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Pipe smoking is music to the
world famous classical music conductor’s ears…
JL:
Where did you first start smoking?
CD: My father smoked a pipe and I think it was
probably during the time when I did National Service. I took up
smoking a pipe on the journeys from London and Windsor, en route to
my barracks. I held the lowest rank in the army as a musician in
the Household Cavalry; no wonder I started smoking.
JL: Do you still
enjoy pipe-smoking?
CD: I’ve just smoked one pipe today.
JL: What tobacco do you enjoy most?
CD: Now, I’ve been introduced to black
mixtures by my son, but I still enjoy what is called an English
Mixture, that is a mixture of Virginia and Latakia. Anyway, the
best version of that comes from George Hoober, in
Munich. He has a package called ‘English No.1’,
that I’m very fond of.
JL: Which musician, living or dead, would you
like most to share an ashtray with?
CD: The two men who I admire probably most were
pipe-smokers. One was Bach, who actually wrote a poem in praise of
pipe-smoking, and Mozart, who we know was a pipe-smoker. And I
suspect Beethoven was probably a pipe-smoker too. So, if one of
these three men would care to smoke a pipe with me – how wonderful!
JL: If you were forced to smoke in the doorway of one of the
world’s musical venues, which I hope has never happened, which one
would you prefer to smoke in?
CD: What an extraordinary idea. Probably in
the gent’s (toilet) at the Barbican. There’s no picture of me
puffing my pipe at the Vienna Opera
House or in La Scala in Milan. I have smoked in all kinds of holy
places, so I can’t say I would prefer one or the other.
JL: Have you ever conducted with your pipe?
CD: Never. But then I’m not old enough,
because it was Klemperer who smoked a pipe and the leader of the
orchestra used to remove his pipe before they started the
rehearsal. I don’t know whether it’s apocryphal or not, but there
we are.
JL: Do you smoke your pipe before a performance,
or light up afterwards?
CD: On the way, usually. I find it has a very
benign influence on the journey to the concert hall.
JL: Do you think that pipe-smoking has helped
the creativity of composers or musicians?
CD: I think it gives them time to
contemplate. It’s seriously difficult to talk much when you’re
smoking a pipe because the damned thing goes out all the time.
Women leave one alone because they suffocate, so a chap’s got time
to himself, and nothing’s more important, if you’re a creative
person.
JL: Has there ever been a special moment in your
life when everything came together – enhanced by the smoking?
CD: Well, that’s very hard to answer. My life is
like a hairbrush – it’s full of high points – and to choose one or
another would be to belittle the rest. But probably the most
satisfactory pipe is after one has got married.
JL: What music to you
enjoy best sitting back and smoking to?
CD: I would
almost certainly choose Sibelius, not that he smoked a pipe, but he
was a shocking consumer of cigars. And there is a leisure about
Sibelius’s music which entices one to light up before the aural
enjoyment. |
