Cellists play rock. Perttu Kivilaakso - cellist of the rock band Apocalyptica

You can work up a sweat, rehearse for hours, become real virtuosos of playing a musical instrument and even collect a harvest of awards at prestigious national and international competitions - and still remain, as they say, widely known in narrow circles. Especially if you play the classics on the cello. However, practice shows that nothing is impossible for cellists. Especially if you team up in a duet with another such virtuoso, choose a Michael Jackson song with a creative arrangement to perform, shoot a spectacular video and - attention! - post it online. This is exactly what two cellists from Southern Europe, Luka Šulić and Stepan Hauser, did: they organized a group with the unpretentious name 2Cellos (2 cellos), changed concert coats for leather jackets, played one of the hits of the king of pop music Smooth Criminal, filmed a video and sent it to the World Web. And within the first two weeks received more than three million views.

It was in January 2011. And now it's July 2014. Luka and Stepan, accompanied by an orchestra, pluck the strings of black-and-white high-tech cellos (the mere sight of which would have given Mikhail Rostropovich a heart attack), performing AC/DC's Back in Black (Rostropovich would definitely go deaf) at the venue of the Exit festival in Serbia. A crowd of thousands of people rages around with delight - in real life, and not on the Internet.

However, they are still very good on the Internet. The enchanting clip with their version of the AC / DC song Thunderstruck has already gained almost 28 million views. The latest, presented at the end of October, a video for a composition combining a melody from The Trooper by Iron Maiden and William Tell Overture from the opera William Tell by Gioacchino Rossini was also received favorably by the public - several hundred thousand views in a few days. But, it would seem, nothing foreshadowed: at the beginning of their career, the guys were one hundred percent nerds - about the same as they showed themselves in the new video.

Slovene Shulich and Croatian Hauser are musicians of the classical school. Luka was born into a musical family and, of course, there are no options here - he went along the musical path: first he graduated from the Academy of Music in Zagreb, then in Vienna and London. Stepan also studied in England, then in the USA - by the way, with maestro Rostroprovich himself. Repeatedly participated in various competitions. For example, in 2004 Shulich won the first prize at the 5th International Competition for Young Musicians named after. Tchaikovsky in Moscow. Both gave many concerts with the best orchestras around the world. It would seem that success, but ... something was missing. Known for a long time from joint performances at competitions, where they often became rivals, the young people united in a duet and threw off the masks of nerds.

And under the masks, very beautiful faces were revealed. But of course it was their talent and energy, not their good looks, that got them the attention of superstar Elton John. The 2Cellos trademark has gradually become a popular brand. The guys signed a contract with the record company Sony Masterworks and recorded two albums. The first... guess what it's called? That's right, 2Cellos. The second one is a little trickier - In2ition. But it is important for them not only to show their virtuosity, but also to throw out powerful energy into the hall. This is probably why concerts have become a feature, and only live. On tour with Elton John, they traveled all over the world (including visiting Russia), opening his show at the largest stadiums and performing in such prestigious places as Madison Square Garden, the Olympia Concert Hall in Paris, at the presentation Emmy awards in Los Angeles, as well as at the celebration of the "diamond" jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II. Following Elton John, other stars shared the stage with young cellists: Red Hot Chili Peppers, Queens of the Stone Age, Steve Vai, George Michael.

The feature of 2Cellos is also that, in addition to virtuoso fingers and an energetic body, their head works successfully. They do not just make cover versions of pop and rock hits by U2, Guns N "Roses, Nine Inch Nails, Sting, Coldplay, Nirvana, Muse Kings of Leon and many others, they rethink music, using one hundred percent the magnificent possibilities of the unique cello timbre and harmoniously linking modernity with the classics (for example, Rossini reconciles with AC / DC, as in The Trooper Overture). However, the guys do not forget the classics in their pure form, however, they also rethink them. Sometimes they will come out with a chamber ensemble, in strict black suits , with classic wooden cellos, and how the Vivaldi will play! You listen, but not immediately and notice that they are wearing sneakers... In an interview, Shulich said that they love AC / DC as much as Bach. Well, we believe.

Lately, I've become more and more convinced that the debut album of a beginning group may turn out to be more interesting than another replicated disc of a well-known band. I learned about the cello musical group Vespercellos quite by accident when I was writing a review of the album of the folk group “Living Water”. Since it is sometimes more difficult to find information about Russian folk groups than about the secret development of a defense plant, when preparing material, one has to search the entire Internet up and down. And in the process of such a search, I came across a “live journal” of the cellist of “Living Water” Irina Lvova. As it turned out, she plays in a considerable number of bands, one of which - Vespercellos - just the other day gave birth to her debut album "Cellorock", on which she performed nine rock compositions on four cellos. Mostly, these are well-known hits of foreign rock/metal bands. took place on February 25 in the club "Curts" on Mendeleevskaya.
In addition to Irina, the current Melnitsa cellist Alexei Orlov, the previous Melnitsa cellist Natalya Kotlova and a certain Elena Kopteva, who seems to have never been “lit up” anywhere, but ... as I said, the domestic folk scene is covered with a veil of darkness, which the site does not has long made it his goal to dispel.
That's why I attended the press conference dedicated to the release of the album and met with the musicians in a cozy club "ArteFAQ" before their performance dedicated to Valentine's Day. Oleg Bobrik from the ShadeLynx.ru folk portal and Aleksey Antsiferov from Nash Neformat also took part in the press conference.

To be honest, I was sure that you were a quartet, but judging by your composition, you are a trio. Tell us how the group came into being, and where did the fourth member disappear to?
Alexei: (after a small showdown with Irina for the right to answer first) In general, the quartet began with the fact that after a concert by the Melnitsa group, in which I play, two young people approached me and offered me to play rock music on cellos.
Irina: Lyosha, you do not tell first! At first there was a music school - me, Lena and another girl... The three of us played music like Apocalyptica. And then they thought: “what a cool cellist in the Mill!”, and invited him to play. And he took it and agreed.
BUT: I will even say more, at first these strange people offered me their arrangements of mill songs (laughs). Moreover, they had a strange relationship with our flutist Sergei Zaslavsky.
AND: We met Zaslavsky quite by accident, in the subway…
BUT: This is what they say. I know the truth (laughs). There were no games at all, I immediately put them aside ... (at this point, the group was almost left without a single male member)

What year was that?
BUT: In 2006. In general, they invited me to play with them. I was then open to cooperation, as, indeed, now, and came to them for a rehearsal. Then it was a trio. Everything was crooked, askew, terrible... I listened, and I liked everything so much, the timbre caught me so much, and how everything sounded together... By that time I knew perfectly well what Apocalyptica was, I saw what they were doing, I understood perfectly well what exactly I don’t like about them, and how you can make something interesting out of them ...
As a result, we started working, rehearsing. Then, for certain reasons, one of the members of the group left and in her place we invited Natalia Kotlova, who played the cello in the previous composition of the Mill. For two years the four of us rehearsed, recorded an album. It was hard, and here we are.

Yes, but Natalia is missing.
BUT: We stopped interacting with her on the rehearsal schedule. She works in two theaters, at least. And in those days when the three of us could rehearse, she had a job that she, of course, could not "score", because Vespercellos is not a project that brings a lot of money - work is more important. We didn't argue, we didn't argue, everything was fine. We just drifted apart in time.

Why did you decide to call yourself Vespercellos?
AND: We thought about the name for a long time, and at night Lesha discussed it with one of his friends who knows Latin...
BUT: Everything was a little different there. Vespercellos is a two-syllable word. Like two roots - "vesper" and "cellos". What is "cellos", I think, everyone understands - cello in the plural. And "vesper"... At one time I worked as an actor in the Moscow Academic Art Theater named after Chekhov. I played there for two years and at that time we talked with the director of the play "A Midsummer Night's Dream", in which I participated. He instilled in me a love for a certain geographical place called Venice, as well as for some authors for whom the word “vesper” was just a red thread through all their work - William Shakespeare, Alexander Pushkin, Mikhail Kuzmin. And this feeling of evening, Venus, autumn is the word "vesper".

Does it translate somehow?
BUT: Yes! Venus, love... "Vesper" in our understanding is a void surrounded by beauty, in which music is born.

Sometimes you perform at apartments. Do you like this kind of material break-in?
AND: Apartments are a completely different story. At a concert there is a hall and a stage, but at an apartment building it is just a room in which people play. And a completely different perception - you do not play for the audience, but just sit and play. Everything is at home there, there is no feeling of a concert.
BUT: Like in your kitchen. It's like playing in the kitchen, just 20 more friends came.

On the topic of playing in the kitchen. I understand that you are rehearsing at Irina's house, but how do the neighbors feel about this?
BUT: We always rehearse at home because we don't have drums, which is the only problem that bands have to rehearse at bases.
AND: Neighbors are normal - we only make noise until ten in the evening. But they got used to it: I have been playing since childhood. They don't steam anymore.
BUT: They don't like it anymore when we stomp (laughs and stomps).

So I look, Alexei and Irina play the electric cello, and Lena - the classical instrument. Moreover, electric cellos differ markedly from each other in design. Do they just look different, or do they sound the same? And how different is the sound of an electric cello from a classical one?
BUT: So, what is the difference between an electric guitar and an acoustic guitar? First of all, these are fundamentally two different instruments with different approaches, goals and objectives.

But what about electroacoustics?
BUT: Well, that doesn't count. As it were, electroacoustics is Lena's option, when the pickup is placed on a classical instrument and nothing else changes. The fundamental difference is that power tools have an internal active sound processing system, i.e. they don't sound like acoustic instruments. And if Irina's cello sounds even closer to an acoustic instrument, this is a Yamaha cello, then Ned Steinberger, which I play, is an absolutely innovative instrument. This is not even a cello, but its distant relative.

Do you also play it in the Mill?
BUT: Yes, I play it in the Mill. It's comfortable.

That is, the electric cello has more possibilities?
Chorus: Looking for what!
AND: It’s just that it’s impossible to play the classics on the electric cello, but the rock player is the very thing.
BUT: In fact, perhaps, but it will sound flat and shabby. Instruments have completely different timbre characteristics.
AND: The main plus of the electruha is that it will not “start up” at any sites. It can be used with any gadgets and effects and the body will not "wind up". Like an electric guitar.

When people talk about a cello rock quartet, Apocalyptica immediately comes to mind. Maybe it is advisable to remain a trio?
AND: And we are not afraid of comparisons with Apocalyptica. And the number of people in the group has nothing to do with these comparisons.
BUT: If you write in an interview that we are Russian Apocalyptica, it will be cool, because all the lovers of Apocalyptica and rock will come, and we will be in chocolate (laughs).
AND: In fact, we are different in general, we play different music, we play differently, we have a different style. They play with effects, and we play with pure sound. This is partly our goal, to play such music on classical academic cellos. Nobody does that. You can take a lot of lotions, a drummer and make a rock sound like everyone else does, but it's very simple. The introduction of such a sound as in Apocalyptica will immediately attract the involvement of the rhythm section - a drummer, a bass player, and we don't want that.

And yet, I heard that you call Apocalyptica your teachers.
BUT: Well, one of them. This list also includes Bach, Mozart, Muse, Rammstein, Kansas. They are just great composers, they have good ideas. If we tour with Rammstein, we will be happy.

An interesting feature, you came to rock with a classical education, but do you often face a choice: to play rock or play classical?
BUT: Well, there is no choice, since I actually have no classical education.
AND: We just went from rock music to academism. We have only Lena, an academician who plays rock music.
BUT: But Lena also played Apocalyptica before all her classical formations and played rock music without any ideas about classical music.

Then a few words about your musical education.
BUT: My mother is a musician with a higher education, a theorist. Behind him was a children's music school, then classes at a jazz college, classes with jazz cellist Viktor Agranovich. Now I am a student of the Schnittke College, cello class. And, of course, the stage is our university. The Ruadan group where I started. I played with them for four years - it was a great base for stage life, for the feeling of being on stage and in a rock line-up. It was a complete rock line-up with bass, drums and sometimes even electric guitar.
BUT: And Lena went to a music school and almost graduated from the Gnessin College.
Lena: Yes, I am currently studying at the Gnessin State Musical College. I can't say that I really like it, but education is education. Bark, diploma.
AND: Music school, and now I, like Lesha, study at the Schnittke school only in the double bass class.

Double bass? Are there any plans to add double bass to the music of Vespercellos?
AND: We are thinking about it, but... Literally in a few weeks, an electric double bass will come to me, and it will be possible to develop further.

They say that in modern music educational institutions, rock music is not in favor ...
BUT: (gloatingly) Now Ira will show everyone!
AND: In general, professors “break” academicians very much in terms of their mind and the way they think. Children come to school and they are slowly hammered into their heads that classical music is the best music in the world, and there is no other music. By the end of the school, they only think so and can do nothing more than academicism. If people with only academic education try to play rock, it sounds very pathetic. They are very bad at it, it looks very funny and, therefore, I do not recognize academics who want to play rock music.

But then you came to your higher educational institution, and there the teachers started telling you the same thing?
AND: Yes, they are trying to “break” me, I constantly deny them with all my might and say: “No, I am not an academician!”. You have to maneuver.
BUT: The main problem, in fact, is in the system of music education, because it is, in fact, the same as it was in Mozart's time. Nothing has really changed since then. And, most importantly, this is a system that does not accept anything new and treats the music of the 20th century - jazz, rock and roll, rock, as something simple, generally accessible and, most importantly, not serious. I am more than sure that many serious academic musicians have dreamed and still dream of playing the music of weak beats, music built on some other laws, but they cannot do this because they have not been taught this. Any music, jazz, rock, classical is a muscle. A banal organ that needs to be trained. And if this muscle is not trained, it will atrophy and fall off.

Do you conduct partisan activities among classmates?
BUT: Yes, I regularly tell classmates that there is music other than classical music, that not everything is limited to academic music. In fact, I have been boiling for a long time and now I will say. Children come to the music school at the age of 14 - 15 years - 9th - 10th grade. And they are offered a set of passions that great composers put into music. How can a person at the age of 15 play about love and death on his musical instrument only due to technology!? This is silly! It’s just that we regularly have reporting concerts, cathedral concerts and such pathos in music, and a girl with a violin stands on the stage and plays great music with a squeaky sound, as if she doesn’t understand anything about it.

But she's learning!
BUT: Yes, studying! But what will she learn? She will learn to imitate these emotions. I don't think a person at 15 can understand what Beethoven meant in his later cello sonatas. Why not start simple? In general, I have ideas, it probably sounds pathetic, to devote my life to fundamentally change this education system.
AND: We have Lesha a little bit of a star, just (laughs).

So, today you released your debut album Cellorock. It came out, as I understand it, samizdat. Have you tried releasing the CD on a label?
BUT: Well, the label immediately replied that we do not have the rights to some songs, and we cannot officially release this disc. Therefore, we printed a small edition on our own in a small printing house.

But there are also your songs on the disc!
BUT: No, there are three tracks authored by our friend Alexei Molchanov - "To each his own", "There is no death" and "Darkness", and the rest - from the world one by one.

Couldn't you take on the disc the things of your authorship or your friends?
BUT: We are such masochists (laughs). The next disc (there is already a studio where we will write, there is a sound engineer, money for recording has almost been paid) will be completely our own. Cycle of nine dreams of Cincinnatus. There will already be a completely different story, trip-hop a little bit ...

Are you going to introduce drums, vocals, expand the line-up?
BUT: No, no, everything will be the same, trio. There will be, perhaps, some small orchestra, which we ourselves will play.
I also want to add that this CD is Cellorock, like CD number 0. This is a band that doesn't exist, music that doesn't exist.

Like demo or promo?
BUT: No, this is not a demo, and not a promo, it's like a cut of the first period of creativity, like a thick dot that says: "That's where we started." A disk that was about us a year ago. Because now we are moving in a completely different direction. There is practically no smell of rock there anymore. It's like electronics played by live instruments. We are already playing some of the material from the upcoming record. I have very warm feelings for Cellorock, but if the next disc is followed by a commercial and musical failure, then I will be much more hurt and hurt than with this disc. This disc is a bird in the sky.

Tell us about your parallel projects.
BUT: There is nothing besides the Mill - everything has been pushed in. Enough learning.
AND: Four groups along with Vespercellos. It's like here, Anarrima, Falsehood Wrong, Vespercellos... Actually, there are three other bands that I play with, but I don't rehearse with. They just invite me to concerts and I play with them.

You participated in the Salt project. And with vocals. What are the results?
AND: (laughs) We were taken to youtube on the page of "Our Radio". That's all.
BUT: The project is absolute nonsense, and we do not expect anything from it. Ira just loves to sing.
AND: It was my crazy idea. The Living Water group developed my interest in folk music. I sang a little there, and liked it even more, and now I'm still doing folk vocals, and it's very interesting to me.
BUT: And I played double bass. Reef played.
AND: Yes, I was engaged in folk vocals, and Lesha just came in and played the double bass (laughs).

But in Vespercellos, I hope, there will be no folk vocals?
AND: Not yet
BUT: Everything is possible.

Irina, as far as I understand, in “Living Water” you almost supervised the recording process, but in Vespercellos?
AND: I was mixing Cellorock. In the process of working, I consulted with some cool sound engineers. With a teacher from the school Meshcherkin, Gnessin professor Kondrashin. But they just said "it's good here, but it's bad here." I sat down at the computer again and redid everything. Our closest friend in this area is Alexei "Doctor" Arzhanov, but he only criticized. So I had to learn everything myself.
BUT: "Doctor" helped us a lot - he gave money for recording. They were recorded at the Quarta Music studio, wrote Ilya Lukashev, an excellent sound engineer and person. Another very important point is that the album was recorded live. It was recorded over several sessions. We sat down and played everything together. The feeling of a concert.
AND: The most difficult thing about mixing was that it was impossible to divide the audio tracks into parts in order to cut out some badly played pieces.
BUT: There are, of course, some controversial moments in it, both in terms of recording, mixing, editing, and mastering, but this is our first disc.

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Apocalyptica cellist Perttu Kivilaakso, whose biography is the topic of this article, has gained great popularity among fans of such an original genre of music as symphonic metal. He is loved and appreciated by many among fans of the classical style in music.

Musician's childhood

In 1978, on May 11, the future famous cellist Perttu Kivilaakso was born. In the city of Helsinki, which is located in Finland, he spent his first years of life. The boy became interested in music from childhood. Perttu's father, Juhani, was an excellent cello player. He taught his son. Already at the age of five, Kivilaakso picked up a tool that changed his future. As a small child, the musician fell in love with opera with all his heart. Moreover, from an early age, he began to attend various concerts, where symphony orchestras performed classical music. Since the boy's father played in an opera ensemble, Perttu had no shortage of access to music and performances. Since childhood, Kivilaakso Perttu began to collect records with various classical works. To date, the musician's collection includes a huge number of opera recordings, among which there are quite rare and hard-to-find compositions. Already at the age of twelve, Perttu, together with the Finnish Symphony Orchestra, played for radio recordings.

Academic years

After Perttu Kivilaakso visited the opera festival, which took place in the Savonlinna fortress, he finally decided that he would devote his life to music. Therefore, he left for Helsinki, where he entered the Sibelius Academy of Music. In 2000 he graduated and received a diploma with honors. Since 1998, Perttu began to play in the Helsinki orchestra. He worked there until 2005. The young man decided to learn how to play a few more instruments. In addition to the cello, he mastered the art of performing works on the piano and guitar. Moreover, Perttu has one very important achievement. At the International Cello Competition, he was able to take third place. No Finn has ever been able to achieve such a result.

Before rock career

After completing his studies, Perttu Kivilaakso went on tour in his native country. His virtuoso playing of the cello could not fail to penetrate into the hearts of the admirers of the classics. Therefore, soon the musician began to perform not only in Finland, but also in many countries around the world. Together with various pianists he has given concerts in countries such as Germany, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Israel, Russia, USA, Japan and Estonia. Perttu was the soloist of the orchestra, which consisted of ninety people. Several large European classical music festivals have not been without the participation of Kivilaakso as the main cellist in the performances.

Member of the band Apocalyptica

With the leader of which is Eikka Toppinen, Perttu Kivilaakso has been cooperating since 1995. But he became an official member of the team only in 1999. Perttu was able to join a rock band when he was seventeen. But the members of Apocalyptica thought that this could negatively affect Perttu's career in the classical direction. After all, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra has signed a life contract with Kivilaakso, and this can be considered an exceptional case. For his rock band, Kivilaakso Perttu composed several compositions, which acquired the following names: Conclusion, Forgiveness and Farewell. Today, the Apocalyptica group, whose members play, is very popular in many countries. Connoisseurs of quality music speak highly of the band and its members. Perttu is also not deprived of attention. After all, he continues to show himself not only as a virtuoso musician, but also as a talented composer.

Personal life

Perttu Kivilaakso and his wife Anne-Marie Berg separated in 2014. They were together for six years. Anne-Marie worked as a model. She lived with Perttu in Finland, in the city of Turku. As Berg herself said, she could not be a simple addition to the life of a musician. Anne-Marie also announced that this relationship took too much strength from her. Now she wants to restore peace of mind. In those years when the couple was together, she wanted to take first place in her husband's heart. But for Kivilaakso, the main thing in life was music.