Miro Tóth: Havířov
Miro Tóth: Hi, we are in the Horná Mariková area, in the village of Hašov. It's 2020, and a few people have decided not to stop, but to continue playing contemporary music, and I greet these few people very much, because they are people very close to me. They make a great festival and thanks to them, such music can still be heard in Horná Mariková, as well as in the village of Hašov and through Andrej Gál. Andrej Gál is a very close person, a friend who has been playing my compositions for more than ten years. We met at a school in Bratislava and he has been playing my music ever since, or we have been playing various music together. I must also say that he is the person who inspires me to make music at all. He is not only a cellist, he is something more for me, because thanks to him I learned not only to know the instrument, but to discover new possibilities of playing and making music, which is a big difference and is very valuable for me. This composition, a solo for Havířov, which was created in 2014 if I'm not mistaken, was also written for Andrej and was also created for a special space. Don't worry, I'll let Andrej speak in a moment. I've been locked up in one place for nine weeks, so now I'm talking a lot more than usual. As you can see, I'm still trying to delay the moment when I start talking about the song itself. First of all, I think that the song should speak a bit for itself, you should always stay in your own world and in your own perception of the song. But I can help you a little, because the song was created on the occasion of a civic activity in Havířov, which decided to save a beautiful train station. The station is exceptional in that it is very specifically architecturally, and either there are no or only partial imitations in the Czech Republic. But a development company and the city came together and wanted to demolish it and build a new multifunctional space instead. Because of that, Ela and Marek Chmiel called me to write a song in which I would record the very environment of the station. So, I got to the station at the residence, where I began to perceive the environment of the station space a little more sensitively, and at the same time I decided to write this five-part composition for them. The best part is that Andrej still thinks it's fifteen minutes, but no. The piece is about twenty minutes long. I don't know what it says about the piece, whether it's bad or good, if it amplifies the feeling that it's supposed to be fifteen minutes, but it's twenty minutes. I can only comment on those twenty minutes –that when you are in the space itself, in that station, and you walk through it, whether you are discovering small nooks or you find yourself in that big entrance hall, the passage of time and the overall mood, supported by the fact that it may be demolished, creates some memory, some history, and that's why some people want to preserve it, they don't want to demolish it. So, maybe that's what the time is, that the song doesn't have two seconds or five seconds, which it could have had, but it has those twenty minutes.
Andrej Gál: That's probably why I perceive it to be shorter than it really is. How many solo pieces have you written for me? I think this is the fourth or the fifth?
Miro Tóth: At the fourth or fifth, I stopped counting.
Andrej Gál: I remember that when we first met, he came to see me at the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava, when I had already been working on the stage for a long time, and asked me if I could play some of his things. I was very happy, because when a composer addresses you and says that he wants to write something for you, it's always fantastic. Well, we've been working together ever since. But this version of Havířov is a bit different, not only because we are in nature, but also because over time, we have improved and changed the composition (because over time, of course, people change their minds), so this is a version without electronics. The composition was actually heard a year ago in Ostrava in a version with interactive electronics, operated by Miro. So just as the coronavirus returns to nature, so have we returned to nature to give this natural version of Havířov.
Miro Tóth: That's true, but we're not alone here. There is a stream, there is wind, there are trees, there is a daughter Natalia, and most of all I would like to introduce you to two dogs who participated in our recording, I must not forget them. One dog is a wolfhound Rita, and the other is an unidentifiable mut, Duncho.
Andrej Gál: I think that's enough for the beginning, let's play the song itself now.
Miro Tóth: Pleasant listening and we send greetings.
This is a translation of comments made in this video which was released as a part of the series The World: Ostravská banda Solos.
