Over the course of seventy years, thanks to its outstanding dissemination work, numerous world-renowned orchestras, singers, choirs, dance companies, jazz groups and directors have performed in museums, concert halls and theaters.
Their subscription concerts have long been held in the splendid Teatro Colón, and the traditional Midday Concerts, created in 1958, are now held at the CCK, with free admission.
If we add to these presentations the subsidiaries that remain in some provinces, and the Mozarteum Joven subscription for those under 25, the figure reaches the impressive number of more than 4,500 performances and a total of 5 million viewers added throughout Argentina.
A tireless work that is not limited to the presentation of foreign artists. True to the spirit of supporting young virtuosos, the Mozarteum awarded 580 scholarships to performers, composers and musical directors, and allowed 370 Argentine artists to use the facilities of its atelier at the Cité des Arts in Paris.
BEGINNINGS
It is impossible to dissociate the emblematic history of the Mozarteum from the outstanding figure of Jeannette Arata de Erize (1922-2013), an essential factotum from the beginning. It was March 1952 when one of the most notable events in Argentine cultural life took place, in a land where the success linked to this type of organization is usually ephemeral and infrequent. A group led by the teachers Mariano Drago and Erwin Leuchter, the musicologist and critic Jorge D’Urbano, the composer and musicologist Juan Pedro Franze, the violinist Carlos Pessina and the composer Carlos Suffern, presented their project to open a local affiliate.
The laudable purpose was to spread the work of the great Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, especially little-known creations of the Austrian genius, the study of his work, its dissemination through conferences and radio programs, as well as publishing scores and related research works.
The first four seasons found refuge in private homes, such as those of the Swedish dancer and sculptor Carina Ari de Molzer, and the house of Jeannette Arata.
The Uruguayan Cirilo Grassi Díaz, promoter of local musical life, who was General Director of the Colón (at his request the stable bodies of the theater were created) was the one who warned that the energy of the young Jeannette could be useful, and proposed that she became the president of that small association. Thus, what began as the activity of a girl with cultural concerns, would become over time an unprecedented organization.
“I never waste time with mirages. I only dream of what I can do”, declared Jeannette and promptly got to work.
He came from a family where music, literature and art were common topics of conversation. His father was a surgeon and his mother descended from a family linked to the French nobility. From a very young age, she attended Gallic theater companies, whose visits were common in those times.
She was later dazzled when she discovered Italian opera. “The first time I went to listen to opera at the Colón they presented Tosca, by Puccini. I was fascinated by the music and the drama that unfolded in the scene,” she would recall.
Married very young, at 19, to the lawyer and polo player Francisco Erize, she would spend much of her time organizing evenings at her house where renowned musicians and critics would attend. With all this background, when he took the reins of the Mozarteum, he distinguished himself from the rest of the musical societies that existed by having a brilliant idea: concerts should be held in museums that had been residences of traditional families, such as the National Museum of Decorative Art ( Palacio Errázuriz) and the Museum of Hispanic-American Art (Palacio Noel).
As most of the solo musicians came from Europe to these places for several weeks, the splendid and educated Jeannette, along with her husband, received them at their home. And she was generating with many of them, a relationship of friendship that would be vindicated.
The 1960 season would be decisive in demonstrating his great management skills. Igor Stravinsky, the outstanding Russian composer, was to come to offer two concerts. But since the necessary sum for the cachet was not collected, Jeannette managed to raise the money in just 48 hours and the Russian composer came to perform in Argentina. His kindness, capacity for work, and imagination to overcome the economic ups and downs that always plague these latitudes, would be his hallmark.
PRESENT
When Jeannette Arata died, her son Luis Alberto Erize (Francisco, her other offspring, is a renowned environmentalist) was elected president. And Gisela Timmermann took over the artistic and executive direction from 1987. Born in Hamburg, a passionate music lover, with gallantry, she carried on her shoulders the enormous responsibility of maintaining the quality of excellence to which this musical society had used to. “You don’t learn to face a task like mine overnight, it takes time,” she said, who joined as a collaborator in 1973.
“My first star singer was Kiri Te Kanawa. With that visit she was really nervous. She had received a very long list of wishes and demands, and she thought, if I fulfill them, nothing can go wrong. Everything went perfectly, as she was easy to get along with, funny and charming, and we had a good connection. On her second visit, she battled the flu and the news of her impending divorce the same night as her performance. I can’t stress enough
the dedication of artists who, at times, must face difficult situations with a smile and total professionalism”, he explained.
The frequent changes experienced, especially in difficult times such as during the last civic-military dictatorship, the Malvinas War, hyperinflation and the economic default of 2001, raised fears for the continuity of programming. “Personal contact with artists and organizers is crucial. For example, we had traveled to Chicago eight times, without success. His orchestra management was not interested. Only when Daniel Barenboim became his boss did we get a tour”, he recalled about the efforts to bring the outstanding American symphony orchestra.
There was a list of the best memories of exceptional artists, which the demanding native music lover was able to enjoy thanks to the good offices of this entity. Among others, the pianist Claudio Arrau; sopranos Birgit Nilsson, Victoria de los Angeles and Jessye Norman; cellist Pau Casals; violinist Isaac Stern; guitarist Narciso Yepes; and the composer Pierre Boulez and his Ensemble InterContemporain. In addition, famous ensembles such as the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, the Berlin Staatskapelle, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchester Nationale de France, and many more. But also a memorable concert in 1987 by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Zubin Mehta, on Avenida 9 de Julio, which is estimated to have been attended by around 120,000 people. The gems in a golden history for the Mozarteum.
