Interview with Tatyana Ryzhkova – by Giuseppe Chiaramonte first part

Giuseppe Chiaramonte: When did you start studying guitar? Why did you choose this instrument? Who was your first guitar teacher?

Tatyana Ryzhkova: I started to play guitar as a child, when I was 10 years old. As a normal child, I didn’t want to play any instrument, I was happy enough without it. But, how it often happens, my mother brought me to a music school. When she was young, she wanted to play guitar but it wasn’t possible, so she had a dream that her daughter will one day play guitar.

Sometimes our parents have pretty good ideas and now I’m very happy that my mother had such a nice dream 17 years ago.

At that time, I was very lucky to take my first guitar lessons with a great teacher, who was one of the best guitar teachers in Belarus – V. Gromov. He was always kind, patient, and a little bit childish. He was a real friend, a great friend.

Giuseppe Chiaramonte: How much important is the first teacher for a musician? How much important was your first teacher for your career?

Tatyana Ryzhkova: I think that the first teacher is extremely important for every musician, especially when this musician is still a child. Your first teacher is always like a lighthouse for you, he gives you a technical basis, understanding of music and he enriches your emotional world. He can pick you up to the stars, but he can also put you down.

Giuseppe Chiaramonte: You performed hundreds of recitals with classical guitar. What do you usually do before an important concert? How do you prepare yourself the day before? I mean, are you used to play a lot until few minutes before the concert or do you prefer to take a rest in order to relax?

Tatyana Ryzhkova: I don’t practice at the day of the concert. It’s too late. I mean, if you cannot play this one or that one difficult passage two days before, it doesn’t help you if you’ll play it the whole day until your entrance on the stage. The only thing that could help you at this moment is to relax and pray. Frankly, I’m always rather nervous at the day of the concert and the only motivation that keeps my optimism up is that some hours from now everything will be over, and after the concert I’ll feel myself like the happiest woman in the world.

Giuseppe Chiaramonte: Where did you perform your best concert(s)?

Tatyana Ryzhkova: It’s a very difficult question. I played really a lot of concerts, but each concert is something special for me. All of them are very different, because the most important thing for me in a concert is my audience. And never, never you’ll have the same audience twice. Applause, reaction to the music and to some of my jokes, the eyes and smiles of the people in the audience, all this is always different. And I think it’s fantastic, because it makes every concert an unforgettable and unique event.