Guildhall Questions: Élisabeth Pion & Alexandra Achillea Pouta answer

This January, Guildhall School returns to the world-renowned Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, New York, to present two outstanding musicians in concert on 18 January.

Pianist Élisabeth Pion and mezzo-soprano Alexandra Achillea Pouta will also give London audiences the chance to preview this programme of masterful chamber works with a special London preview performance on Friday 14 January.

In this interview, they talk about their inspirations for the programme, how they've been preparing and what they're most looking forward to about the performances.

Can you tell us a little about yourselves? How have you worked together, and what brought you to Guildhall to study? 

We are two very enquiring ladies. We didn’t know each other before the school chose to pair us for this recital, but it’s been an incredible human discovery to discover one another, on so many levels. We were shocked when we realized how many of our interests converge: we are both keen collaborators, immersed in creation, poetry, literature, fashion and feminism. We have had many subjects to discuss together which go beyond music, but which are also intrinsically related to it when it comes to repertoire choices and the way one chooses to present it. It’s of utmost importance to ask ourselves as musicians: “How do we want to tell those stories, and which stories are relevant now?”

We have had many discussions on each work we chose to present and every time if felt as if we were uncovering more layers of understanding of each other’s view of the world.

We also very quickly started to improvise together which has been a real joy and a great way to get to know each other. 

We want our art to be impactful. We are anchored in strong traditions, but very much desire to be artists of our time, connected to our era and its needs, desires, struggles and interrogations. We want to make our audiences think and question with our music making.  

We are interested in the performance art as a whole and see the concert stage as a platform for exploration and experimentation.

For this concert we collaborated with British fashion designer Cat O’Brien, who created corsets for us using Caravaggio’s painting A Nymph, Satyrs and Putti, three figures that are representative of our programming choices. 

We came to Guildhall because of its openness to creative people and their willingness to help strong individual voices be developed and heard. It’s an environment which is highly stimulating, and which encourages young musicians to truly ask themselves who they want to be as artists in the 21st century, and which gives them tools to realize their potential to its fullest. To add to this, Guildhall is in the ever-vibrant Barbican centre, at the heart of London’s art scene. One which we both cherish for its diversity and quality of artistic values. A scene in which we feel we have space to offer and grow.

You’ve chosen a very varied repertoire for the concert - can you tell us more about the programme? 

It’s a programme of all-French delights, shall we say! 

Élisabeth: I am really thrilled to open the whole evening with a solo first half where I will play four amazing composers. First, Hélène de Montgeroult, a contemporary of Mozart whose music is unbelievably ahead of her time. She was a true visionary, and unquestionably paved the way to romanticism. As for Lili Boulanger, she is a flavour of her own, mysterious and mystique yet always playful. I will then go on with Messiaen’s Le Baiser, an ‘apperitive’ to Harawi, in a way, and then end the first half of this concert with a joyous rapturous explosion on Debussy’s famous island!  

Alexandra: I love the freedom of expression I get to share in performing Aperghis’ Récitation No.9, at the beginning of the second half of our concert. This piece for unaccompanied voice, is a hint for the wild ride centred around the question of “why therefore ce désir?” that is coming for our audiences. A very “physical” piece, which makes use of extended vocal techniques and improvisational elements, both of which are giving licence to the performer to be radically individual. We will then join our voices for Debussy’s Chansons de Bilitis, an incredible cycle - probably the most sensually intoxicating one of the piano-voice repertoire.

Our love for Messiaen brought us to choose to present a selection of five poems from Harawi. We are absolutely obsessed with this cycle, and we plan to do the whole work together this year. It’s incredible that Messiaen both wrote the music as well as the poetry. It is a work of deep and powerful beauty which we can’t wait to bring to the audience. 

We will end the night with three Brel songs, as an ‘after party’ cycle. We’ve admired Brel for a long time and it’s thrilling to bring him to the classical music stage. We can sense in his music a profound richness, both in thought and in musical language, as well as interesting influences from more formal classical composers like Fauré and Chabrier.

We admire his boldness in being able to address some of the deepest issues of the human spirit - and sometimes being wildly insolent about it - yet he does it under the, shall we say, protection of the songs’ gorgeous melodies and rhythms, which make his messages more digestible, or seem at first more innocent to the audience. Une certaine forme d’arrogance mais sans prétention. 

This mode of presentation is extremely effective: people eat his words gluttonously, and the food has already reached their gut before they realize what they have eaten. And now they can’t go back. He’s an artist who makes people reflect, think, and evolve.

Our overall themes for the recital are: the wild woman archetype, sensuality, boldness, death, love, freedom, birds, stars, star-birds. 

What are you most looking forward to about the performance and the experience? 

We look forward to going to New York! It will be my first time going to the US, which is incredibly thrilling (Alexandra), and for me (Élisabeth) it is a touching way to end four years of studies at the Guildhall, since my audition to come to London took place in New York in 2018 - coming full circle! 

At this point of the process, we simply want to present this programme which we’ve built and crafted lovingly, wholeheartedly to the audience, and then go and enjoy New York! See some shows, perhaps some burlesque. We will also have coachings with great musicians we admire, who live in the city. One thing is sure: we will certainly make the most out of it!  

You’ll also be performing the same repertoire at a concert in Milton Court on 14 January – how do you feel about having two opportunities to perform

It’s great to be able to present the programme twice. In London, we will be performing in front of many of our friends and mentors who have supported us for the whole preparation, so it is very touching for us. It is also a great opportunity to test the programme in front of a full audience, in a concert hall for the first time, and get used to the shape of it coming out of us as one breath. We think this is a great preparation for New York which will truly make the programme get unto our skin.   

How are you preparing for the concert? 

We have had a lot of sessions together as well as coachings with different mentors who have been incredibly inspiring, giving us insight yet being very much aware of the importance of making this performance our own, to own the pieces, find our own sound and find what exactly we want to say with this programme. As we mentioned earlier, storytelling is central to us. Until the performance, we are focusing on getting back to the details of each specific piece, whilst taking care of the whole and visualizing the full experience.

At this stage, the mot d’ordre is to rest, work smartly, and gather full energies for the concerts. 

What have you learnt from this experience (so far)? 

We’ve learned so much already. In a few words: blending sound worlds, wholeness, maintaining individuality in collaboration, intuition, care, ecstasy, love… and that we both do headstands before going on stage!