Chapter Four

Of all the piano professors I studied with in Paris, I preferred Professor Pierre Sancan. His pedagogy left a lasting and indelible impression on me. Although I went on to study under other emminent piano professors at the Paris Conservatoire, I continued to see him for private lessons. Once you went on to study with another teacher, you were discouraged from taking lessons from anyone else, even from your former teacher. But with Professor Sancan, I was glad that I could still go to have lessons with him when I needed his opinion or advice about my playing. I was grateful that he allowed me to consult him. After all, he had auditioned me when I first arrived in Paris, and had reshaped my poor piano technique à l’anglaise, as he called it, to the French school of piano technique. With him I had assimilated the all-important Art of Fingering and how to read the details of a piano score, often missed or misread, hence the reason for buying correct music editions, and then how to project one’s emotion in one’s playing which defines interpretation. 

I finally understood the meaning of musical phrasing, which is akin to how a person breathes, the expressiveness in the rise and fall of crescendos and diminuendos and the finer nuances of using the piano pedal. It was Sancan who opened my eyes to the beauty of Impressionism mirrored particularly in Debussy’s piano music. 

Professor Sancan had an engaging personality, and an infectious sense of humour. I remember his fondness for chocolates which, as he put it, inspired him when he composed. Occasionally when I went for my lesson at his Studio at Salle Gaveau, I used to see a large box of chocolates on one side of the music rack on the grand piano while on the other side there was a large bottle of Alka-Seltzer tablets needed to ward off any indigestion caused by the chocolates! He always spoiled me with a generous handful of delectable chocolates although I declined the Alka Seltzer tablets! 

He was a wonderful storyteller, punctuating his many tales with his talent for acting and mimicry. Lessons with him were always interesting and the time went by much too quickly. He had the gift of drawing the best from a student which was why he was much sought after as a teacher. 

As a pianist he had a remarkable piano technique and a very keen sensitivity which emmanated in the lyrical quality of the tone his fingers could draw from the piano. Unfortunately there are only a few recordings of Professor Sancan’s own playing, many could not be salvaged to be re-recorded digitally. His most memorable performance is of the Piano Concerto in G by Maurice Ravel. I attended his concert of the Ravel concerto in Paris and its audio recording can be found on Youtube. I also saw a performance of his ballet entitled Les Fourmis, or ‘The Ants’ but unfortunately there is no available recording of this modern ballet. 

Professor Sancan introduced me to the competitive world of international piano competitions. In 1969 when he was one of the judges at the Marguerite Long Piano Competition, or Concours Marguerite Long as it’s called in French, he gave me tickets for the whole event and told me to take a break from piano practice. He felt that this was a good learning experience for me and insisted that I attend all the performances of the competition, from the early preliminaries to the finals, so he expected to see me in the hall!

The Marguerite Long international piano competition was held every two years in Paris, in conjunction with the Jacques Thibaud international violin competition. The preliminaries of the piano competiton were held in public at another concert hall similar to the Salle Gaveau, and all the performances started at 9am until the evening with a lunch break, and another shorter one in the afternoon. Only the Finals were staged at the prestigious concert hall, the Théatre des Champs Elysées.

It was my first experience to attend an international piano competition and I’m glad I did as I was told! I attended every single day and from where I sat in the hall, I could see the panel of judges at their tables on one of the lower balconies directly opposite the stage. By attending every single day of the piano competition I understood why Sancan insisted that I heard all the performances because by listening to every candidate, you discern differences, who played better, whose tone was more appealing and which candidates were obvious favourites. No one in the audience was allowed to applaud between each candidate’s solo performance during the preliminaries. 

During the lunch and interval breaks I met with some of Sancan’s students who were there, and we started comparing notes. One of them got me a list of those candidates and even some paper and a pen to jot my own comments down. I became really interested and looked forward to each day! As the competition progressed towards the semi-finals and then the finals the excitement was quite palpable especially when the results were announced after each stage of the competition. More people attended and the hall was quite full for the much anticipated finals of the competition which comprised a solo recital as well as a piano concerto with orchestra. The concertos were held after dinner and the audience was allowed to applaud. That year, one of Professor Sancan’s students, Jean Philippe Collard, won the First Prize! Naturally we were all thrilled and I found mself cheering although I didn’t know Collard at all!

For about a week after the piano competition there was a lot of buzz and excitement at Professor Sancan’s class at the Conservatoire. Obviously he was jubilant that one of his students had won! 

Two years later, although Professor Sancan was not one of the judges, I attended the same piano competition. The first prize winner was Vladimir Feltzmann, a young Russian, and the fourth prize winner was another young Russian, Youry Egorov, whose Finals’ recital was unforgettable! He played the famous Carnival by Schumann and it was the most remarkable interpretation I have loved ever since! Feltzmann played Rachmaninov’s 3rd piano concerto at the Finals and brought the house down with his performance, the audience went wild with their vociferous accolades and thunderous applause! It was obvious that the audience wanted him to win and he did although he tied with a French contestant, Pascal Rogé, who was booed and pelted with rotten tomatoes on stage when the results were announced! Unfortunately Rogé’s interpretation of the same Rachmaninov piano concerto was quite insipid compared to the electrifying performance by Feltzmann. 

Professor Sancan was pleased that I had attended every single performance of the Concours Marguerite Long and his reason was to instill in me the desire to compete. It wasn’t enough to practise diligently and be an obedient student as he pointed out. He wanted me to have the desire to perform, to be fired up to play on stage! He found me to be too reticent and reserved compared to his other students, even the supposedly shy Japanese students. He told me that I was a very good student, that I had great determination coupled with a dogged perseverance, but now he wanted me to cultivate a desire to perform. He discerned a passion that lay hidden within me of which I was shy. 

He told me that my greatest asset was my musicalité. He said that I could make the piano sing - coming from Sancan, that was indeed a priceless compliment! Ma petite Flavia, technique can be acquired through hard work and practice but musicalité is given to very few, this cannot be taught. 

As I remember my lessons under Professor Sancan’s tutelage, I’m paying homage to the best piano professor I had in Paris. I felt sad when I went to see him for the last time before I left Paris. He met me at his Studio at Salle Gaveau. 

He recalled how he had first met me and how he found it amusing that I always asked for a repeat whenever I couldn’t understand what had been said even when a person was angry! And now, look at you, ma petite Flavia, you can speak French like a native! 

My early attempts at speaking French and understanding the colloquial way of speech had caused a few unusual gaffes. As he put it, I had a disarming way of interpretating the French language, his favourite was when there was a new student from Turkey who spoke a little French and hardly any English. She had come to meet Professor Sancan at his classroom, Salle Pierné, at the Conservatoire. Since I knew what it was like to feel a bit lost in a new place, we sat together and tried to get acquainted. When Sancan arrived he came over to greet her. Realising that she couldn’t speak much French, he asked me to ask her in English, her nationality. In French, a Turk is called ‘un Turque’ for a man, and ‘une Turque’ for a woman. I didn’t realise my error when I happily replied in French, “elle est Turquoise!..” (She is a Turquoise), not realising that I had used the gemstone instead! Sancan thought it was a charming mistake and told me that he would always remember my version of the feminine gender for Turque was Turquoise..!   

I told him that I would try my best to stay in touch with him, that I wasn’t sure when I could return to Paris again and his reply was very poignant. He patted my head as he’d always liked to do and then placing his hand over his heart he told me that I was always there and I would know how to find him.

Professor Pierre Sancan died on October 20th 2008. His biography can be found on the internet. I have included the audio links below this Chapter for your reference. These include rare performances by Professor Pierre Sancan himself and of his compositions which were recorded by other performing artists. 

To be continued

🎼 PIERRE SANCAN - Sonatine for FLUTE and PIANO [Sheet Music]

Ravel - Pierre Sancan & Pierre Dervaux (1965) Piano Concerto in G major

Pierre Sancan (1916-2008): Piano Concerto (1957) 1/3

Pierre Sancan - Toccata (audio + sheet music)

Pierre Sancan - Mouvement (audio + sheet music)

To view pictures of the concert hall please type “Theatre des Champs Elysees pictures” to see a whole range of photographs and information.

Similarly for more information about the Marguerite Long Piano Competition, if you type this on Google, it appears as Long-Thibaud-Crespin Competition, or Concours.