Elena KATS-CHERNIN, Composer (Wild Swans documentary)

Stella Motion Pictures

Documentary glimpses on music composer Elena Kats-Chernin's creative journey whilst composing the original score for the #ballet 'The Wild Swans', based on Hans Christian Andersen’s 1838 fairy-tale. #HansChristianAndersen #ElenaKatsChernin #australiadance #musicdocumentary

Transcript

00:00Really, this is the project of my year, and I've been looking for this, you know, for my whole life.

00:04I've never written a ballet. I've always dreamed of that.

00:09Ballet, you know, that's my love. I love movement, I love, ah, it's magic.

00:14No, I don't mind anything, just have me whatever I like.

00:16Okay, that's great.

00:17You just get inspired.

00:19The workshop is great because it's the first time in many, many, many years

00:23that I actually get to play the piano and watch dance to it.

00:30I find that dance is like another instrument.

00:46If I do too much, it takes away from the movement.

00:49Sometimes, staying with just one chord is much more effective.

00:53It's very important for me to hold back and say, I'm not accompanying.

00:58I try to counteract what they're doing.

01:00It's quite hard because I actually am an intuitive person.

01:03When they do a jump, I make a jump in my music, and it's not always good.

01:07Sometimes, it's really nice to see a big jump, and I'm playing something really hypnotic and slow.

01:13It's much harder for dancers.

01:14They've got to also go on the other level and get it from within.

01:17It's almost like every move has got much further to go.

01:26I go a completely different direction, right?

01:28I won't do dramatic.

01:29I need to write 90 minutes of music for a sixth instrument.

01:33No, that's not little.

01:35That's quite a lot.

01:36You know, you write a piece for orchestra of 12 minutes.

01:38It takes at least two to three months, and here we have 90 minutes.

01:43So, of course, we repeat some things, but there will never be repeats really.

01:47There will always be something different, and there will be different instrumentation.

01:50So, the task is big.

01:52No question about it.

01:54Oh, my God.

01:55I'm sorry that I have a little trust you were issued.

01:58It's a paper war.

01:59It was the first thing I played on that tape.

02:01No, I don't have it here.

02:02Here we are.

02:03Brother's contract.

02:04It's always on the bottom of the pile.

02:05What's this?

02:06Now, leave that because...

02:07Yeah, leave that.

02:08Overture.

02:09Great.

02:10Great.

02:11I have overture.

02:12I have overture.

02:13And what's first after overture?

02:14It's this.

02:15It's like cleaning up a mess, you know, in the room.

02:19You suddenly have messes of paper of score, then you have messes of paper of piano score.

02:24And then you say, oh, if we correct it here in the piano score, we cut a couple of bars.

02:29They have to be cut in the score as well.

02:31They have to be also cut in the parts.

02:33So, there's this incredible chain of events that you have to constantly think ahead about.

02:38Otherwise, you end up in a big mess.

02:41Stop.

02:42Sorry.

02:43Okay.

02:44Then two chords.

02:45Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.

02:48Just one group.

02:49And then...

02:50Yeah.

02:51We never have really amazing conflict because we're actually all going on the same journey

02:58in the same direction.

02:59Because, yeah, because sometimes there are, of course, collaborations where a composer brings

03:03a work at the kind of end of process and says, there it is, you take it or leave it,

03:08that sort of thing.

03:09And that's not the best way.

03:10Three.

03:11Four.

03:12Five.

03:13Six.

03:14Seven.

03:15Eight.

03:16Ten.

03:17Four.

03:18Five.

03:19Six.

03:20Seven.

03:21Eight.

03:22Ten.

03:23Nine.

03:24Seven.

03:25Eight.

03:26Ten.

03:28You know, we have a good fairy in this ballet.

03:44We've got a good fairy, so we kind of believe that it's just all going to fall in.

03:48I mean, with hard work, of course, from everybody,

03:51that good fairy is going to give us the, you know, the fairy dust

03:54and just throw it all over the ballet and the music.

03:57And it's going to be all gone hard. It sounds so silly.

04:00It's after, by my score, is that correct, Ilana?

04:04Yeah.

04:04Round 55, there's a wrong note somewhere there.

04:07We just need to check the parts, OK?

04:09There's something wrong there.

04:12There's that one.

04:15That's fine.

04:16There's one wrong note in The Witch.

04:31I always hear a C natural.

04:33Somebody's playing a C natural with one bar.

04:35I'm always mixed with me, this is my favourite chord.

04:37And if there is a wrong note, it just drives me nuts.

04:39I'm sorry, this is the only one.

04:46I'm sorry, this is my favourite chord.

05:16I'm sorry.

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