Ariane Haering by Pascal Auberson
I am very happy that such a personality, such a great pianist recognized far and wide, accepts my proposal with such joy and simplicity. It is quite rare in this world of fierce competition that artists of this notoriety accept with such ease to question themselves.
It is thanks to Gaspard Glaus that I met musically Ariane Haering during a streaming in these times of Covid 19 behind a flat screen.
With Ardita Statovci – their Ariadita duo – they performed the reduction of The Rite of Spring for two pianos. I was shocked to hear how easily, competently and brilliantly Ariane approached this work, making light of the difficulties of such a score by adding, as if that were not enough, a percussion instrument placed under her piano, like a “foot drum”, with the added bonus of a tambourine stroked with the edge of the same foot! Apart from the technical performance itself, I was subjugated by the strength and light, the groove and the lightness that came out of her performance, as she danced on Igor’s spring with her whole body. Everything I was feeling at that moment was moving away from the staid image of the traditional concert pianist and I really enjoyed it. It was like a musical love at first sight and I wanted to integrate it in our duet with Gaspard Glaus. Honored by his positive response to the project and especially by his desire to get out of his “comfort zone”, we started working towards a trio. Ariane knew from the start how to pass on the electricity between Gaspard and me, which is often missing when the music is only male.
Her sense of humor, the distance she has from the profession while practicing it in a playful way, to approach with as much rigor, seriousness, with the same passion both a recognized work and a work in the making.
Although the subject is more private – she decides to end her biography in these words: “I am a mother of four children, I live in Salzburg and I invest as much energy in the well-being of my family as in the realization of my dreams as a musician.”
I found this sentence to be beautiful and humane. To have the strength to try not to separate the “job” from life. Robert Filliou said with a certain malice: “art is what makes life more interesting than art”. There is so much love in Ariane’s musicality that her playing is impregnated with it beyond the bitter where we find the mother and the sea.
I am already looking forward to presenting our “Eros, Thanatos and the Sun” soon on the finally liberated stages.
photographic credits:
Josef Fischnaller Warner Classics