LDV102

Xavier Phillips, a legacy of generosity It is his water and his air. There is not a day in the life of Xavier Phillips that is not filled with music. Not a minute goes by without his breathing, thinking, speaking of music. It has been flowing in his veins since childhood. His pianist parents, once they realised this undeniable fact, gave up their careers to devote themselves to the musical education of their son and his elder brother, the violinist Jean-Marc Phillips Varjabédian. From an early age, he was trained with rigour and benevolence by Jacqueline Heuclin, who was Maurice Gendron’s assistant, then by Philippe Muller at the Paris Conservatoire, and finally, after winning a number of prizes at international competitions, was schooled in generosity by his idol, Mstislav Rostropovich, who was to become his mentor for seventeen years. It is from Rostropovich that he takes his credo: ‘You give something as an artist through what you do, with humility, not by showing off your ego.’ Phillips knows the immense debt he owes the Russian cellist: his priceless teaching, concerts under his direction with the most prestigious American orchestras after his debut with the Orchestre de Paris, and that passion for transmission and its imperious necessity. For Xavier Phillips, who has received so much, teaching cannot be dissociated from his life as a concert performer. ‘You have to focus your attention on others, to look outside yourself, to give back’, he insists. At the Sion campus of the Haute École de Musique de Lausanne, his students learn that one does not cheat in music. It is a question of passion and truth. 38 FAURÉ ∙ THE MUSIC FOR CELLO AND PIANO