work full of colour and yet still very private, set deep inside Dvorak's personal feelings."

Was there a danger of becoming jaded with such a well-known piece? Isserlis is vehement: "Every great piece of music seems different every time you play it."

Different colleagues make for changes too. He remembers his 2002 Auckland recital with Stephen Hough. "We played the Rachamninov Sonata and came at the last movement from very different points of view and met in the middle, without feeling any compromise."

Compromise is not a word in his vocabulary. On his website, one of his pet peeves is "most classical crossover music" (to me he dismisses it as "music written with dollar signs behind it".)

I realise he is also not fond of people who ask him why he chooses gut strings, but I broach the subject. "Humanity" is the simple answer and he goes on to say New Zealand and Australian sheep usually provide the gut because British sheep have too much fat.

Cellos are a safer topic. On this visit he'll be playing his Feuermann Stradivarius because "both concertos need a huge range of poetic colour".

When is his 1740 Montagnana brought out of its case?

"Mainly for Shostakovich or some concerto where I have to use it percussively," is the answer.

"The Strad doesn't like being hit."

Not surprisingly for the author of a best-selling children's book (Why Beethoven Threw the Stew, a decidedly wacky musical appreciation primer for children and adults), Isserlis has a way with a phrase.

He has already described Schumann as "a manufacturer of dreams". But he reminds me of Thomas Beecham's description of Schumann's special gift as "seeming to tell each individual listener an individual secret".

Schumann is one of the many composers Isserlis actively champions. Another is Saint-Saens and the cellist was behind a Saint-Saens Festival in London a few months ago.

"I just wish it had been on a bigger scale. Joshua Bell and I played this gorgeous piece, La muse et le poete, which is positively experimental in a freeform sort of way. And yet people look down on Saint-Saens."

Isserlis will take up the cause of French music in Auckland when he tackles Dutilleux's Tout le monde lontain, which he describes as "the greatest cello concerto by a living composer.

"It's very French. You can hear the relationship to Debussy and Ravel and yet it's completely original".

There is a personal connection too. Isserlis had lunch with the 88-year-old composer a few years ago.

"He was very nice but got into a very French state because he forgot to go to the bank. As I was due to leave for New Zealand the next day I was in a bit of a state too, packing and practising."

I can't resist asking him if there are any concertos he'd like to be able to pack in his luggage if composers had written them.

"I could have done with a Brahms Concerto, or a Bruckner. Very few composers wrote them back then.

"Some of the best balanced scores come from the 20th century. Elgar is brilliant and so is Walton. Dutilleux is too. He uses such a large orchestra but - touch wood - the cellist doesn't get overwhelmed."

Performance

* Who: Steven Isserlis, with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

* Where and when: Auckland Town Hall, Friday 6.30pm; Saturday 8pm