‘It has to be connected to your soul’ - Nobuko Imai on Mozart Symphony no.40

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In 1966, in my first year studying at Juilliard, Felix Galimir invited me to Vermont to participate in the Marlboro Music Festival. I didn’t know what to expect, and the first thing I saw when I got there was a huge board with the schedule for the whole week written out. I discovered my first rehearsal was the very next day, with three people I didn’t know, to practise Smetana’s String Quartet no.1, which I also didn’t know. I quickly discovered that it starts with a viola solo, and the viola part is huge from beginning to end, so I stayed up until 3am that night practising it. That was my first introduction to Marlboro, but I loved being thrown in at the deep end and being expected to swim! That summer I had no time to think, and I loved playing chamber music so I just embraced it…