Heart of the keys: meeting Annique Göttler
I had been following Annique Göttler (27) for a few months on YouTube already – before meeting the pianist in Stuttgart, Germany, at the famous Liederhalle: A heritage-protected concert venue built in the 1950s, considered to be among the most important post-war cultural buildings in Germany. From there it’s a short walk through the city to the Steinway house, where we had a great talk about Annique’s career, on how she managed to build an impressive social media presence, and why when in doubt it’s usually best to just start …
Interview and Photos: Max Wittrock
The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Diatonic: Annique, can you remember what drew you to the piano initially?
Annique Göttler: My sister, she's two years older than me and she started playing piano. And back then, at five years old, I wanted to do everything my sister did. She was my big idol. She still is sometimes (smiles). I just wanted to play piano like her. And at some point, very early, I just figured out that this instrument is perfect for me and that I want to stay with this instrument forever.
Diatonic: Starting that young: Did you have an intrinsic motivation to practice?
Annique Göttler: In the beginning? Most of the time: yes. But of course I was a child and I also wanted to do things a child wants to do. I saw my sister, my siblings, playing with friends outside. But back then I already knew, at the age of eight, that I wanted to approach this in a more professional way. And my mom, she was very supportive, she basically reminded quite often that I should stay at the piano instead of going outside and playing with the others.
And at some point, I think at around ten or eleven years old when I also changed my teacher, it became very normal for me to just practice. I changed to the music school in Stuttgart. And there it was just normal for everyone to for example play things by heart and to practice a lot. So it became normal for me as well, and nobody had to tell me: "You have to practice."
Diatonic: At that point, still very young … did you consider that this could be a career? That there are actually people making a living playing the piano?
Annique Göttler: I think you don't really realize as a child what it means to make a career out of something or to do something professionally. I just knew that it's awesome to be on stage. I saw all these great pianists like Martha Argerich, Kissin and so on, and I thought: I want to be like them. That's it!
I didn't think about money, I just wanted to be a great pianist and to be on stage – that was the main motivation to get into this.
Diatonic: I vividly remember when I had to play the clarinet in front of my elementary school class. That was when I decided that musical stage performances are just not for me (both laugh). But for you it was the opposite experience?
Annique Göttler: Yes, I love to be on stage. I love to play the piano and play with the audience. That's something that’s really, really great. You can literally feel how the audience is breathing in that moment, how the attention is there or not. And you can play with them, just grab their attention. That's one of the things that I really love about being on stage. And then of course, I practice so much, I just want to show off a little bit (laughs).
Diatonic: I think a lot of people who read this interview have probably experienced things like recitals in music schools – but not a big concert atmosphere where more than 100 people are listening. Do you actually experience stage fright at that point – or is it just pure joy for you when you walk out on the stage?
Annique Göttler: When I was younger I never really had stage fright, the more people listening, the better. Now that I'm getting older and more famous it's a little bit different because you realize that there are people who … have expectations. I'm still not really having stage fright, I am just nervous – but in a mostly positive way (laughs).
Diatonic: A popular question on Reddit or Google: Do concert pianist actually make mistakes while performing?
Annique Göttler: Oh yes (laughs) .. a lot (laughs)
Diatonic: But how do you deal with them? You practiced a piece for weeks, months, maybe even years? And then suddenly, a passage that you've played effortlessly for years now, suddenly you're hitting a wrong note. Does your professional brain just tell you don't worry about it! Or does it make you uncomfortable? What happens in that particular moment?
Annique Göttler: I would say it’s a little bit different every time. And it also depends on how well you know the piece.
If you’ve played the piece for many years – it's like an old friend. You know it very, very well. And if a mistake happens … you can just calm down and you can just overplay it. Nobody will hear it. But if you’ve played the piece for just a few weeks or months: It’s not that locked in your head and body yet. So you will definitely be a little bit more nervous. And maybe the audience will hear it, will see it. But that's totally fine. I mean, normally we say that if you learn a new piece, you should play it at least ten times in concert until you feel more comfortable on stage, until you can manage to deal with these types of situations better.
Diatonic: I went to law school and if anyone out there is familiar with the German law school system: There's one big exam at the end and you have to study for months, up to one and a half years. And then there's this one big test.
What I would assume to be difficult – mentally: You have all this time that you spent preparing for the performance: And finally you're on stage, you're playing .. how do you mentally prepare for this scenario as a professional? Do you have to be a certain type of person, someone who just doesn't have a problem with that pressure? Or can you actually prepare for these moments? Could you take us behind the scenes a little bit?
Annique Göttler: I think everyone has his own routine for a concert. Some people may not have a routine. Then that's their routine basically (laughs).
But for me: On concert day I like to play the program that I'm going to perform very, very slowly with the scores in front of me – so I don't struggle while I'm playing and I'm not putting myself in an insecure situation. Because I know out of experience that if I do this and I'm having a little memory loss in the morning – I know I will take this on stage. Even if I look it up afterwards I will be scared of this part and ask myself in the wrong moment if I can still remember everything. These moments very often lead to a fail on stage.
But the more you play on stage, the more experience you have, the more you know: Okay, this will calm me down or this will bring me in the right mood for the stage. And I think for everyone it's a little bit different. What I also figured out: If I talk to people, random people backstage – directly before I go on … it calms me down because I'm not thinking about what I have to do now.
But this is just before the performance. Of course you have to prepare for everything in advance with many, many weeks and months of hard training.
And then when you actually do go on stage, there are also things that you can do to calm you down. Breathing is one thing that I think is totally underrated; like really deep breathing. and having a picture in your head, a sentence, something that inspires you before you hit the first note – that is so helpful!
Diatonic: I was jumping ahead a little bit: Let’s go back to your early years in Stuttgart, you were slowly realizing: Wow, I want to be a concert pianist. At age 18 or 19, you're just finishing school and about to go to university. How did you decide what school to go to, what to study exactly? Can you take us back to that moment in time?
Annique Göttler: Yes. As I'm not coming from a musician family, I didn't know how this whole thing works. So I was asking around. And people told me that you basically have to apply to a lot of music schools. And then just drive around Germany to apply for all of them, play the entry exam and everything, and introduce yourself to different professors.
And me and my family thought: One thing that I really need to be able to do while studying is practice. And my impression at the music schools in general was that the practice situation for piano was very bad. You have to wait very long until you can practice, sometimes you have to practice in the middle of the night and on instruments that aren’t that good. So I decided to stay at home at first where I could just continue practicing with nobody disturbing me, where I’d be completely free. So we were searching for someone who could teach me in Stuttgart. And luckily, a big coincidence, I met my professor at one of my concerts.
We got to talking and I felt that our personalities matched. So I though t it’d be good to to do a test lesson. We had planned for 45 minutes, but ended up working together for two hours, time just flew by. It was such a good lesson that I thought: Okay, I definitely have to work with this professor, Hans-Peter Stenzl, who luckily is also in Stuttgart.
Diatonic: When you're studying to become a professional concert pianist: What are lessons like? Are they more about musical expression or what do lessons actually look like? Sorry, might be stupid question …
Annique Göttler: No, it's not! Especially in the beginning of my bachelor we did a lot of basic work. Because before I went to study at music school I had played around a lot. I liked to play fast and loud, as a teenager everyone wants to do this. Of course I had a great teacher, but I think I missed some of the basic works to actually understand music, the way it is written and how I have to interpret it. And that's maybe also too early for someone who is just 16 or 17.
And my professor, he showed me all the basics of how to find a good fingering, how to do specific movements at the piano, how to find the right movements if I have to learn a new piece and everything. His goal was to teach me how I can learn on my own, without someone giving me feedback on basic things. But now, as I am finishing my studies, we are of course working much more on interpretation … because … all the technical stuff, it's there.
And the interpretation is the most interesting thing to work on – because you actually have to find the heart of every piece. Sometimes it sounds like I want to make it sound good, but that's very often the wrong way because we don't want to make something, it should just come to us, it should make us basically. It sounds weird (laughs).
Diatonic: How do you approach a new piece of music? Do you do research on the composer for example? And how do you find your own voice and your own interpretation?
Annique Göttler: I think it's always important to also look at the background of the composer – at that moment in time when he composed a specific work. Because only by doing this you can comprehend specific details of the composition. And then, after understanding this part, you have to look into yourself to find a matching emotion that you keep in yourself. Every one of us is experiencing a different life. And every second of our life is secured somewhere in our brain.
And what we are doing is we go through all the different emotions that are secured and say: Okay, does this one fit? This one? Does this one fit? And what comes closest to what the composer felt in that moment or could match the music the best? We will never be able to play exactly what the composer meant because … it's only the composer who can play it like this. But that's also something interesting because every piece can sound completely different with each pianist.
Diatonic: And I think it should.
Annique: Definitely!
Diatonic: I think that's what makes music interesting. If you look at the movie industry, for example directors who win Academy Awards: You will very rarely find someone who wins an Academy Award in their thirties and in their forties. It seems like most directors tend to do their best work when they’re a little older. That might have to do with the fact that filmmaking is a very complex thing to do, you gradually get better at it. But from my point of view it also takes a long time to actually find your voice as an artist and hence to do your best work.
Would you say that as you get older … your interpretations get … better or... better is probably not a good word …
Annique Göttler: … deeper …
Diatonic: Yes, deeper or maybe more meaningful?
Annique Göttler: Definitely. It depends on how you work with the piano and what's your personality. But I think with many great pianists – the older they get, the deeper their interpretations get. I'm pretty sure that right now until I hit maybe 35, I am the peak of my technical abilities, then it's going downwards.
I probably won’t be able to play extremely fast anymore when I'm 60 years old. But then the interpretation will be much deeper … so that people will still love to hear it … hopefully (laughs). But well, I see it at least with other pianists and even Martha Argerich at the age of 80, she can still play like a 20 year old technically, but her interpretation is getting deeper.
Diatonic: When your studies at music school were coming to an end: How did that change the way you looked at the job, the business side of things? When did you start thinking: How does this business actually work? How do I find an agent maybe? These sort of things?
Annique Göttler: Something that I didn't really like about my studies was that we were not really prepared for that. And I can see a lot of students around me that are dreaming – and are not really prepared for what is coming after the studies. I was lucky that my dad was always thinking about: How will my daughter be able to earn money in the future? Like even in the moment when I was not thinking about this at all. So actually before I started my bachelor's, I had a deal with my parents: We said that I should also study something else, which was information science, to have financial security and freedom to continue playing piano.
So whatever happens, I will be financially secure, won’t feel pressure and can just continue to play the piano. Hence I started my bachelor studies and my first thought was: Finally, I can concentrate on playing piano! Because before that I had to go to high school and it was like: I just want to play piano!
And then I studied and played piano for one semester and I felt like something is missing because when you're that young, I started music school at 18, you still don't really understand everything deeply. For example I didn't understand music history or music theory, how they were going to help me in my studies to be exact.
So I was not so much into it, which I regret a little bit now. But anyway, I thought, you know, I have a lot of time left, I can do something else. And then I started studying information science parallel to my music studies and finished the bachelor's degree. So that was one thing to secure the future.
But something that I learned through pursuing another degree was also the whole economic part and also going into online marketing and social media marketing.
Diatonic: … because I think a lot of people forget that a concert pianist actually also receives email, also has to do business things. So what does a typical day look like for you at the moment? How much time do you actually spend at the piano practicing your craft? And how much time do you spend on social media or for social media or for other channels?
Annique Göttler: I would say it's maybe around 60% for just practicing and 40% for creating videos, for answering comments, for thinking about new content and everything. And sometimes it's the other way around. But I really have to evaluate how I can balance it better (laughs).
Diatonic: When did you start your first social media account as a professional pianist or as someone about to become a professional concert pianist? Do you remember?
Annique Göttler: I think it was after the summer of 2018 that I started my Instagram channel. I was on vacation with my family and I thought: I have to do something!
Back then I was still studying information science and I thought: there is this thing, the social media thing, that I don't really have deep knowledge about. I was not using Facebook so much, actually not using it at all. And I thought: There is this thing … and maybe it can help me! Why not try it? So I created my Instagram channel and it took a very long time until I finally decided to put a video of me online. And: It was a pretty bad video (laughs). Back then I had my old piano, a Yamaha grand piano, which was great. It was my accompaniment for many, many years, but it was completely played down, it doesn't sound good anymore (laughs).
And I had an old smartphone which didn’t have a very good video camera, and the audio was also bad. But I just thought: Okay, you know what? You have to start. You have to start now. I don't have professional videos, I don't have professional recordings or anything. But you have to just try it!
And so I recorded myself, I put it online, which really took quite a long time. And then I discovered: Nobody is interested in it, which I thought was good (laughs). This gives me time to just develop everything and to see what I can do better and to learn along with the platform. Then over the time it grew and grew and suddenly … it grew very fast (laughs).
Diatonic: I originally discovered you on YouTube though – where you have more than 180,000 subscribers. Can you share what led you to start another channel on another platform? Because it seems like so much more work than Instagram.
Annique Göttler: That's true. Actually it was my brothers who told me again and again and again that I should start YouTube. I was hesitating a lot because I felt like, you know, if something’s published on YouTube everyone is going to see it.
But then, you know, it's just stupid thinking because I'm doing the Instagram thing anyway (laughs).
Thinking about content for YouTube, I had a lot of ideas, but I didn't know if it was going to work or not. I'm still figuring out. I mean, as content creator, you're always, always searching for good content. I saw that some topics are not covered well on YouTube regarding piano playing. And then I thought: Okay, maybe I can just try! Talking about fingerings or whatever. It took a long while though until I finally published my very first YouTube video. And again, it's the same effect as on Instagram. I thought at first that a lot of people were going to see it … but luckily, no (laughs). And again I had a little bit of time, not as much as on Instagram though, to develop my channel. But it was also good that it really pushed me forward to try to figure out how can I create better content. And it was during COVID. So I had a little bit more time because I wasn't playing concerts at all unfortunately.
Diatonic: I think almost everyone out there will agree that social media, in some form or another, is important for an artist today.
And that's why a lot of people reading this, maybe artists themselves, have questions like: Oh, I want to do this so badly myself. But: How do I overcome self-doubt?
To help them: Maybe you could share some of the principles that you've learned so far.
I know it's always a tough question because everyone is different, every content channel is different. But maybe there are some things that apply to other artists as well and that could help them succeed on social media as musicians.
Annique Göttler: First of all: You have to continuously publish things. If you only upload one video every week or every month on Instagram … you're probably not going to receive the attention that you were aiming for.
And starting out it really doesn't matter if you have high quality recordings or something.
I know that there are many people out there who think they need a high quality camera and high quality microphone or something to create a good video. But at the beginning: It really does not matter! What matters is the content of your video, for example: Is it inspiring? What exactly are you showing? Are you showing how you're practicing or how you are playing? Are you showing different struggles that you experience?
You have to find out what people actually want to see and then stick with it.
So just try it and start. This is also something I think many people don't dare:
To just start.
Diatonic: How did you find the courage? And I would like to add that people tell me that there are basically two ways to grow on social media. You either become super famous in real life and then you start a social media account – because if you're the most famous soccer player in the world then everyone will follow you anyway. Or you create good content and are consistent, as you said, like really disciplined about it. So what gave you the discipline to actually stick with it?
Annique Göttler: I think one good side effect of playing piano is that you have to be disciplined (laughs). Like you have to learn to be disciplined because you have to play every day, even if you don't want to. Just knowing that at the end of the week there is a deadline, I have to publish a YouTube video, otherwise the algorithm is not going to like me anymore. I know I have to finish that video no matter if it's good or not. I just have to do it!
Diatonic: If I look at the subject of photography on YouTube for example, lots of people are pointing fingers at content creators in that space and say: "These people aren’t photographers, they're YouTubers talking about photography."
You start every video with a short introduction, telling people that you’re a professional pianist. How do you balance being a content creator on YouTube – and your main job, actually being a concert pianist?
„Being a content creator and a professional pianist don’t antagonize one another“
Annique Göttler: Maybe people think that I'm more of a YouTuber than a pianist, but I think that's mainly because the last two years, because of COVID, I really didn't have any chance to perform on stage … or just rarely. I think this will change now when everything gradually opens up.
On the other hand, for me, it is not really something that is playing against each other. Nowadays it should be normal that if you're an artist to then have an online presence. You should stay in contact with the people who are listening to your music. For me these two things – being a content creator and a professional pianist – don’t antagonize one another.
Diatonic: In terms of business: Are you considering doing something directly with your audience? I would assume typically, as a pianist, you have an agent or someone, you're booked for concerts and third parties arrange for you to perform at a venue and you get a salary of a certain percentage. But having this large audience gives you other opportunities, but pursuing them could also distract you from your musical career?
Annique Göttler: Right now I'm really just trying to focus on everything that’s leading to playing piano. My goal for me was always to be on stage. So everything I'm doing is leading there. I'm interacting with my audience, I'm also giving lessons like masterclasses, but everything is directly related to the piano. I'm not trying to get away from it, but closer.
Diatonic: A question that I ask professional pianists a lot: How do you cope with that inner pressure to grow as an artist … but there’s no summit that you can climb, no marathon you can run … growing as an artist is not a bucket list item you can cross off at some point I guess … So what's that journey like for you?
Annique Göttler: My goal is simply to play the piano, there is so much piano literature out there … My goal is to play everything that I want to play in my lifetime. I don't really care if someone is listening or not. Of course it would be great if people heard it, but I just want to play all these great pieces! For example, the Chopin Études, I always hoped I could finish all of them in my lifetime; and to be able to play them now and keep them for the rest of my life … that’s already a big, big thing for me and a bucket list item I can cross off.
Diatonic: I think in terms of mental health … that’s a great goal: To just play the pieces you love, without caring too much if someone’s listening. On the way to Stuttgart today I listened to an interview with a filmmaker and he said: "If your only goal is to make it into Hollywood … and you’re never reaching it, you’re making films, but you won't be happy. So just embrace the process." And it really sounds like you're still very much in love with your instrument – which I think is wonderful.
Annique Göttler: Totally. I think if you're not in love with the instrument, you shouldn't do this job (laughs).
Diatonic: But since you were talking about literature, let's look at some of your favorite pieces and why they are your favorite pieces. And a question I really like is:
If you could take one piece of music to a remote island and accidentally there's a grand piano, your memory is erased … which piece would you take with you? Something that you could maybe dive into for days, weeks, or even years.
Annique Göttler: Oh it would definitely be something by Chopin. I just... I don't know which one it would be right now, but probably if I have to answer now, it would probably be Opus 25 No.1, the first etude of the second cycle. Or the second sonata in B-flat minor.
Diatonic: And what draws you to Chopin? And when did your love for his music start?
Annique Göttler: I had a DVD when I was like eight or nine years old of Evgeny Kissin, "The Gift of Music" or something. And during the DVD menu, before you start the movie … there was background music, a melody. I didn't know what it was, but it was so beautiful and I searched for it for many years, my mom as well, And at some point by accident we bought a CD by Artur Rubinstein, which includes the second Sonata by Chopin.
And in the third movement in the middle part of this movement, there it was, this beautiful melody. Like, everyone knows this, this Marche Funèbre, but nobody knows the middle part. It's so beautiful, like, literally. And I completely fell in love with Chopin after that. Then I saw the challenge in all these etudes. I started playing etudes very early. And the more I played Chopin, the more I got into his music. And I think something that's very special about Chopin's music is that he is someone who writes out of the piano like, I can't imagine any other instrument playing this piece of music. For example, if I take a sonata by Beethoven, I can sometimes imagine, for example, a string quartet or piano trio or a symphony orchestra or whatever. And the same counts for Mozart or a lot of other composers. But for Chopin, there's really just the piano, and that's a huge difference for me, to other composers.
Diatonic: But is there a Mount Everest for you? Something you see on the horizon, a piece of music where you say: This is something I want to tackle most definitely, but I just haven't found the time yet to really go through it?
Annique Göttler: There are a lot of pieces that are on my wish list (laughs). One of the biggest parts was definitely the Chopin Études. And I think the good thing is that if you manage to play all the Chopin Études, you won't be scared of anything coming anymore, at least not technically. Of course, musically every piece is difficult and has its own challenges. But when it comes to technique, really the Chopin Études are the top of the top (laughs).
Diatonic: They teach you a lot?
Annique Göttler: They taught me a lot. And they are still teaching me. Yes.
Diatonic: How do you practice these days? How much time is spent working on basics? Do you still play scales? Like, could you take us through a typical practice routine?
Annique Göttler: I think playing scales is a little bit overrated – when it comes to learning technique at least. Because in piano literature we don't find scales so much. And when you have to play scales, you practice them.
I think it's good if you can play scales if you want to improvise a lot. And maybe that's also a good reason for everyone to practice scales, just to get an understanding of harmony and to know which note belongs to which key. But just practicing scales will not improve your technique so much. I like to start my working day at the piano with a warm up routine that I do with Hanon on every day.
I know some people hate Hanon. I also hated Hanon when I was small until I started to study and I started to understand how good it is for me, because it's not musical at all (laughs). And that's the good thing about it, because you really just focus on your body, on your fingers and your wrist and your elbow on your shoulder and everything, just the whole mechanics of your body to get warm. And then you're ready to play. That's the best thing that you can do, because I feel if you do a warmup with a piece then you already dive into the music and you're missing all the technical stuff that should be warmed up. Because then if you're not warmed up you're making so much more mistakes.
So that’s the warm-up. And then I start practicing the actual repertoire. I pick out specific parts of it, sometimes it's just a few lines. Sometimes it's a bigger part that I just want to tackle to understand the bigger picture better. It really depends on the piece and how far I’ve progressed with the piece.
Diatonic: I would assume a lot of people think that la concert pianist has 300, 400, or even 500 pieces ready to play. But what does that look like in reality? If you would have to play a concert tomorrow: Are there pieces that are always ready for performance, a basic repertoire? And how many can you actually add per year? How do you develop repertoire as a concert pianist?
Annique Göttler: You have a standard repertoire – which equals the actual repertoire that you're practicing right now. So if I had to play a concert tomorrow I would play all the Chopin Études – but nothing more. But simultaneously for example I was studying a Mozart concerto right before or a Moszkowski concerto or whatever and little other pieces. So if you gave me about two weeks’ time, I could get it all back into my memory and muscle memory and. Also a Waldstein sonata which I played like five years ago or something.
If the pieces are really, really well studied, they are so much in your body and in your brain that you can easily get them warm again. But if it had to be tomorrow: Then it would be just the program that I'm practicing right now, nothing else (laughs).
„My dream for life is definitely to play everything by Chopin“
Diatonic: Now looking at the future again: What are your professional goals or things you would want to work on for the next years to come? Specific composers for example?
Annique Göttler: My dream for my life is definitely to play everything by Chopin, at least for piano solo. I'm not so much into his Cello Sonata or the songs that he wrote, but all the piano pieces that he composed I want to include in my repertoire someday.
And there are also other pieces that I mentioned before, like Listz’s B minor Sonata or the third and second Rachmaninov piano concerto. The third one I already played, but I want to play it again because I feel it was a little bit too young when I played it (laughs).
And a lot of other pieces – but these are the ones that are definitely on my checklist. Also I would love to play in one of the world’s big concert halls, like Carnegie Hall of course. Or the Liederhalle in Stuttgart … where I’ve already played.
Diatonic: Thank you so much Annique. And all the best for your future. And thank you so much for taking the time for this interview!