Simon Rattle, the bus conductor
(Filed: 03/08/2005)
Kate Connolly examines an award-winning documentary that reveals how the Berlin Philharmonic's chief conductor took Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring' to a transport depot
It is hard to imagine that Sir Simon Rattle has ever been an unquestioning consumer of anything. Even during his school days he found it hard to accept how music was taught. "If they wanted to teach us football, we would kick a ball," he says. "In art, we were allowed to paint and draw. But in music you were told, okay, sit and listen passively."
Such an unsatisfactory experience was central to his decision, on becoming chief conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic four years ago, to bring the orchestra's music to the masses. He wasn't going to wait until they came to him, even as head of what is arguably the greatest orchestra in the world.
Rattle's brave determination to include some of Berlin's most phlegmatic and recalcitrant teenagers into the orchestra's working life, from the very start of his collaboration with the orchestra, has been captured in Rhythm Is It!, one of the most popular German documentary films for years, which has just won two prizes at the country's film awards.
In a former bus depot on the edge of industrial wasteland in Berlin, the cooperation between the teenagers and an initially sceptical orchestra reaches its height in a performance of Igor Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, attended by an audience of several thousand. Rhythm Is It!, which has been shown to select audiences at London's ICA and is currently seeking a British distributor, allows the viewer to be privy to the fascinating process as the musicians descend from their elitist stage, and 250 children morph from a chaotic and disillusioned mass into an exuberant yet disciplined troupe of dancers.
"Why not?" Rattle asks in between rehearsals. "Why does it always have to be professionals? Music is not only for rich businessmen and their wives. If I have any religion at all, it's that this is for everyone." But in his endearingly down-to-earth way he admits he is "scared shitless, as we say in Liverpool", that it is not necessarily a good idea for a mountaineer to choose Everest for his first climb.
The film's makers, Thomas Grube and Enrique Sanchez Lansch, began with the idea of making a film about how the Berlin Philharmonic was faring under the direction of Rattle. Although the musicians had enthusiastically voted him in as the successor to the ailing Claudio Abbado, many critics suggested that the Liverpudlian might be too adventurous and experimental for their liking.
"During our research, we soon realised that the orchestra's educational project revealed much more about the direction in which it was moving under new guidance, than any changes in the concert hall," says Sanchez Lansch, a former opera singer turned music-documentary filmmaker.
Under the patient but stern guidance of British choreographer Royston Maldoom, who drives around in a red post-office van, the unruly youths from the bleakest of backgrounds slowly realise their potential. As they stretch their limbs in ways they have never done before, they discover much about themselves and learn to love the music they declare to be "really cool" and "weird".
In one scene, Maldoom instructs the children to reach their fingertips into the air, to plant their feet firmly on the ground and to open their bodies in order that they get an idea of their confidence and might. He goes through the rows, commenting on their positions.
"With this girl we see that she knows how big her potential is," he says. "But her gaze is pointing downwards because she is not sure whether she will be allowed to use this potential." About a Turkish boy, he says: "This boy here can achieve everything, but at the moment he is still hiding."
He and his assistant, fellow British choreographer Susannah Broughton, at one point come close to giving up on the project after their restless pupils appear unable to sit still or take instructions for more than a few seconds. One of their school-teachers, visibly upset, intervenes to suggest Maldoom is being too harsh on her children. But Maldoom, who has 30 years' experience teaching in the field of dance including work with street children in Ethiopia, remains undeterred in his quest to shape his troupe, yet is visibly frustrated that the children don't recognise their own talents.
"I cannot see a single person in this room who is not capable of being extraordinary," he shouts at them. "You can change your life in a dance class. Think about it."
As the performance date nears, Maldoom finally declares they have undergone a "200 per cent improvement."
"Royston, it's f***ing unbelievable," says Rattle, bouncing up to him in one of the last rehearsals.
"Okay, now I'll go and tell them it's shit," replies Maldoom, rubbing his moustache with a mischievous grin.
The children slowly unfold, against a backdrop of scenes of gritty Berlin. Martin, a self-confessed loner, is initially anxious about being touched, and shies away from lifting the other boys in one of the ballet's more complicated moves. Later he says the experience has been so inspiring, he wants to become an acrobat. For Olayinka, an 18-year-old refugee from Nigeria who lost both his parents in the civil war, the experience gives him the strength to push on, take his exams and make new friends. Maria, who admits that laziness has always been her middle name, agrees to continue with her studies. "I realise I can achieve something after all," she says.
The bus-depot performance of Rite of Spring, which has since been followed by others, including Ravel's Daphnis and Chloe, is just one part of a whole range of education projects under the banner "Future@Bphil" which Rattle has introduced to great acclaim since taking up the baton in Berlin.
The project has been hailed by German critics as an educational revolution, and Rattle as something of a hero for helping Germans realise the importance of increasing access to high-brow culture.
But in one of the film's most interesting insights, we realise that even in Berlin, one of the world's most vibrant arts and music capitals, our greatest cultural export is having to fight for funding as he did when in Britain. In a city that, as he says, is bankrupt to "an extraordinary level" - £39 billion - however much praise his project attracts, he is very aware that he will have to fight for its survival.
"All the next years the arts are going to have to struggle to an extraordinary degree," he says, "and we're going to have to remind people that they need the arts. It's a necessity - like the air they breathe and the water they drink."It is hard to imagine that Sir Simon Rattle has ever been an unquestioning consumer of anything. Even during his school days he found it hard to accept how music was taught. "If they wanted to teach us football, we would kick a ball," he says. "In art, we were allowed to paint and draw. But in music you were told, okay, sit and listen passively."
Such an unsatisfactory experience was central to his decision, on becoming chief conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic four years ago, to bring the orchestra's music to the masses. He wasn't going to wait until they came to him, even as head of what is arguably the greatest orchestra in the world.
Rattle's brave determination to include some of Berlin's most phlegmatic and recalcitrant teenagers into the orchestra's working life, from the very start of his collaboration with the orchestra, has been captured in Rhythm Is It!, one of the most popular German documentary films for years, which has just won two prizes at the country's film awards.
In a former bus depot on the edge of industrial wasteland in Berlin, the cooperation between the teenagers and an initially sceptical orchestra reaches its height in a performance of Igor Stravinsky's Rite of Spring, attended by an audience of several thousand.
Rhythm Is It!, which has been shown to select audiences at London's ICA and is seeking a British distributor, allows the viewer to be privy to the fascinating process as the musicians descend from their elitist stage and 250 children morph from a chaotic and disillusioned mass into an exuberant yet disciplined troupe of dancers.
"Why not?" Rattle asks in between rehearsals. "Why does it always have to be professionals? Music is not only for rich businessmen and their wives. If I have any religion at all, it's that this is for everyone." But in his endearingly down-to-earth way he admits he is "scared shitless, as we say in Liverpool", and that it is not necessarily a good idea for a mountaineer to choose Everest for his first climb.
In a scene from the documentary, choreographer Susannah Broughton instructs her troupe
The film's makers, Thomas Grube and Enrique Sanchez Lansch, began with the idea of making a film about how the Berlin Philharmonic was faring under the direction of Rattle. Although the musicians had enthusiastically voted him in as the successor to the ailing Claudio Abbado, many critics suggested that the Liverpudlian might be too adventurous and experimental for their liking.
"During our research, we soon realised that the orchestra's educational project revealed much more about the direction in which it was moving under new guidance than any changes in the concert hall," says Sanchez Lansch, a former opera singer turned music-documentary filmmaker.
Under the patient but stern guidance of British choreographer Royston Maldoom, who drives around in a red post-office van, the unruly youths from the bleakest of backgrounds slowly realise their potential. As they stretch their limbs in ways they have never done before, they discover much about themselves and learn to love the music they declare to be "really cool" and "weird".
In one scene, Maldoom instructs the children to reach their fingertips into the air, to plant their feet firmly on the ground and to open their bodies in order that they get an idea of their confidence and might. He goes through the rows, commenting on their positions.
"With this girl we see that she knows how big her potential is," he says. "But her gaze is pointing downwards because she is not sure whether she will be allowed to use this potential." About a Turkish boy, he says: "This boy here can achieve everything, but at the moment he is still hiding."
He and his assistant, fellow British choreographer Susannah Broughton, at one point come close to giving up on the project after their restless pupils appear unable to sit still or take instructions for more than a few seconds. One of their school teachers, visibly upset, intervenes to suggest Maldoom is being too harsh on her children. But Maldoom, who has 30 years' experience teaching in the field of dance, including work with street children in Ethiopia, remains undeterred in his quest to shape his troupe, yet is visibly frustrated that the children don't recognise their own talents.
"I cannot see a single person in this room who is not capable of being extraordinary," he shouts at them. "You can change your life in a dance class. Think about it."
As the performance date nears, Maldoom finally declares they have undergone a "200 per cent improvement".
"Royston, it's f***ing unbelievable," says Rattle, bouncing up to him in one of the last rehearsals.
"OK, now I'll go and tell them it's shit," replies Maldoom, rubbing his moustache with a grin.
The children slowly unfold, against a backdrop of scenes of gritty Berlin. Martin, a self-confessed loner, is initially anxious about being touched, and shies away from lifting the other boys in one of the ballet's more complicated moves. Later he says the experience has been so inspiring, he wants to become an acrobat. For Olayinka, an 18-year-old refugee from Nigeria who lost both his parents in the civil war, the experience gives him the strength to push on, take his exams and make new friends. Maria, who admits that laziness has always been her middle name, agrees to continue with her studies. "I realise I can achieve something after all," she says.
The bus-depot performance of Rite of Spring, which has since been followed by others, including Ravel's Daphnis and Chloe, is just one part of a whole range of education projects under the banner "Future@Bphil" which Rattle has introduced to great acclaim since taking up the baton in Berlin.
The project has been hailed by German critics as an educational revolution, and Rattle as something of a hero for helping Germans realise the importance of increasing access to high-brow culture.
But in one of the film's most interesting insights, we realise that even in Berlin, one of the world's most vibrant arts and music capitals, our greatest cultural export is having to fight for funding as he did when in Britain. In a city that, as he says, is bankrupt to "an extraordinary level" - £39 billion - however much praise his project attracts, he is very aware that he will have to fight for its survival.
"All the next years the arts are going to have to struggle to an extraordinary degree," he says, "and we're going to have to remind people that they need the arts. It's a necessity - like the air they breathe and the water they drink." (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links) (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links) (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)
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