Daniel Lozakovich, Gautier Capucon, Helene Mercier perform Beethoven's Triple Concerto together for first time at Classical Bridge
In January 2023, violinist Daniel Lozakovich and cellist Gautier Capucon shared a Paris stage with Blackpink, performing alongside the K-pop group at a televised charity gala hosted by French first lady Brigitte Macron. This month, the two meet again — in Seoul, and for Beethoven. They join pianist Helene Mercier, conductor Mikhail Pletnev and the Rachmaninoff International Orchestra for the Triple Concerto at the Classical Bridge International Music Festival, marking the orchestra’s Korean debut.
The two orchestral concerts cap the sixth edition of Classical Bridge, which began Thursday and runs nine days through Friday across Seoul Arts Center, Lotte Concert Hall and Goyang Aram Nuri under artistic director and pianist Klara Min. This year's edition gathers 21 artists over seven performances, and marks the 140th anniversary of Korea-France relations.
Lozakovich performs Schumann's Violin Concerto on June 11, and the three soloists join forces for the Triple Concerto the following evening. Both programs feature Rachmaninoff's tone poem "The Rock" and the Korean premiere of "Rachmaniniana," Pletnev's own orchestral suite.
All three arrive with an established affection for the country. Lozakovich, who says he has "many dear friends in Korea," counts Park Chan-wook's "The Handmaiden" among his favorite films and points to bibimbap "after a night of intense celebrations" as his favorite food. "I like it so much there that probably soon I will start learning Korean," he said.
Capucon is similarly effusive.
"I think the Korean audience is passionate, enthusiastic, knowledgeable and respectful," he said. "I love the Korean audience, so I’m really, really happy to come back to this country." The cellist, who calls Mercier and Lozakovich "my dear friends," added that the food, too, is "extraordinary."
Mercier was not on that Paris stage, but K-pop is on her radar. "I am interested in jazz, improvisation, rap and K-pop," the pianist said. Different genres, she added, "strike her with the sense of freedom — the feeling that everything is possible." Returning after her 2024 appearance at the festival, she remembered above all "the outstanding young audience, who were both attentive and enthusiastic."
Mercier also brings a long history with the Triple Concerto — and, at 66, the widest view of the trio's 41-year age span. She performs alongside Capucon, 44, and Lozakovich, 25. "I have a special love for Beethoven's Triple Concerto. I have performed it with many different musicians, but this will be our first time performing it together," she said of her partners, adding that she has "great admiration" for both. Asked how such different backgrounds shape the ensemble, she said: "In the end, we are all part of one universal family."
Mercier began her musical training in Montreal before furthering her studies in Vienna, New York and Paris, where she is now based. Over the course of her career, she has performed alongside renowned musicians including Mstislav Rostropovich and Ivry Gitlis. She is married to Bernard Arnault, the chairman and chief executive of LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton who is also the wealthiest man in Europe, a connection that adds another dimension to her partnership with the cellist Gautier Capucon. Born in Chambery, France, Capucon mentors emerging talent through his Cello Excellence Class, a program hosted by the Louis Vuitton Foundation, the Paris arts institution established by the luxury group.
Lozakovich, born in Stockholm, signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon at 15 and made his name in the Tchaikovsky and Beethoven concertos before moving to Warner Classics.
The night before the Triple Concerto, Lozakovich takes up a personal cause: Schumann’s Violin Concerto, a late work that went unperformed for more than eight decades after it was written and still sits at the edge of the standard repertoire. "It is one of my missions to make this concerto a core part of the repertoire, as I believe it possesses the deepest spiritual world among concertos," he said. The performance will use Pletnev’s own reorchestration of the score — the product, Lozakovich said, of "many long conversations" between the two about the work.
Pletnev looms large for Lozakovich and Capucon alike.
Lozakovich, who recorded his Warner Classics debut album with the conductor, does not hold back: "Mikhail Pletnev is magic. A mystic artist who has an other-dimensional vibration of understanding harmony and very sharp senses of time and color," he said. "I dream in real life each time I am on stage with Pletnev."
Capucon, who has worked with Pletnev as both pianist and conductor, said he is looking forward to collaborating with him again.
The partnership extends beyond the orchestral stage. Lozakovich and Mercier recorded "Lost to the World," the violinist's album released in March, and will perform works from it alongside Franck's Violin Sonata at a duo recital on June 14 at Art Center Incheon, two days after the festival closes. The album takes its title from the Friedrich Ruckert poem behind Mahler's "Ich Bin Der Welt Abhanden Gekommen," ("I have become lost to the world"), which closes the record in Lozakovich's own transcription. "There is such a heartbreaking sense of solitude, but at the same time a very strong sense of hope," he said. "It truly saved me in difficult times."
For Lozakovich, the goal in Seoul is the same as anywhere. "My main goal, especially for today, is for people not to be distracted by all the superficiality around them," he said, "but to look more toward the stars and feel their memories."
gypark@heraldcorp.com
