Music as my first love never falls apart

I have the pleasure to introduce a brilliant pianist, who considers the world a wonder. Alejandro Vela does not let himself be driven by coincidence. His persistence lies in simplicity: believe strongly and then you shall make it happen. And he does. One hand always knows what the other one is doing – especially when he plays the piano for international concert halls. He is an off-stage cook (not even a kitchen rookie) and he cannot stop telling about his numerous plans while we have a virtual coffee.

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Alejandro Vela pianist

How did you come across music and learning the piano?

My mother and my grandmother started to teach me when I was seven years old. Three years later a friend of theirs, composer Robert Avalon found me eligible for his attention and gave me piano lessons and an introduction to classical music. He was based in San Antonio, Texas, so we travelled several hundreds of kilometers from Mexico every week. I grew up in a supportive and encouraging milieu where everyone took my side. On top of that I also wanted to play nothing but the piano, even from my early childhood. Besides the several hours of practicing, I played soccer, baseball, tennis and skateboard like any other child at that time. When I was fourteen, I started a vocational high school of arts in Houston, High School for the Performing and Visual Arts also known as HSPVA. My stepfather, who was a Hungarian Jewish holocaust-survivor, has done everything for me to access teachers and institutions of high standing, including numerous summer festivals in the United States, Israel, Switzerland and The Netherlands. This is how it happened that at the age of seventeen I became a student of Yoheved Kaplinsky at the Juilliard School in New York. I felt as though I was gaining admittance to Valhalla.

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Alejandro Vela pianist

Why the piano?

It surely comes from my blood and the ancestors. I spent a period of my childhood with my grandmother at the age of two. She loved to play Agustin Lara and other popular melodies of her era and I constantly live with this picture. I still own my grandmother’s vintage piano, more than a hundred years old. A grand piano as well, which was guiding me as a mate or my companion to become a classical performer. Piano music is my life.
I know by experience but our readers might have an interest in it: how does it feel being taught by parents?
It is the best indeed. I feel I had a charmed life to be surrounded by so much discipline and the ideal teacher, my mother, as I saw her as a kid. Through her, I discovered the nature of ambition.

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Alejandro Vela pianist

Tell us about your time in the Juilliard School? Did you find it as special as told in the legends?

That was the best time of my life. Those were the years when I explored and built up myself, both inside as an individual and outside technically on the instrument. There was not a minute when I stopped working or believing in my dreams so I did more and more and more training. You have only six years to achieve your studies (Bachelor and Master of Music degrees) then you have to go and invade and win big stages for yourself so I took advantage of the moment and the right place. However, it has become much easier now to build an audience, in the world of social media, than twenty years ago when I finished my studies.

Do you have a pianist idol?

I have many idols. Emil Gilels, his playing goes without saying; just clearly there. I heard András Schiff live in New York City playing Schumann and Bach. What I caught about him his touch. The sound that comes out of that piano, pure and refined. He draws you in until you get the sense that you are dealing with a magician. Lars Vogt rules the pieces with so much energy, any recording sounds alive. Nikolai Lugansky came to Amsterdam about 20 years ago, even before he was considered a top pianist and someone highly recommended me to listen to his recital. His performance of works by Rachmaninoff has opened a new perspective and pointed me in the right direction. I got further inspiration to develop those skills of being expressive and intimate with the audience at the same time. Also, I greatly thank Christoph Eschenbach, the iconic conductor with whom I had the privilege to work. I feel grateful for the sensitivity and sonority he led me to and for encountering a share in the exquisite musicality of a great master. I am willing to learn from anyone in whom I find some value and virtue, and I like to hear more music than good technique. What is the matter of fine details without the beauty, you know?

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Alejandro Vela pianist

You seem to be more focused on gratification and gladness than the chase after success. What challenges are you looking for to improve yourself?

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