Jean guihen queyras interviewing

The following is an extract from an interview with Jean Guihen-Queyras in The Strad’s January 2021 issue. To read in full, click here to subscribe and login. The January 2021 digital magazine and print edition are on sale now.

Jean Guihen-Queyras, Isabelle Faust, Alexander Melnikov and the Freiburg orchestra release their latest recording, of Beethoven’s ‘Triple’ Concerto, in February.

"Mitten wir im Leben sind" BACH — Jean Guihen Queyras

Work took place during two intense days at the Teldex Studio Berlin in June 2020, once quarantine rules enabled Heras-Casado and Melnikov to reach Germany, and plans had been made to keep everyone 1.5m apart. ‘Simply being in the same room with other musicians, combining sounds again, creating harmony, experiencing rhythm, was very emotional and intense,’ says Queyras.

‘Whether you’re 1m or 1.5m from each other, in the end it doesn’t make such a big difference. It felt almost normal.’ Of course, he points out, it might have been a different story had any one of In Three Dimensions: An interview with Jean Guihen-Queyras GUGAQ