Gábor Takács-Nagy’s Postcard from Verbier

Far from taking it easy over the summer months, Manchester Camerata’s Music Director designate Gábor Takács-Nagy has been working with young chamber musicians high in the Swiss Alps.  Back in 2007, he was appointed Music Director of the Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra. The orchestra takes young musicians from across the world, and guides them through the treacherous waters of the professional world. This is Gábor Takács-Nagy’s fifth Verbier Festival.

“It’s very very busy because so many concerts are taking place, and there aren’t many rehearsals for one production, but of course everyone wants to give his or her best. So the work and the rehearsals are really special and intensive.”

“Being here in the mountains, in a Summer festival, it gives a new imagination somehow. It’s away from the normal concert halls. This has something special, the Swiss Alps and the artists also here – it’s a kind of artistic family – we know each other very very well, because there is a core. Martin Engstrom the boss of this festival, invites back lots of the same people year after year so we know each other. It has a special atmosphere.”

The Verbier Music Festival started 17 years ago.  The idea was to find a reason for people to some up to the Alpine ski resort in the Summer Months.  Today it attracts the best performers from around the world who are drawn by the informal atmosphere and the chance to play with like minded musicians.

The Festival’s chamber orchestra is comprised by young players from dozens of countries.  But does that make it hard to create a coherent body of players?

“I have to give – one, two, three days to get things together. But how can I put it? – Music is such a universl language, if you talk about musical issues,  suddenly through the music different persons are getting together. If you are talking about Music Music, Music, the technique will be the same. Even if people are coming from different schools or countries.”

“It’s a magical thing, the magic of music making. This of course needs talented youngsters, but here at Verbier
everyone is at such a high level.”

Gábor Takács-Nagy toured Asia with the orchestra and mezzo-soprano Frederica von Stade. He was a founder  member and first violin of the Takács Quartet, but since 2001 has devoted himself full-time to orchestral conducting. Since 2007, he has been guest Chief Conductor of the Hungarian State Symphony Orchestra and the Budapest Symphony Orchestra MAV, and regularly conducts the Irish Chamber Orchestra.

Appointed professor of chamber music at the Geneva Conservatory and the Ecole Supérieur de Musique in Sion in 1997, Gábor Takács-Nagy also gives masterclasses at numerous international academies.

Gabor has several concerts with Manchester Camerata this coming Autumn, and takes up the rold of Music Director in September 2011.

Read more about Gábor Takács-Nagy

Find out about the Verbier Festival

Read about the Verbier Fetsival Academy on the Borletti-Buitoni Trust website

See Gabor performing at Verbier on Medici TV