CRITIQUE – The Argentine conductor and harpsichordist celebrates the 300th anniversary of Bach’s “St John Passion” at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées.
La Plata. Just over thirty-five years ago. In his father’s garage, Leonardo, aged 11, is directing from his makeshift harpsichord – a piano he has transformed by pricking the hammers with thumbtacks – the Mass in B minor by Johann Sebastian Bach… At least, the recording of the Messe en ifwhich he plays on the family turntable, and over which he improvises his own continuo while giving the starts to his sister.
Read also
Marina Viotti: “Every minute on stage is a victory over life”.
The future Wiesbaden Opera star also rehearses her dance moves in her father’s garage. Paris. This evening. The same Leonardo is about to conduct the St John Passion by Johann Sebastian Bach, in a version choreographed by Sasha Waltz.
You can see the same glint in his eyes. That of a passionate fan of the Leipzig Cantor’s music, who doesn’t hesitate to describe the vast oratorios that are his Passions like “ works of total art, whose universal discourse is intended to address to the greatest number “