I recently interviewed an incredibly talented and accomplished violinist named Monica Hugget. She will be playing for EMV’s (Early Music Vancouver) upcoming show: ‘Le Mozart Noir’ on February 4th at the Vancouver Playhouse, which is a classical show in celebration of Black History Month. The show includes pieces composed by Joseph Boulogne, Mozart and Haydn. However, the focus of this article is on Joseph Boulogne because the show is comprised mostly of his works, and also, he was a very powerful and influential figure who is often forgotten in the face of history. As a half-African living in France in the 18th century, a time of much prejudice and racial discrimination, he did a lot with his life. On top of being a renowned athlete, he was also a commander in the army, an abolitionist (anti-slavery activist) and most notably, a phenomenal violinist and composer. In this interview, you will learn more about both Monica’s life and his.
Interview with Monica Hugget
Me: How long have you been playing the violin and what got you interested in it?
Monica: I’ve been playing the violin for 57 years … I was the fifth child and all my older brothers and sisters played the piano, but our uncle gave us a violin and I decided I wanted to play it, I think partly just to differentiate myself from all the other children … and I felt sorry for the violin because nobody was playing it.
Me: Did you always know that’s what you wanted to do as a career?
Monica: Well … I love music, my whole family loves music … and I think when I was … about 7 or 8 … it had emerged that I was talented at music, and talented at the violin and so, by the time I was 12, the parents and the teachers had decided I would be a musician, and that was it. I didn’t ever have to make up my own mind because they decided for me.
Me: How did you come about this opportunity (to play for ‘Le Mozart Noir’)? What interested you about it/pulled you in?
Monica: Well … I’ve played music by [Joseph Boulogne, Chevalier St George] before and he’s completely fascinating, he’s like someone from a Hollywood film, in fact you could almost say it was far fetched. He was the child of a French land owner in Guadalupe and his slave… the father must have realized that this boy was exceptional [because] he took him to Paris when the boy was seven and he enrolled him into a very elite school for fencing and for horsemanship. The Chevalier St George was famous as a teenager as a fencer, and was the champion fencer in France. He must have been playing the violin and studying music at the same time because suddenly, the French were amazed to see this famous swordsman turn up playing in an orchestra in Paris when he was about 21. So he was phenomenally gifted, obviously very intelligent, beautiful to look at – women adored him – he knew Marie Antoinette, he worked for the noble – the aristocrats in France – but of course, being mulatto, he was very influenced by the ideas of the revolution. He merely lost his head… [he] was sent to a guillotine in the revolution but managed to survive.
As a soldier, he was the commander of the first black battalion in France, and in his battalion there was the father of Alexandre Dumas the novelist – and I think that some of those characters in the Alexandre Dumas novels like The Three Musketeers … are somewhat based off of his father and his father’s circle and the Chevalier St George. He had the most incredible, colorful life.
Me: What story do you think his music tells?
Monica: He lived at a time when music was in flux. Music since about 1600’s to the middle of the 18th century had been baroque music, which is a very longstanding style of composing and towards the end of it, it eventually got very complex. The music of Johann Sebastian Bach is baroque music. There was a reaction against it, and wanting to go back to something simpler, so Chevalier St George as a composer has composed what we call galant or early classical music. It’s relatively simple, and very elegant, but he was a real virtuoso, and so … some of the violin parts are extremely difficult. You’re … playing something very elegant and polite, and … you can imagine all the aristocrats enjoying it and then suddenly … you hear the fencer, you hear the swordsman, you hear the virtuoso coming out.
Me: Which aspect of him and his life do you find to be the most inspirational?
Monica: I think as … a career woman [who] has really committed her life to doing as good work as I can, and wanting to be a director and a soloist, and having to tolerate a certain amount of resistance – especially in the United Kingdom – to a woman being in charge, what I admire about Chevalier St George is that he must have had to confront prejudice constantly. Racism was perfectly acceptable in the 18th century and yet somehow he was able to not let that destroy his ideals and his visions, and it didn’t stop him being incredibly creative – he wrote concertos, and operas – and he was the most phenomenal athlete, and a leader of soldiers, and a thinker involved in the politics of the French revolution. He did [all of] this as someone who is half African, and at that time, his courage, his tolerance and his unremitting belief in himself – that’s what I admire.