Richard Šeda: From Autodidact to Cornetto Master
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| (c) Jan Klimeš
The cornetto player Richard Šeda lives in South Bohemia, far away from the major musical centres. Only once, so as to study at a conservatory, has he strayed from his native town of Dačice. Afterwards, he began teaching at the local music school. The still waters, however, were markedly rippled by his steadfast interest in early music. A fascination with the cornetto drove him, initially a trumpeter, to relentless studies of this instrument and has ultimately turned him into an absolute master. At the present time, the name of Richard Šeda appears in numerous concert programmes across Europe, yet concurrently remains connected with “his” Dačice.
This is an excerpt of an interview which is published here with a kind permission of Czech Music Quaterly magazine 1/2016.
What was your journey from the trumpet to the cornetto, and to early music in general, like?
The journey started back during the time of my studies at the České Budějovice Conservatory, where Baroque music was frequently played, albeit on modern instruments. I cannot remember when the very first impulse emerged, yet it probably began with searching for recordings of Baroque music performed on copies of early instruments. At first listen, I was intrigued by the sound of the natural trumpet, its typical, slightly husky sound. Then I felt a strong desire to acquire one, but I did not have the contacts that would have made it possible to procure the instrument. After graduating from the conservatory, I began taking private recorder lessons, which at least to a certain degree satisfied my desire to play early music. Yet the fateful turning point occurred in 1998 or so, when I came across a recording of The Czech Lute, a cycle of 13 songs by the Czech Baroque composer Adam Michna of Otradovice, performed by the Ritornello ensemble. That is when I first heard the sound of the cornetto, and I was eager to try it out. So I got in contact with Ritornello’s artistic director, Michael Pospíšil, through a printed music directory – at the time, precious few were connected to the internet –who gladly invited me to his home. I set out to see him in Prague, convinced that I would immediately be able to play the crooked rod and find how simple it was. Yet the very opposite was the case. The problem rested in the unnatural spacing between the cornetto’s holes. I returned home bewildered and disappointed that not even this wind instrument, although with a mouthpiece, was the right one for me. Then it dawned on me that unless I got to possess my own cornetto I would never make out how to play it. Following about two years of my playing a relatively poor instrument, with an even worse mouthpiece, my feeling hadn’t improved much, yet, nevertheless, I was at least capable of playing a few simple songs.
What was the most difficult thing about playing the cornetto at the beginning?
Two things in particular. A very uncomfortable span of the fingers, which for a year or so caused me pain in the hands; and the correct breathing into the instrument. In a way, the cornetto is similar to the human voice and requires an approach diff erent from that to the trumpet, to which I had been used for years. I also had to resolve the problem with the relatively small mouthpiece. For years, I played a model that was designed for former trumpeters, which was not ideal. Over the course of time, I gradually began to
use smaller and smaller mouthpieces, as it was not possible to play a small one from the outset.
Mouthpieces are a topic in itself. Could you specify what exactly it entailed to move from the trumpet to the cornetto and what types of mouthpiece are used for the cornetto?
Compared to that for the trumpet, the cornetto mouthpiece is much smaller, with its inner diameter ranging between approximately 12.5 and 14.5 mm, and the area against which the lips lean is sharp, similar to an acorn cap. They are made of hard wood or horn, the material in the case of my mouthpiece. Individual cornetto players use mouthpieces of various sizes, depending on the structure of their lips. I personally am of the opinion that a suitable mouthpiece is more important than the instrument itself.
You actually began as an autodidact, yet judging by your accomplishments I assume that you ultimately found an excellent teacher.
I obtained my initial training from Michael Pospíšil, and before long I started to perform with his ensemble. A great benefit for me was his summer workshops, at which we played for a whole week from a facsimile of the 17th-century Capella Regia Musicalis hymn book by the Czech Baroque composer and organist Václav Karel Holan Rovenský. Michael also taught us how, by means of toothpicks and ink, to create a stave and transcribe songs in our own hand, as we were not allowed to make copies. I will never forget this experience! Perhaps this is precisely why I still have a deep affinity to Baroque hymn-book songs. Furthermore, I was inspired by the Brno-based cornetto player Radovan Vašina and Štefan Sukup from Prague, whom I envied for their ability to play the cornetto and aspired to catch up with them. And, of course, I procured recordings made by globally renowned players and sought to imitate them, which was actually the only way for me to study the cornetto in my country. To this day, unlike in Western Europe, it is not possible to study the cornetto within an institution in the Czech Republic. In 2004, I first encountered a professional cornetto player, at the Summer School of Early Music in Rajnochovice. It was a really big deal for me, yet the true watershed of my musical life was a workshop in Prague led by the French cornetto player Judith Pacquier, who shortly after the course invited me to participate in her projects, so as to, as she said, improve my musical expression. I even joined her ensemble, Les Traversees Baroques, with whom I have recorded several CDs. A strange period began, one during which I performed more frequently abroad than at home. This opened for me the world of the finest musicians, whose names I had previously only known from recordings.
What is it that makes the cornetto so attractive for you?
The cornetto is wonderful owing to its being an instrument of plenty of colours, possessing a great expressive potential. Now and then, following a concert, the audience surprise me by saying which colour from among the contemporary instruments the sound of the cornetto evoked in them. I above all like the cornetto because I can play the music that was written for it centuries ago and pass it on to other people. I also really enjoy overcoming the difficulties pertaining to playing the cornetto and the opportunity to hone my technique unceasingly.
In addition to participating in numerous projects, you have founded your own ensemble…
Yes, I longed to have my own ensemble, which would systematically perform music for the cornetto in combination with other instruments. Therefore, in 2007, I formed Capella Ornamentata, whose repertoire is predominantly made up of Renaissance and early-Baroque pieces. At the present time, we mainly play in the wind confi guration of cornettos, trombones and a dulcian. Of late, we have also frequently collaborated with the Renaissance polyphony Cappella Mariana vocal ensemble, headed by Vojtěch Semerád. We have recorded together the album Praga Magna, featuring late 16th-century Rudolfi ne Prague music, with its core being the Missa Confi tebor tibi Domine for eight voices, by the Kapellmeister Philippe de Monte, the last of the great masters of Franco-Flemish polyphony. This spring [2016], my ensemble will be releasing our debut CD, Da pacem Domine, bearing the secondary title “Music in Pre-White Mountain Bohemia Across the Denominations”. The bulk of the pieces on the disc, almost exclusively hailing from Bohemian sources, are performed on wind instruments, yet, in line with the period practice, the cantus firmus is provided by the vocals. I would like to add that we made the recording with a reconstructed historical organ in the original 465 Hz tuning, which was typical of the cornettos in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Since 2000, your native town of Dačice has hosted the Dačice Baroque Days. You were one of the festival’s initiators, and you have also prepared its programmes. What is the main purpose of the project?
Our festival came into being with the aim to present Baroque music and literature in a manner that would engage the local culture institutions: the museum, library, chateau – Renaissance, by the way – and the Dačice music school. Later on, we added concerts given by professional Czech and – on two occasions – foreign ensembles. Last year, the Dačice Chateau castellan and I included in the programme a Baroque fair with music, dance and traditional handicrafts, which has met with a great response on the part of those visitors who do not usually attend the other events of the festival.
In 2013, Dačice was celebrating its 830th anniversary. On that occasion, you included in the programme music from the “Dačice Gradual”. Could you tell me more about this historical relic?
The Dačice Gradual is an illuminated hymn book of the Dačice literary brotherhood, dating from 1586–87 and comprising 500 sheets with Czech notated liturgical songs. In musical terms, the Gradual is nowise unique, as it contains the ordinary Renaissance repertoire, yet it possesses an immense historical value for our town, since it documents its ample 16th-century artistic production. The tradition of literary brotherhoods was widely spread in the 15th and 16th centuries in particular. It is estimated that at the time about 100 brotherhoods operated in Bohemia and 55 in Moravia. They were essentially religious societies, associating the inhabitants (men and women alike) of individual towns and forming a certain social network – for instance, the members were obliged to attend funerals and commendations, and even were bound by the commitment to financial support. At the same time, educated citizens formed a sort of elite within the brotherhood, which they also named. These men of letters, who constituted a smaller
part of the membership, undertook to sing together at divine services. The Dačice literary brotherhood was founded in the 1580s at the latest.
What other musical monuments can be found in Dačice?
I would like to mention another two, which I am very keen on. The first of them is a hand-written psaltery, which, according to the latest findings of our leading musicologist, Martin Horyna, served for training school children. It is a collection of psalms, versified by the 16th-century Czech Brethren priest Jiří Strejc and arranged for four voices by the French composer Claude Goudimel. Most likely, the model for the Dačice manuscript was the 1618 Prague print The Psalms, or Songs of Saint David.
The other monument is a huge unique collection of liturgical autographs, which came into existence in the 18th century at the Dačice Franciscan Monastery. Three of them contain sacred motets, while the majority of the others are anonymous masses in chant and mensural notation (chant was the foundation of the Franciscan church music). The monastic statutes forbade figural music, that is, music involving song and instruments, yet besides chant the Franciscans performed at least monophony and two-part music in the contemporary style, accompanied by the organ. The most typical example of manuscripts containing masses was a series of three volumes, titled Chorus I, Chorus II and Organo. One of the masses is titled Missa Michniana and has been ascribed to Adam Michna of Otradovice, from the nearby town of Jindřichův Hradec.
You seem to be rightly proud of the musical history of your town, especially given that so many intriguing sources have been preserved there…
Yes, I am very proud indeed. And I would like to continue to make Dačice citizens and others alike familiar with our oldest musical monuments through concerts and recordings.
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© Dina Snejdarova
Czech Music Quaterly
Capella Ornamentata (only in Czech)
