How do you mostly listen to music?
These days it’s iTunes/Spotify on the hop, but if I had more time to sit down and really cherish a recording, it would be vinyl all day long. Playing so much music every day myself, I choose my moments to get really stuck into a recording, so sound quality is essential when the moment arrives.
What was the first ever record or cd you bought?
Pablo Casals’ Bach Cello Suites. Still one of my favourite possessions.
What was the last piece of music you bought?
A jazz album by the late John Taylor and Kenny Wheeler called Moon. I love John’s playing and keep finding amazing things in his discography. He is very missed.
What’s your musical guilty pleasure?
I’m not sure I feel guilty about anything I’ve liked to listen to, but I would accept that a brief teenage dalliance with Def Leppard was a bit misguided. These days, I like an occasional burst of Steve Earle, Steely Dan or Led Zep, but that’s all good stuff.
If you found yourself with six months free to learn a new instrument, what would you choose?
I’d do a jazz piano course. If that seemed futile a few weeks in, perhaps the viola.
Is applauding between movements acceptable?
It’s fine by me if the audience feels compelled to do it. It happens rarely, but it’s really no problem as long as the musicians keep control of the arc of the piece.
What single thing would improve the format of the classical concert?
More promoters taking the right kind of risks with contemporary repertoire in their programming. We are spoilt in London as there is so much good stuff going on, but some other countries are more conventional in their approach and so could struggle to find an audience in the future.
What’s been your most memorable live music experience as an audience member?
Too many to form even a top 20, so I will limit myself to the last few years: Zimmerman’s Soldaten in Salzburg, Birtwistle’s Secret Theatre in the same festival, András Schiff’s stunning survey of Bach at Wigmore hall, Mark Padmore’s Winterreise with Till Fellner at the Plush festival, John Taylor’s solo piano... and many more.
We’re giving you a time machine: what period, or moment in musical history, would you travel to and why?
I wouldn’t go back that far, late 60s perhaps. Incredible things were happening in contemporary music and jazz, and it was a golden age for classical performance and recording.
What is the best new piece written in the past 50 years?
Impossible to answer! My current shortlist: Birtwistle’s Mask of Orpheus, Ligeti’s piano etudes, Kurtág’s Quasi una fantasia, and most recently George Benjamin’s Written on Skin. Maybe Birtwistle. But this list will look different in a month.
What’s the most overrated classical work? - ie is there a warhorse whose appeal you really don’t relate to?
Tchaikovsky’s piano trio would be high up the list. As would the Rachmaninov piano concertos.
Which non-classical musician would you love to work with?
Perhaps Brad Mehldau. I’m loving his recordings at the moment.
Imagine you’re a festival director here in London with unlimited resources. What would you programme - or commission - for your opening event?
A new orchestral piece from George Benjamin, and Charles Ives’ Universe symphony.
What do you sing in the shower?
Whatever I screwed up in my previous concert.
It’s late, you’ve had a few beers, you’re in a Karaoke bar. What do you choose to sing?
I’d peg it straight out of there.
Adrian Brendel is the Nash Ensemble’s cellist. The Nash Ensemble’s 2015/16 season Mozart, Mendelssohn and the Italians, opens at Wigmore Hall, London on 17 October.
