 So my history with the Dvořák concerto goes back a long way. I think I was about nine years old when I first Heard it possibly somehow I got a record of Rostropovic playing it with Adrian Bolt conducting and I went through craze of just listening to it every day though I think I only listened to the first moment because of course then it was records And I was too lazy to turn over for the second and third moments but I listened again and again and fell in love with this piece So this must have been yeah, it was 9, 10, 11 something like that and then when I was 12 I begged my teacher to let me start playing the piece and She gave in and I did and I was 12 and my father who was an amateur violinist Was very disapproving. He thought that's a terrible idea You're much too young to start learning playing the Dvořák concerto And he arrived to pick me up after my lesson. I said listen, I can play it I played in the first bars and he put his hands over his ears and said So up to which it probably was to be fair Anyway, I kept practicing it and then when I was 14 I first Performed it. I first I performed the first moment at my school With the orchestra there, which I think probably wasn't very good, but then I Performed the whole piece with the orchestra at a festival in Austria that was run by my teacher and The horrible thought is that that was 1973 Which means that I must have started playing it around 1971. So I've been playing that piece this piece for 50 years and In a couple of years time I can celebrate My 50th anniversary the first time I performed it cellists have to and conductors and orchestras have to make their own version really and I think Hennie's done absolutely the right thing by going with basically basing your new edition on the first edition the Simrock because as far as we know Those were Dvořák's final thoughts But what we don't know is what Dvořák really wrote about it. How much sort of input Hennosz Vihán had the cellist for whom it was written I mean his hand is even on the On the manuscript offering corrections putting in corrections. So we just don't know how much Dvořák really changed and how much he was pressured to change or whatever So I think it's very interesting to look back at the earlier version of the concerto And I was brought up with them with an addition based much more closely on that manuscript early manuscript than the first edition and Just to look and see what shall is prefer. I mean there's some things I prefer in the in The Simrock in the first edition and there's some things I prefer in the manuscript and that's just an entirely personal choice, but I think cellist should all make the personal choice. I think what Henle has done so to as I say to base the The addition on the Simrock is absolutely right, but you offer As well many sort of different readings from earlier versions. I think so the cellist can pick and choose So there are all these different versions that One has to decide between in order to make an addition. They can be puzzling, but I don't find anything that's Really finally inexplicable as I say I sort of prefer some some of the earlier versions to the to the first edition But I think everything's there The only passage I change myself now there's two pastures. I change myself from anything to Vvořák route and that's sort of bit naughty But I do it purely because I think it sounds better is the passage Just before the recapitulation of the first moment where as I say when I play it Vvořák's original sounds like a donkey having a nervous breakdown, and I don't think that's what he wanted really And that's how I feel It just doesn't sound good and then the Ossia is possible, but for me it sounds a bit weak So I do as many people do I do double stops six and sevenths Which I think sounds better and again, it's not crucial It's just another way of playing the passage and then towards the end of the first moment I put the sort of the melodic triplets on the top line Rather than the Vvořák's version where he has it on the bottom line I don't think you can hear it very clearly and there's some octaves coming down triplets But again, you know, there's a really tiny details and you told me there's There's you've really been asked a question whether in the the second phrase the cello has That it really could be a syncopated e major chord and then the e It's not that it would sound horrible as a grace note, you know, just I'm messy So I could absolutely I have no problem with that that bar at all There's nothing, you know, there's some things there's a G sharp I play in the first moment that people jump in fact When I played with the Berlin Philharmonic, they make me not to do it for the second performance But I like it and it's in the manuscript and there's a big question about whether the The very end just before the cello Sort of ushers in the final tutti whether it's a D natural or a D sharp 16th in the in the violins just before the pizzicato D sharp. It's the last note before that But the cello has played D natural So I don't I sort of go with Charles Macarius who left a message on my machine once because I left a message for him asking about it He said it can't possibly be a D sharp. I would be a false relation. It'd be horrible. I Asked the violins to play D natural well, I think these The passages where you have Ossia, so I mean no chalice plays the Ossias and most of them because just for ego reasons Because they're easier and therefore it looks if we can't play the difficult bit So we egotistical chalice always go for the more difficult ones I Think some of the passages where we actually there's no Ossia written um like the passage where the cello is accompanying the winds in The sort of second theme of the second group said the cello's going do you do you know it was original It was just 16th which you know, I can see why Veehan changed it for something more impressive But it's very interesting to know what was there originally because that shows you that's an accompaniment So it's so many chalice because it's difficult and flashy They play it really loudly not listen to the winds, but the original just focuses your mind and what the passage is about So I think that's interesting to know As only there's the two places in the first room or actually do something for sure Hasn't written I'm a bit ashamed, but it's only because they really do sound better When I play them the versions I play but I'm always encouraging other chalice Try try and do before checks version, you know, and if you can make it sound great wonderful I can't but What should always start with the composer's version? But as I say, it's it's passages virtuoso passages which are not It's not going to change the meaning of the piece at all to play them one way or the other as long as you Don't change the harmonies, which of course I don't the basic harmonies So one has a certain freedom of those passages, but But one has no freedom not to respect Voschak's markings and tempo markings and his the way he writes the piece as a grand symphonic work You know one has to understand it's when one is accompanying when one has an equal voice and when one is the principal voice I advised not Put Vianne's fingerings and bearings in the part and thank you for taking my advice on this because they're really from another era and You know where cellists did this hugely sandy and things and I Don't know. It's it seems to me. They're not particularly musical But there's also the question behind how musical was he how much did he understand the piece and I'm not sure he did I mean yes to what I asked for into the first performance in London but then when he couldn't not only did Leo Stern the English cellist get the first performance in London Dvořák brought him to Prague to get the first performance there and Vianne meanwhile had tried to insert a cadenza of his own Into the piece we have no idea where because it's nowhere it would fit and it's ghastly It's awful and I looked at it That's incredibly difficult to if you could play it then he was a good cellist Technically, but it's it's horrible and it would wreck the piece and so I must say you know with some Some performers for the past like Joachim with Brahms. That's very different Because Brahms obviously relied on Joachim and took his brilliant suggestions and Vianne obviously did make some very good Suggestions, but I think he made some very bad ones as well And for me that it would just be confusing to have the his fingerings about I mean it's great We've got them in the score So again any cellist can study them But Either you'd have had to have had three parts which would made it very heavy this poor addition Drooped or You know or put them in Into the the blank solo part without my input and that I think it just makes it no longer blank Makes it an interpretation. It's Vianne's interpretation So I think you did just the right thing putting it in the piano score Vianne's things and then leaving the new version completely clean And which I hope cellists will basically use with an odd glance at my one for suggestions My markings are suggestions. They're not instructions. They're suggestions and many cellists will completely disagree with them And that's how it should be That's basically with this addition. We're just continuing a discussion Every cellist will have his own view of the piece and the fingerings and bearings and all the other markings are part of that view and Everybody's got to have his own journey with the piece and arrive at his own his or her own destination Well keep traveling and mine's still changing all the time because it does with a masterpiece great music says something different to you every day And what extra I consider is definitely great music