Goddess with a Gift By Inge Kjemtrup Anne - Sophie Mutter launches an ambitious three - CD Mozart tribute Photo Credit : Tina Tahir c / o Shotview PhotographersThe lavish surroundings of the lobby of London ’ s Savoy Hotel — with its art deco murals , imposing columns , and plush settees — seem a suitable place to meet violinist Anne - Sophie Mutter , whose name is usually accompanied by the word “ glamorous . ” Reviewing her concerts , most critics can ’ t help but comment on her striking appearance , as she ’ s always impeccably groomed and wearing one of her trademark slinky , strapless dresses . “ Like a goddess stepped down from Mount Olympus , ” is how Geoff Brown of the Times of London described her in a recent review . So what does a glamorous violin goddess look like on a regular day ? Quite elegant , if the goddess in question is Anne - Sophie Mutter . She ’ s of medium height , slim , and , yes , elegant , in a peach - colored jacket over shirt and casual slacks . The 42 - year - old German - born violinist is gracious and poised , speaking excellent English with the slightest of accents . After 30 years in the limelight , she ’ s also a practiced interview subject . Her poise today is all the more noteworthy because she and her longtime chamber - music partner , pianist Lambert Orkis , have just finished an afternoon rehearsal for the coming week ’ s three - day marathon of Mozart sonatas at the Barbican Center . Plus , they only flew in this morning from a concert the night before in Dublin . Orkis has been Mutter ’ s sonata partner since 1988 . Though Mutter does not seem terribly interested in the period instrument approach for her own playing , Orkis is noted for his experiments with historic pianos . The duo recently played some of the Mozart sonatas — most of them piano sonatas with violin accompaniment — on Mozart ’ s own piano in the Salzburg Mozart Museum . “ It was very interesting to try to blend in with the sound of . . . That little thing ! ” she says referring to the composer ’ s small five - octave fortepiano . “ It ’ s a totally different approach . I found it utterly inspiring and much of the intimacy you can transfer to modern playing . ” In 2005 Mutter got a jump on the upcoming yearlong festivities surrounding the 250 th anniversary of Mozart ’ s birth year by performing and recording the Mozart violin concertos with the London Philharmonic Orchestra . The concertos are the first of three planned recordings in her ambitious Mozart Project . Later this year , she ’ ll also be recording the Mozart sonatas that she ’ s been touring with , as well as the piano trios . The project , she says , is her “ low bow to the great composer . ” The music of the great Classical - era composer has been something of a cornerstone in Mutter ’ s career . She made her concert debut , at age nine , with Mozart ’ s Second Violin Concerto ; wowed the Salzburg Festival in 1977 with the Third Concerto ; and recorded the Third and Fifth Concertos with her mentor Herbert von Karajan when she was all of 14 . In Karajan ’ s view , Mutter was “ the greatest musical prodigy since the young Menuhin . ” High praise , but surely standing in front of the Berlin Philharmonic at such a young age must have been somewhat daunting ? “ The first rehearsal was a little tense , ” she admits . “ But I was only 13 , and life was simpler . " Born in 1963 in Rheinfelden , Baden - Württemberg , in the Black Forest region of Germany , Mutter first came to public attention when she won a national violin competition at the age of six , just a few years after starting the instrument . Her main teacher was the Carl Flesch pupil Aida Stucki , who , with von Karajan , was very protective of the young violinist . “ I had a very calm childhood , ” recalls Mutter . “ I started concertizing relatively late . Though this famous [ Salzburg performance ] was at 13 , I only had a really heavy schedule at 16 or 17 , and by then I was , repertoirewise , very well prepared . ” Yet even at that age , she had a mind of her own . “ I needed to try out how much I could do , how much I actually wanted to do , ” she says . “ I found out I don ’ t really want to do that much , I don ’ t really want to play 120 concerts a year until I drop dead . I could feel there would not be enough time to live nor to study scores and be really fresh and hungry . ” Does she think today ’ s prodigies can enjoy such normal childhoods ? “ I think the pressure was always there , even in Mozart ’ s time , ” she says . “ People always love to see cute little children do crazy things , that is always very entertaining . The media exposure is more relentless than it used to be ten or 20 years ago , but other than that , the problems stay the same . ” Stucki was a major influence in her formative years . She was , and is , “ a tremendous violinist , but first , a wonderful musician , ” Mutter says of her former teacher . “ The way she was able to teach every pupil in a very personal viewpoint is something I ’ ve never found in any other teacher . Having been a teacher myself at [ London ’ s ] Royal Academy of Music for many years , and having seen great soloists teach , I think we all fall into the trap of showering students with our knowledge , not acknowledging that everyone has their own capacity to take in certain information . “ But she was able to give every pupil what was needed . ” According to Mutter , it was Stucki who suggested she play without a shoulder rest . “ I don ’ t have a very long neck , and when I was a child I went through the entire arsenal : I did the Menuhin thing , and then a little pillow , and a cloth , and everything was uncomfortable . And then Aida said , ‘ Why don ’ t you just try it without ? ’ And it felt great ! For a while I used deer skin underneath so it wouldn ’ t slide around , then later on , in my teens , I found out , ‘ Oh boy , better than deer skin is my own skin . ’” She laughs at her turn of phrase . Her Strad , the Lord Dunraven , is fine as a result , she says . “ I don ’ t sweat on my shoulder . ” Still , she has had a protective layer added to preserve the instrument ’ s original varnish . A center chin rest keeps the violin where she wants it . With von Karajan , the young Mutter recorded many of the warhorses of the violin repertoire : concertos by Brahms , Bruch , Tchaikovsky , and so on . However , she credits the late conductor Paul Sacher with sparking a passion for contemporary music . “ He was a living encyclopedia . I could just call him and say , ‘ How was it with Bartók ? Tell me something about the Second Concerto , ’ and he would go on for hours . ” She was also drawn to the stupendous art collection that Paul and his wife Maja had in their home in Basel , Switzerland . “ Their house was wonderful , but totally unpretentious , ” she says . “ All these Chagalls , Mirós , and Hans Arps everywhere . ” That love for modern music has continued . Mutter has commissioned music from such contemporary giants as Witold Lutoslawski , Krzysztof Penderecki , Henri Dutilleux , and Wolfgang Rihm . In 2006 she will give the world premiere of the Anthèmes III Violin Concerto by Pierre Boulez , with a Sofia Gubaidulina concerto to follow in 2007 . Her recording of Penderecki ’ s Second Violin Concerto , which was written for her , won two Grammy Awards . She also scooped up a Grammy in 2005 for her CD of another tailor - made concerto , this one by her new husband Sir André Previn ( coupled with concertos by Korngold and Tchaikovsky ) . She ’ s not very interested in crossover projects , though she loves listening to jazz and enjoyed playing the ad libitum parts of Lutoslawski ’ s pieces . Mutter still plays the great concertos , of course , and has the Elgar , Walton , and Barber concertos in her sights for the future . Twenty - eight years after her first , youthful recording experience , it was an accomplished and experienced violinist who recently directed the London Philharmonic at Abbey Road Studios to record all five of the Mozart violin concertos , along with the Sinfonia Concertante with Yuri Bashmet . “ With the LPO , I want to recreate the atmosphere of a concert on records , ” she says . “ I take risks in concerts . ” She was also determined to bring out the more intimate side of the concertos . “ There is a bonding within the LPO , which makes this chamber - music approach to the concerti possible , ” she explains . “ We did many of the rondo movements and the minuet movements in a quartet grouping , which gives the transparency and the lightness of a very private performance . “ For the recording it was absolutely perfect ! ” For the Mozart trio tour , she was joined by cellist Daniel Müller - Schott and pianist , composer , and conductor Previn . Mutter and the 75 - year - old Previn married in 2002 , and the big difference in their ages raised eyebrows . For some , particularly the German media , which has followed her every move since childhood , Mutter ’ s private life is of equal interest to her public life . A first marriage , with lawyer Detlef Wunderlich , ended tragically with his death from cancer in 1995 . “ Every tragedy , or every really wonderful moment in your life , changes you as a person , ” she says , “ and hopefully makes you a better person , more sensible , more sensitive , more caring — more thankful for life . ” She has two children from her first marriage , and much of her free time is spent with them . “ I used to go hiking a lot , but my children are not great fans of hiking yet , ” she laments . “ So I do mainly table tennis and basketball and football and swimming — everything they want to do . ” The glamorous soloist with a ping - pong paddle in her hand ? It ’ s an irresistible image . Her son plays piano and her daughter plays flute , and both are in the school choir . Did Mutter herself ever sing ? “ Oh , yeah , self - taught , you know . I used to sing the ‘ Queen of the Night ’ aria . I actually sang it once for Karajan ! ” she adds with a laugh . “ I was very young then , which explains why I dared do it . ” To aid other young string players , she founded the Circle of Friends of the Anne - Sophie Mutter Foundation in 1997 . one of its current scholars , 21 - year - old Armenian violinist Sergey Khachatryan , won the 2005 Queen Elisabeth Competition and has received widespread acclaim for his recent debut recording . What does the foundation do for its young artists ? “ It is buying the violin , buying the bow , getting the right teacher , having conductors give advice or even take them on tour , ” she explains . “ We produce CDs for the scholars , send them around the world , I write letters explaining why I believe in the person , I go on tour with them , we give commissions . “ There ’ s nothing I wouldn ’ t do for a scholar , if he is good . ” Previn has just composed a double concerto for violin and double bass , which will be premiered in Boston by Mutter and one of the scholars , Slovakian double - bass player Roman Patkoló : “ I figured if it ’ s a double concerto for violin and bass that it ’ s easier to put on a program , ” Mutter says . I later attend two of Mutter ’ s Mozart concerts at the Barbican . She looks terrific , resplendent in a draped , cream - colored , tightly fitted dress . She plays beautifully , bringing care and attention to every phrase , perhaps too much for the taste of some critics , who find the sonatas lightweight . “ Lending heavy interpretative weight to what are sometimes nursery baubles isn ’ t always a good idea , ” says Brown of the Times . But despite the homogeneous nature of the programming , my attention doesn ’ t wander for a second . I am particularly taken by her lovely flautando playing , as in the second movement of the E flat , K . 380 sonata . Oddly , only one of the late sonatas is in a minor key , the E minor , K . 304 . The work was said to have been written by Mozart when he was in Paris and had received news of the death of his mother . I had remarked to Mutter that despite the minor key , none of the recordings I ’ ve listened to suggest anything gloomy — there ’ s nothing like the darkness of some of the viola quintet movements , for example . “ Often people play K . 304 as if it were the easiest piece , ” she replies . “ There are not so many notes , but I tell you what you can make with this piece if you know where it came from . Tremendous . You can show the art of vibrato , or nonvibrato , the art of flautando , what the bow can do , what color can do , and what you can express with a stringed instrument . ” When asked what her legacy will be , she laughs . “ I don ’ t know , I want to leave some good contemporary recordings behind , some mirror of the time in which I lived . And I ’ m not yet finished — I have a few more ! ” Mutter seems to be satisfied with her life at the moment . “ I think one gets used to the demands of life . But you never know what the demands will be tomorrow , with children growing up . You never know if they ’ ll need you more or less , or if you ’ ll need them more or less . Every year , at the end of the year , I swear to myself , ‘ Oh , next year I ’ ll do less . ’ And strangely enough I never succeed , ” she muses . “ But there is a healthy balance in my life that I think everybody can live [ with ] and be happy . I ’ m an optimist ! ” And a glamorous one at that . Mutter on Mozart “ In the violin music of Mozart , phrasing might be even more crucial than in Beethoven because Mozart was the better fiddle player . Beethoven was a tremendous pianist , but he worked pretty much against the violin . Mozart was a great virtuoso , especially during the period where he wrote the concerti . So phrasing is tremendously important , as is the lightness , the precision , the room between the notes . It takes an incredible amount of control , more even than in the Beethoven sonatas . “ It ’ s just highly refined music . “ With Mozart , what helped me was to study the letters , to read what else he was composing at the same time , what influenced him . I do think everything we need to know as a musician is in fact to be found in the score . But the more you know about other pieces , the better you can relate them , and also relate tempos and get a feel of how the movements are interrelated . “ I have also read the Leopold Mozart book on playing . That really is an incredibly sophisticated book . Not only does it introduce the school of Italian virtuoso playing , but it says so much about phrasing . There are so many different bowings he expects a violinist to be able to control . This man really thoroughly analyzed violin playing . That makes him one of the great teachers of his time — no wonder his son was such an excellent violinist ! Plus the whole story of Italian tremolo , which is the beginning of vibrato , and how keen he was about sound production . “ Nothing should happen accidentally in anything you play , but this is especially true in Mozart . He is often underestimated because there are not clouds of little black notes flying through the sheets of his music . What he writes , it ’ s always very minimalist in a way , but — the few notes he writes are absolutely perfect in the way they show the harmonic development of the piece and express emotions . And as they are so extremely exposed , you can ’ t lose your concentration for a minute . “ On the Mozart trio disc , we played four of the late piano trios . I must confess that I selected them because in these , the violin has at least something to say . In the early ones it ’ s really true that the fiddle is the right hand , the cello is the left hand . But the violin emerges into something more beautiful and interesting , and the late trios give the violin enough that I have a right to be on stage ! “ Without Mozart ’ s late [ violin / piano ] sonatas we wouldn ’ t have Beethoven ’ s decision to take the violin as a serious partner . In Mozart ’ s early ones — K . 302 , K . 304 — the violin still has a rather modest role , although that develops very , very quickly into a partnership , where the violin introduces thematic material and is of equal importance to the piano . “ For both the Brunetti ( K . 379 ) and the Strinasacchi ( K . 454 ) sonatas , he did not write the piano part out . During that period , improvising was just a natural way of surviving an evening . And he was a great improviser , so for him it was no big deal . With the Prague Symphony he writes this wonderful letter to his father , saying “ I arrived , I have no music in my suitcase . I ’ ll write myself a little symphony . ” My husband always gets rather annoyed when he reads this , because it takes him longer than three days to write a symphony . “ But Mozart is Mozart ! ” What Mutter Plays Since 1984 , Anne - Sophie Mutter has played the Lord Dunraven Stradivari , 1710 . The violin is named for an Irish politician , Windham Thomas Wyndham - Quin , Lord Dunraven ( 1841 – 1926 ) . For the Mozart sonata programs at the Barbican , she used a bow by Donald M . Cohen . “ I don ’ t think it ’ s so much necessarily the repertoire , it ’ s just [ at different ] phases in life you go through you need a different bow , ” she explains . “ I think the change also keeps the hand fresh . Of course , I would never play with an extra - heavy bow in Mozart , but other than that , it depends on the hand I have at the moment , the needs my arm has , and for that I try to find the bow that I hopefully already possess . Otherwise , it ’ s time to buy another one ! ” She recently purchased two bows from Boston - based maker Benoît Rolland . “ I ’ m a great fan of his bows , as is Lynn Harrell , ” one of Mutter ’ s frequent chamber - music collaborators .