Festival features master pianist

Some people like to sweep landmark birthdays under the carpet, others see them as a chance to celebrate. Pianist Melvyn Tan seems quite happy to announce that he reaches his 50th birthday next month: it's even mentioned in his concert programme biography. Or was it a case of friends letting the cat out of the bag?

"It's partly that," Melvyn laughs, "but it's not a big deal. On the other hand, it seemed like a good opportunity to have a nice concert and have some friends come and play as well. That will be at the Wigmore Hall in London in October. But I'm not having six months of birthday concerts as some colleagues have done."

All of which begs the question: how old was Melvyn Tan when he first sat at a piano?

"I think I was four, going on five. I started because my sister, who is nearly ten years older than me, played the piano in Singapore, which is where I was born. I used to go with her to lessons and apparently played by ear what she was playing. They can't have been very difficult pieces!

"I was slightly pushed into it by my parents, I think they saw that I was musically inclined. But it didn't really mean very much to me until I was about ten or 11. It wasn't until I came to England at the age of 12 and went to the Yehudi Menuhin School that I realised the piano would play a big part in my life.

"In Singpore, everybody was brought up with the Associated Board exams, with their terrible red instruction books. That's what a lot of students do from one year to the next. They learn their exam pieces, they pass or fail their exams, and then they go on to the next grade. they don't really learn very much about music. I actually learnt a few more pieces than that- I could play some complete sonatas.

"But when I came to England, my playing style was completely broken down, and I had to start working at my technique. I am sure I had fallen into all sorts of bad habits, although I had reasonably good teachers early on. It wasn't until I went to the Menuhin School that the lessons became really rigorous. I think that happens to everybody who goes to a music college or conservatoire, they tend to set you back a few years."

We are talking in Melvyn Tan's West London studio, into which quite a number of different pianos have been cleverly shoehorned. The instruments include a modern concert grand piano and several examples of the earlier fortepiano, as known to Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven.

"After I left the Royal College of Music, to which I went after the Menuhin School, I became very interested in early music, and the performance practices of the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.

"I stumbled on to the world of early pianos very much by accident, but stumble I did. It taught me a lot about a period of music which I didn't study much at college. It woke me up. I discovered that there was this huge, and very necessary, repertory which I hadn't looked at properly. And I fell in love with the sound of the instruments.

"Then, after ten or 12 years, I became disillusioned with the purely practical side of the fortepiano. I travel around the world a lot and often I would encounter an instrument that just wasn't very good.But I couldn't walk away, and say: Goodbye, and thank you very much, I'll get on the next plane home'. I had to go through the concert "So I began to nurse the idea that I might one day come back to playing the modern piano. Now 80 per cent of my work is on that instrument, although this year, being Mozart year, I have done a little bit more fortepiano. I still love the sound the fortepiano makes and I think it teaches us a lot about why composers wrote the things they did, particularly Haydn, Mozart and early Beethoven."

Melvyn Tan has also recently begun to direct Mozart's piano concertos from the keyboard, an experience which he enjoys.

"It means that you are in total control right from the beginning and don't feel subservient to a conductor. It's a very nice feeling. Strangely, from the very first concert I directed, I wasn't nervous at all. Usually I get nerves before a concert."

Melvyn admits that there have been occasions when he has been totally at odds with the person on the podium about the interpretation of a piece of music. What does he do then?

"You tend to put on your professional hat. You just grin and bear it to the best of your ability. You try not to get too involved - there is no point in throwing a scene. I don't think I've ever really thrown a scene in my whole career.

"But why should a conductor see eye to eye with me musically or vice versa? You just go ahead and do it and, more often than not, the audience don't really know. They say Oh, what a lovely performance' If you get a lot of applause, the conductor may hate you even more - they don't like soloists getting a lot of applause."

As Melvyn's engagements take him all over the world, I wondered how he copes with the travelling.

"I don't. The older you get, the less you cope. You don't sleep as well. But I think you learn not to panic. If your flight is cancelled, you take the next one. That is a good sign of old age, you don't start fretting."

But, for the moment, Melvyn is working much closer to home, playing in the Oxford Chamber Music Festival. Among other things, he will be playing a new piece by contemporary Austrian composer Thomas Larcher. There is one snag, however: Melvyn has not yet seen the score.

"I do know him, and I know his music is quite difficult. I keep ringing him up to say: Please can I have the music?'. But nothing has arrived."

Melvyn Tan plays in the Oxford Chamber Music Festival on September 27 and 30. Tickets and full details of the festival are available from the Oxford Playhouse box office: 01865 305305.