Conversation with Zofia Neugebauer and Johannes Klumpp about Il Vento non Scritto

Zofia Neugebauer © 2028 by Sophia Hegewald

On her debut album, Il Vento non Scritto (label Berlin Classics), dedicated to Wolfgang Amadé Mozart’s two Flute Concertos, the soloist Zofia Neugebauer captivates the listener with her exceptional musicality. Accompanied by the renowned Folkwang Chamber Orchestra Essen, conducted by Johannes Klumpp, Neugebauer, a multidisciplinary artist, is constantly seeking new forms of expression, composing and developing new ideas that help her gain an even deeper understanding of the world of emotions and classical music.

The Folkwang Chamber Orchestra Essen will celebrate its 70th anniversary in 2028, and Johannes Klumpp has been its principal conductor since 2013. The orchestra, made up of young graduates from the Conservatory of Music at the Folkwang University of the Arts in the Ruhr city, enjoys experimenting with concert formats, genres and styles. Under Klumpp’s leadership, it has succeeded in building a particularly close rapport with its audience through concert-talks, artist interviews, and concerts for families and across generations. Musically, the focus is on the works of Mozart.

Zofia Neugebauer and Johannes Klumpp have been kind enough to agree to an interview (in writing via email) with Mundoclasico.com. Here are their exclusive comments:

Juan Carlos Tellechea: First of all, let’s talk about the bridge to electronic music, Ms Neugebauer. You describe the title piece as “electronically inspired”. How does one translate the aesthetic of synthesizers or loops to an entirely acoustic instrument like the flute, without it feeling forced?

 Zofia Neugebauer: I wanted to create some pieces that would inspire the listener to find that soft flow of inspiration, that Il Vento that comes and brings new creative ideas. For now in my music I want to be speaking to the audience through my very own personal sound, therefore the flute sound stayed unedited.

I consciously used the same sound stylistic for the miniatures and for the concertos - with lots of singing qualities and long phrases so the CD can stay coherent, as a one full experience to be lived through.

From the Score to Freedom, the album title Il Vento Non Scritto (“The Unwritten Wind”) suggests spontaneity. How much of what we hear on the CD was actually created in the studio in the moment and is not written in any manuscript?

ZN: Cadenza in the classical concerto is actually one big process of improvisation just like historically executed before and I love to let myself be taken by the music and harmonies. In the first piece Cadences Libres I took the motives of Mozart concertos and crafted them into each other carefully so they become like a hand-woven lace of sounds interconnected with my voice.

For the last piece from the Album - Il Vento non Scritto, I let myself dive into the Soave sia Il Vento from Mozart’s Così Fan Tutte. There were some weeks that I couldn’t stop listening to this Terzetto, and it became like a real imaginary space in my mind.

Just like I could lock myself up in this little beautiful room of sounds in my head. So - I took this sound space to the studio together with Mozart’s partiture of Così fan Tutte and directly recorded what I had in my mind.

The Cadenza as Self-Portrait, for the Mozart concertos, you wrote your own cadenzas. Does a cadenza, to you, reflect more the character of the composer, or is it a place where you weave in your own biography (Poland, Basel, Berlin...) musically?

ZN: For those concertos, I really wanted to stay in the classical stylistic yet with a little bit of my own singing sound quality. I am also a singer, and I think it always influenced a lot my phrasing choices, so maybe here you can find a little bit of my personal touch to the cadenzas. Basel and Berlin, those were also very important places for me to learn how to learn the Baroque sound language, so in a way indeed I’m sure you can hear a bit of that periodical instruments touch in our Mozart interpretation with Johannes Klumpp and the Folkwang Chamber Orchestra.

The Risk of the Debut, many soloists choose a very safe, purely classical repertoire for their debut album. Why was it important to you to take this risk and confront Mozart directly with a completely new musical language?

ZN: My motive to combine those worlds was to put a light on Mozart’s creative forces. Recording the concertos and writing dozens of cadenzas made me realise that the longer I spend time in Mozart’s atmosphere, the more creative spirit I gain, and so suddenly I had a big need to write something inspired by that feeling, with the hope that it could carry to the receiver of that music - this magic creative spell of Mozart’s music.

Also - I think that Mozart is still so modern, one can see it particularly in his operas- the emotions and human behaviours explored in his operas are so relevant to our times now, so I think that my compositions and the Mozart concertos are not that different worlds in the end - maybe not in the musical form and style, but when you tune into the emotional layer of the compositions included on the album, you can find those similarities easily.

Directing a Music Video, you were both involved in the video for the title track. How much does the visual aesthetic already influence how you phrase a piece in the recording studio nowadays?

ZN: Interpretation and recording of the music were definitely the first ones—a long time before I had the idea for the music video. I mentioned before already how recording and working with Mozart’s music made me feel even more in flow of creating more music and more art in other forms, for example I felt a strong need to paint for myself a big Mozart portrait, which you can find sometimes as an honorary guest of some of my social media videos.

On the music video, we capture two people dancing and painting in a very free form of expression— that’s where I wanted to put a light on the fact that everyone of us has a very different form of expression even if we are using the same tools. On the video, we start with a short synchronised choreography but then go into our own flow, and that creates some forms on the canvas which we can clearly see are different from each other even if we are both dancing to the same Mozart concerto— and so exactly that difference I wanted to capture on the video. The dancer in the video is Matt Fleuvart, an amazing young talent of Opéra de Paris.

And now, Mr Johannes Klumpp, let’s talk about the approach to orchestral sound and dialogue… You are an expert on Mozart, that brilliant yet ‘underrated’ composer… To what extent has Zofia Neugebauer’s modern, almost improvisational approach changed your view of the Folkwang Chamber Orchestra’s articulation in classical concerts?

Johannes Klumpp: To be honest, not at all. Through our phrasing and our lively, effervescent playing, we try to get as close as possible to Mozart. A few years ago, I had the pleasure of working with Sophia for the first time. She performed the Flute and Harp Concerto with us. I was impressed and delighted by her musicality, her vitality and her tone. That is why I suggested we record the flute concertos together. I had the feeling that this combination would be a perfect fit. And I am delighted that this view has been confirmed.

A symphony of sound, the album features miniatures that bring Mozart into the present day. How difficult was it for the orchestra to switch back and forth between the refined, historical Mozart sound and the atmospheric demands of the new pieces?

JK: The album encompasses two worlds: a Mozart world and one in which Mozart travels through time. The orchestra and I were only involved in the first world. Our challenge was to help produce the best recording in history.