Yo-Yo Ma: On the Silk Road
Cellist and classical music icon Yo-Yo Ma discusses his world-music project
Yo-Yo Ma is one of those rare people who can make even a hardened cynic believe that artistic and personal integrity go together. He is not only one of the greatest, most versatile cellists of his or any other time, but is endowed with an extraordinarily inquiring, adventurous mind that leads him into far-flung intellectual, cultural, and historical explorations. Lesser men and musicians might be suspected of engaging in these enterprises to generate publicity, but the sincerity of Ma’s involvement with his projects is never in doubt: he throws himself into them whole-heartedly and absorbs them into his musical and personal life. Completely open to people and ideas, he radiates a genuine, embracing warmth; totally natural and unassuming, he is always eager to learn. In a notoriously competitive, slippery profession, not a disparaging word is ever heard either from him or about him.
I have been his ardent fan and admirer for a long time and have had several opportunities to talk with him. When I first met him at the 1991 Tanglewood Music Festival (see "Yo-Yo Ma: Music from the Soul," May/June 1992), he was experimenting with a piece by MIT composer Tod Machover for electronic and acoustic cello and four computers. By the time he telephoned me for our latest conversation in February, he had, in addition to his regular performing and recording activities, undertaken numerous fascinating journeys through time and space, from the world of Bach and the Baroque to Appalachian folk fiddling and the Argentinean tango. As he talked about these projects, a connecting thread between them emerged despite their diversity, which he described as "a linear continuum in the pursuit of learning something." Indeed, the word "learn" runs through his conversation like a Leitmotif.
Further Resources
Read about Yo-Yo Ma's 2011 Goat Rodeo CD project.
Ma’s recent collaboration with Chinese composer Tan Dun, whose music calls for Chinese and European instruments on the soundtrack for the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (which has just won several Oscar nominations), is clearly linked to his current adventure: the Silk Road Project. Described as "a new initiative aimed at exploring cross-cultural influences among and between the lands comprising the legendary Silk Road and the West," its activities include concerts, festivals, and educational outreach in North America, Europe, and Asia. Shortly before our interview, I heard Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble, an international group of young musicians who play both Western and Eastern instruments, present a sampling of their programs at Columbia University’s Miller Theater. The event featured musical excerpts and commentary by Ma and several scholars, including the Silk Road Project’s executive director, ethnomusicologist Theodore Levin, professor of music at Dartmouth College. Naturally, the Project became the interview’s first subject.
What sparked the idea for the Silk Road Project?
YO-YO MA I’ve been traveling all over the world for 25 years, performing, talking to people, studying their cultures and musical instruments, and I always come away with more questions in my head than can be answered. One of these is the idea of culture as a transnational influence, and the Silk Road, though basically a trade route, also connected the cultures of the peoples who used it. The Project started with several symposia of scholars, and it was eventually decided to form a nonprofit, knowledge-based organization that would combine new and traditional information about places where people have been making exciting, wonderful music. When you learn something from people, or from a culture, you accept it as a gift, and it is your lifelong commitment to preserve it and build on it. But an innovation, to grow organically from within, has to be based on an intact tradition, so our idea is to bring together musicians who represent all these traditions, in workshops, festivals, and concerts, to see how we can connect with each other in music.
How do you find them?
YO-YO MA We did a lot of field work; Ted Levin and others went to Central Asia, China, and Mongolia, located composers, and listened to their works, and just yesterday we heard more compositions from Armenia, Turkey, India, Pakistan, Japan, and Korea. Then about two years ago, we asked 16 people to write pieces, and last summer, we invited about 60 musicians to Tanglewood for a 12-day workshop to play them so we could make some sensible programs. They came from Iran, Uzbekestan, Tajikistan, China, and Mongolia, but many master performers can also be found in Toronto, Chicago, and San Francisco, and there is a large contingent in Queens, New York. However, they keep up a strong tradition of their native music, even though, like many emigrants, they often have to do other things to make a living.
Did your 60 musicians speak English?
YO-YO MA Some did; language is a problem we have to address. Many of the Central Asians know Russian, and Ted Levin speaks it fluently. I speak Chinese, but Mongolian is completely different, so we had to have translators.
