Rune Minne
I think music’s most important role is one of connection

Violinist Rune Minne graduated earlier this year from the music programme at KASK & Conservatorium, performing one of her favourite pieces: Ernest Chausson’s Concerto for Violin, Piano and String Quartet. She will soon be continuing her studies in Graz. She speaks enthusiastically about her time in Ghent and her love of music.

LINDE VERJANS 

How did you get started in music?

RUNE MINNE 
It’s actually quite a funny story: I was three years old when my parents first took me to the cinema. We went to see ‘Plop en het Vioolavontuur’. When I got home, I said I wanted to learn to play the violin too. My parents thought for a long time that it was just a phase I would grow out of, but I kept at it. A year later, I was able to start at a Suzuki school. There, I learnt everything by ear at first, and I think I’m still reaping the benefits of that today. Later, when I was in the third year of secondary school, I transfered to De Kunsthumaniora. When I continued my studies at eighteen, I took lots of trial lessons and that’s how I eventually ended up in Ghent, with Lisa Jacobs. I immediately felt that she was the right teacher for me.

KASK & Conservatorium was also a wonderful school in other respects. The freedom you’re given to put together your final exam programme is incredibly valuable. It allows you to truly discover and shape your own voice. I have a great love for the twentieth-century violin repertoire and built my programme around that. As well as Chausson’s Concerto for Violin, Piano and String Quartet, which I’d always wanted to play, I also performed Enescu’s Second Violin Sonata. I wasn’t familiar with that piece beforehand, but my teacher, Lisa Jacobs, recommended it to me. She has a real knack for knowing which piece suits which student, and she was right again this time (laughs).

LV
She sounds like a lovely teacher

RM
She certainly is – the best I’ve ever had! Not only does she tailor her choice of repertoire entirely to each individual student, she’s also just incredibly dedicated to all her students. Thanks to her, we get opportunities to perform outside the school, such as at her Festival Zeeland Klassiek earlier this summer. That’s obviously a wonderful chance to play alongside professional musicians and get to know new people. I think it’s really special that she gives us these opportunities. 

LV
Are there other people you look up to?

RM
Janine Jansen, of course! I could watch her forever, especially when she plays Chausson. Her recording of the Concerto was a huge source of inspiration while I was working on it. I also find Joshua Bell a very interesting violinist; I particularly love his performance of the Franck sonata.

I think it’s quite normal for a violinist to look up to those big names as role models, but I actually look up just as much to my chamber music teacher, Pieter Jansen. It’s wonderful to actually know someone who knows so much and plays the violin so well, and to be able to talk to him. He’s someone who always radiates calm and instils confidence.

LV
You’ll be heading to Graz soon to continue your studies with Sylvia-Elisabeth Viertel. What will that be like?

RM

I’m going there for a postgraduate course and will have violin lessons twice a week, a group technique class once a week, as well as chamber music. That’s exactly what I was looking for: a way to focus entirely on the violin for a while longer. I also think studying abroad will be an enriching experience. You get to meet new people and broaden your horizons. The conservatoire in Graz is large, which offers plenty of opportunities. I hope to find plenty of inspiration there and meet lovely people to play chamber music with.

LV

What is the role of music in society and how do you see that evolving in the future?

RM
I think music’s most important role is one of con­nection. It really brings people together. There are so many ugly things in the world, such as racism or homophobia. On stage, all that falls away. Music will always play that connecting role. Still, I’m a bit worried about the development of AI. At the moment, a robot playing the violin still sounds terrible, but who knows what might be possible in the future? I hope that people will still be able to tell the difference between human interpretation and a robot’s reproduction.

Perhaps the instrument itself will be adapted, as in an experiment Pieter Jansen told me about. During a collaboration with a Parisian quartet, he experimented with a loudspeaker inside the body of the violin, allowing a sound engineer to manipulate the sound. This would allow you to add acoustics in a ‘dry’ concert hall. Such hybrid instruments might well become part of the future of music, although this does take you further away from how a violin was originally intended. Is it still an acoustic instrument then?

LV
One final question: which of your achievements are you most proud of?

RM

My final exam, of course – it went exactly as I’d imagined, and I really enjoyed myself. At the start of the school year, I had the opportunity to perform Barber’s Violin Concerto with the school orchestra, conducted by Michel Tilkin. And some time ago, when I was twelve, I raised money for a charity: Prinses Harte, which supports children with cancer. By playing at markets and selling my own CD, I was able to give €800 to Harte’s parents. Harte died of cancer when she was six. That might not seem like a huge amount now, but as a twelve-year-old I was proud that I’d managed to raise it.