"Actually, I think it's a huge mistake to play Bach to start with." "Why?" "I'll tell you why." "Because, you know, this is a fifteen minute audition." "You need to make a statement." "You need to impress the jury." "And what would you like me to make an impression with?" "Well I think, in my mind, you would start with probably a Rachmaninoff Sonata." "Are you fucking insane?" "Bravo!" "Bravo!" "Okay I'm ready." "Buskowski, Schumann, Scarlatti." "I'm tired." "Sing a fifth first and just take it down." "Same thing." "Marika is spending Valentine's Day in New York City." "Yeah..." "In a classroom." "Yeah!" "That's Carnegie Hall." "You ever played there?" "Yeah I played two times there." "Is it nice to walk back by it?" "Well yeah but I see it every weekend." "Yeah but the important is to play..." "Play there." "Do you spend a lot of time waiting when you come?" "Yeah well usually what I do is I'll just take her to her lesson and then... go." "There's nothing else I can do." "The day flies." "Okay, you know..." "I sound really bad." "Well what happened is that your guitar is stuck." "Or you're strumming the air instead of strumming the strings." "You're doing this and... yeah this has to sound like a very energetic strumming of a guitar." "Marika is a very intense kid." "And intensity is a two-edge sword." "Just relax, and just play." "If she plays a wrong note she gets so angry with herself that that's all you can see... if she could hit herself she would." "See, now you sound like something because you sound like you have character in the playing instead of fear." "How did it go?" "It went well I just got my grade report from pre-College division." "And it's pretty good." "I have As." "That means honors." "So I'm happy yeah!" "A nice way to finish the day." "You know we keep looking at the horses and always wondering are we going to go for a little ride at some point." "But we haven't done it yet." "You don't want to look like a gothic." "Oh shit." "It's been a few months I haven't performed." "So it's going to be the first time" "I'm performing a real recital..." "I'm getting stressed a little bit now." "Well it went pretty well," "I was just I got really tired because the piano is actually heavier than at my house, actually yeah, so I got a little bit tired by playing a Scarlatti Sonatas but hopefully Schumann was a bit quieter so..." "Are you going to wait for your daddy or no?" "Yes, I think I will wait for him because it's not professional going out and seeing my dad so I'm just going to wait until my dad comes because I think he's talking with his friends that came so I'm going to let him talk" "and he'll come soon I know." "No doubt." "Yes." "In which piece?" "No, but Schumann..." "Yes, yes Schumann but they're not at the same tempo." "The pieces are not written at the same tempo..." "Inside each piece, pieces are too short, too short to change each tempo inside." "You need more unity of that movement..." "Yes he's here, I think he's talking over there." "Yes." "Ok." "All the best." "Thank you." "Air Canada, Montreal passenger, Marika Bournaki, flight at gate G12." "When I listen to Marika play," "I find that she has this beautiful tonality, she has something that cannot be taught." "You learn technique, you learn pedaling, you learn to read music but you don't learn heart." "Heart is something, which you have to feel, you just sense." "As the time approaches, she'll feel more nervous and I know I'm going to hear the same stuff..." "I'm afraid, and this and that." "It's usual." "Sometimes I just don't really want to practice or maybe I'm better off being in Montreal and being with my friends and having fun and go to parties... but in the end, I really like what I do" "and I'm sure it can bring me really far, and makes me happy and people around me happy." "So, why not do it?" "Stupendous, thank you." "Thank you very much." "Her fingers from the side reminded me of a spider if you will but the feminity of a real woman" "taking control of that Steinway." "Excellent, excellent," "I have grandchildren and I try to get them to learn but it has to be..." "it's a gift." "I liked your pretty hands." "Thank very much, thank you." "The instructions enclosed..." "Do her parents know that she's..." "Yeah yeah they know." "Her mom told me to get her out of class." "So what are we going to do?" "Bring her to Second Cup." "Second Cup?" "I mean she's not stupid guys." "When she's coming we talk about euhm..." "Just say we're talking about..." "The O.C.!" "Starting on thursday." "The O.C. ok the O.C." "They are so good liars..." "Oh yeah, so it's easy." "Then at least now we've put them to work for a good cause." "Yeah exactly." "We're all shocked." "Everyone is pretty in shock." "She told us like a week ago." "We haven't seen her almost the entire summer." "And she says she's leaving..." "like forever." "Although we don't see Marika that much because she's always practicing and stuff like for her to leave... it's a shock." "I'll come back!" "I know you'll be back." "Surprise!" "Apply pressure on left and right side with arms and think about how special you are" "to so many people." "Aw!" "Marika, during the course of these two years we've seen you grow and become who you are today it's hard to let someone go so soon but we know that this will help you and you will be the great pianist" "you deserve to be some day." "We've all experienced so much of you and believe that it is all unforgettable, be it the good and the bad." "Not having you around will be a big change and will leave an empty space in our group and our lunch table." "We still can't believe that this is all ending so fast and in short just know that we will no doubt miss you" "and also remember to be true to yourself and don't be afraid to show anyone the real Marika." "We love you and care very much no matter what." "Remember that." "Your friends Jessica and Kirsten." "I hate brushing my teeth." "There's this song," "I don't know if you know it." "Jack Johnson Banana Pancakes." "And it's like euhm... well I'll just play it." "But basically, it sounds like go back to sleep." "So it's like, my mom was listening to it, this is what she listens to in the morning, but this is not good it's just like" ""can't you see that it's just raining ain't no need to go outside"." "It's always hard to live away I think." "When I first moved here" "I wasn't used to be on my own and doing everything on my own and not having my parents drive me..." "I had to figure out how to travel." "It was an hour at first." "You know, going to school, the train," "I had to figure out the train system." "I had no one to show me." "Ouch." "I swear I will fall in front of you." "See it's very tidy it's very..." "I think I know myself better, because you know I'm by myself." "I get a lot of time with myself to think about my likes and dislikes and also I get to do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do." "I used to actually care what I looked like... oh I know what I'm going to wear!" "My sweatpants!" ""Waking up too early, maybe we could sleep in"..." "see!" "Why!" "Pretend like it's the weekend now." "I suck at life." "So have you guys met any guys?" "Have you been dating at all?" "I think this is the first time you've asked me this question." "No, this is why would you ask this question!" "I don't know!" "I just hit me, like two girls together, just like..." "I don't know!" "Were at Juilliard." "Okay, one, we were in the same high school." "We were in PCS." "Everybody is gay." "Yeah... or discusting." "So... sorry PCS!" "And then..." "Juilliard is almost the same story." "But more of the latter than the former." "It's like a..." "It's all the same level." "Yeah." "So what do you do about it." "I change it..." "Right." "But you can't change it when you're sitting there..." "Everything you do wrong is on your face immediately." "If there's a sound you don't like, whether there's a note that you missed... whether it's fumbling a trill or something... it's immediately on your face." "Seriously." "Marika is definitely a colt." "A very vibrant and very energetic one." "She does need to be tamed sometimes." "But you know, sometimes you wonder how much taming you want to do because you don't want them to lose that spirit." "Okay, we're going." "Oh!" "Caramels." "Would you like some caramel?" "Homemade." "Bye Momma." "We are going to Ottawa." "Or Gatineau... where?" "Yeah, well I mean Gatineau is right on the other side of the Ottawa river." "And why are we going today now?" "Well, what do you think?" "Oh yeah, to practice on Glenn Gould's piano!" "I'll get full scholarship for College." "I'll get to the top of the list." "I'll be number one." "And I'll get all the money." "Well, you know what?" "That would be nice." "I know." "That's not what it sounded like..." "That's what it is..." "Oh my god." "Look at his sunglasses." "Unbelievable." "You have them with you?" "See!" "It's like, it could be one of them." "Look at this, it's unbelievable." "It's exactly the same style as the one down there." "The red one." "Can I have them!" "Please!" "Playing on Gould's famous and favorite Steinway piano, we have a treat for you." "16 year old musical star Marika Bournaki will perform the prelude of Johan Sebastian Bach." "English Suite ♪2 in F minor." "Well we have the same taste in sunglasses I mean..." "She remembers me from earlier than I remember her." "No!" "Yeah!" "Did you think he was cute when you first saw him?" "No... of course!" "What was your first impression when you saw her?" "This is becoming a love story!" "Nothing special..." "I came to New York because I knew that Marika was..." "Good!" "We met in pre college." "Stop!" "Now I'll just go on my knees and ask her to marry me." "No." "I've never seen my dad play in this kind of setting ever." "So this is a first." "I'm excited." "See, now he's nervous, he's practicing!" "Yeah, what about me when I want to warm up." "I have to scout pianos in hotels." "When you're a pianist, you sit at the piano." "But I remember, when I was younger, like when my knees were shaking when you're standing up..." "You feel them much more than when you're sitting." "It's like a job interview." "If an important agent books you anywhere in the world that's your start in your career." "So yes it's potentially a career maker." "What if I suck?" "Well, they'll either say, thank you very much or they'll say even if you sucked it sounded pretty good." "House management." "I'm so fucking tired." "I told them two beds." "If you want we can try to change but..." "I don't think you realize how dirty this is." "Like, let me complain." "Do you see how dirty this is?" "Do you see how this is dirty?" "Do you see how dirty this is!" "I've never stayed in a place like this." "How am I supposed... how am I supposed to sleep... it's the same crap, it's just because it's brown that you can't see it." "It's so fucking ghetto." "Like what the fuck." "Where's the light?" "Yesterday she didn't sleep at all so we basically went through two days without sleeping." "And she got her period yesterday so that added a little bit to the whole... emotional." "The most famous square in London." "The Trafalgar Square." "I'm hungry," "I don't care about the Palace." "I can't even frickin visit it so there's no point." "I know, we can't visit it." "The frickin Queen's in it." "This is so creepy, I don't like this." "Me and David, that was my boyfriend everyday," "I'd see him everyday and when I leave," "I feel like I'm leaving somebody behind but I mean, that's fine, like I'm in London, what the hell." "Why am I complaining?" "I was just thinking like the image of a college student is like jeans and a big sweatshirt." "Like more relaxed." "You know like comfort." "So it's kind of like..." "In a way, for you, you dress like this just the way you want everyday." "I mean it's stages." "When you have a concert," "Ya have to have like you know, it's like Superman." "You put your suit on." "Cat woman I would like to say." "Okay, Cat woman." "Sorry about that." "No but I'm talking about my personal style." "Concert is not... well it should be but..." "Yeah, no it should be, because I also think you're making a statement when you dress a certain way when you play a concert." "It looks really bad." "It looks cheap, this looks cheap." "It looks like a maid outfit." "I don't want to look for concert clothes it pisses me off." "Everytime I played people have told me I look fine." "I don't undertand this frickin obsession." "There's no obsession, I look fine." "Okay I have pretty blond hair, it's fine." "Leave me alone." "One of the questions they'll probably ask you is why do you want to be a concert pianist?" "What do you enjoy about being a concert pianist?" "Nothing." "Well, do you enjoy the practicing?" "Yeah." "Okay, so that's one part of the answer." "What else?" "I can bullshit but that's about it." "Okay." "So what's the bullshit." "That I like to perform, that I like to get a right for a performance." "I'm very motivated," "I want to communicate something to the public." "I'm not just playing for myself and my practice room but finally it's kind of like the gratification of when you get to play for the public." "You have to play for other people, share what you've been working on." "Actually it's funny because this was your answer you would give when you were like 13 years old." "I know but that's because I was..." "You were more mature then than now?" "No, I wasn't mature I was set up." "You set me up." "I set you up?" "Yeah I had like..." "I never told you..." "Yeah you did, well kind of." "I had like a written answer to say." "Like it's kind of how it's tweeked." "Now it's not how I feel at all." "I don't want to travel," "I don't want..." "I see it as the compromise." "I like to play for myself." "I like to learn." "Is this because you're attached to much to New York?" "No!" "It has nothing to do with that." "It just has to do with that" "I'm not twelve anymore and it's not about playing and signing autographs and like thinking I'm so cool because I'm going to places and I'm missing school." "You know it's like..." "I like "la petite vie"." "I like my routine, I like to practice," "I like to play for a couple of people." "I'm not like a rock star." "I think there are some challenges as a woman that you don't have as a man." "I've noticed for example that since she's been dating David that... especially I've had the chance to see them together, so it's nice I mean look... she has to go through those things," "that's what life is all about." "But clearly, when you get... how do I put it... emotional but in a soft way," "I think it takes a bit some of your edge off" "from what you're doing, career wise." "I don't sound like a professional yet." "You don't?" "No." "I still sound like a teenager." "So then, why would they want to book you?" "I don't know, based on what?" "Okay well, if you feel you're not ready yet, so why are you here?" "I don't know, you tell me." "I tell you?" "!" "Don't clap." "Shut up!" "Tell me what your strategy is right now..." "Strategy?" "In terms of what?" "Keeping her prepared." "Basically I just want to keep her as calm as possible." "I think I'm getting sick." "This is Marika Bournaki" "I'm supposed to be playing in the hall this morning?" "Okay thank you." "We got some good feedback." "They want to establish a good relationship, trust, and plan ahead because it's not going to be a short..." "Invest, invest in the future." "And they were giving an example of an artist that they've taken on," "I think it was in 2002, and that is just starting now to really emerge." "So as an example of how they'd like to invest for the longer term and take things... not necessarily at a slow pace but take time to build a career." "So are you proud of Marika?" "Sorry?" "Proud." "Oh of course I'm proud," "I'm always proud of her." "She did good today." "I haven't been in Montreal for summer like five years or something." "But I'll be going in and out of the city but... it's okay." "It feels okay." "My room is a mess right now." "I have clothes everywhere and my mom's stuff everywhere because she's moving out soon..." "I don't know, it doesn't really feel like my room because I haven't been in here for so long but... it's okay." "Well my parents officially got divorced in April officially, but they've been talking about it since September." "And it was actually really funny because just like two nights ago we actually talked about it and nobody has talked about it and it's like, anytime I come home, you know my mom kind of blamed me a little about..." ""since you've been gone everything's been different"" "you know stuff like that." "Why are you using this edition?" "Because I lost my other music." "Until I was like 14, in my head I was never going to get married," "I was never going to have kids" "I was going to be like the coolest person ever." "But then that changed!" "You know I was so impatient, that's one thing I learned from David," "I became I think much more patient, my teacher said it really, tamed... calm me down." "Really grounded me." "And it's true." "I feel like it should be easier that we do the same thing because we have the same responsibilities towards our craft." "For me music is the greatest and I get the chance to share it with other people and it doesn't matter if it's Carnegie Hall or if it's for two..." "Sounds just like me!" "...people, you know, some old people or some people that don't understand as long as I manage to give them the maximum" "I can then even if one person from the audience comes to me says you know I actually felt something... that's what I care." "And if that brings me to some place better to a higher level that means that it's the way it's supposed to be." "I am going to YCA office, which I hope won't be a problem because it's Saturday." "I'm just going to drop off my CDs." "YCA, Young Concert Artist, organizes auditions every year" "for the people that they name as winners they really help to make it to the next step of getting major management in their careers." "This is so creepy you can see inside." "It can be very important if you win, you know you have winners of these auditions that became very successful artists." "The jury will ask you which piece you would like to perform first then they will request other works." "The audition all together is about fifteen minutes." "So, my point is that... coming back to Bach, is that you know..." "You shouldn't." "You shouldn't." "Are you kidding me?" "I'm not kidding you at all." "I'm not kidding at all." "Actually, I think it's a huge mistake to play Bach to start with." "Why?" "I'll tell you why." "Because, you know, this is a fifteen minute audition." "You need to make a statement." "You need to impress the jury." "And what would you like me to make an impression with?" "Well I think, in my mind, you would start with probably a Rachmaninoff Sonata." "Are you fucking insane?" "Do you understand?" "You have fifteen minutes to make yourself feel comfortable and establish yourself." "It's your choice." "In the end, you're the one who decides." "But I'm telling you, these people will be auditioning like a hundred people." "I'm not a robot you know and I think that that's what's the hardest part you know, it's kind of you have to put it on automatic sometimes without it being automatic, you know the whole practicing thing" "and the whole giving up everything, you know life gets in my way that's what happens to me." "I mean I've been preparing for YCA for... very seriously for like a month in a half." "So you want to do this..." "I might mess up or..." "Any more disclaimers?" "No I think that's it." "I might mess up also a lot..." "but okay." "Veda she gave me a lesson and I tell her well this is coming up in a week in a half so and then she freaks out." "This is the problem." "Off camera please." "How can you, why do you do this... so then she tested me." "She asked for the things that were the weakest." "My confidence went all out and again" "I was in this vulnerable position, which she always puts me in." "When did you play... you performed this?" "Yeah..." "I played... a lot of things went wrong?" "Yeah..." "She proved to me in any way that I'm not 100% ready." "And like my dad was disagreeing... what are you talking about?" "!" "It's not just a business." "It's not just about making money." "It's about more than that." "And once I'm more than that, that's when it's going to happen." "So I'm still mad at him." "And he's like yeah but it's your fault..." "It's not my fault, it is my fault maybe that I wasn't good enough maybe it's my fault that I wasn't prepared but it's not my fault that he decided to set up this thing against," "even maybe his better judgment or against my teachers judgment." "Sometimes I call him because I discover a beautiful thing and I'm talking to him about it and he wants to get over to how was practice how was this, how was that." "You know of course it's because he cares and he wants me to be able to make a career because he knows how hard it is and because he lived and didn't make it but it's like at some point" "you just kind of have to rise above all that and you know understand that it's not about that." "What were you trying to tell him about?" "I was telling him about a song, a Schumann song," "I was talking to him about Frauenliebe und leben, it's a song cycle by Schumann and I listened to it and I cried in class because it was so beautiful and so sad and I called him to tell him about that" "and he was talking to me about YCA you know, and it's like I don't care about YCA," "I don't care." "I don't even know why I'm crying." "But it's true, I don't care." "And it's always about you know, career and concerts and how people think I sound and you know," "managers and you know, but it's not about that." "It's so not about that." "I know all you are doing is helping me." "I'm just upset at myself because apparently... because I've been working hard but apparently not hard enough." "Or maybe I'm not just good enough." "So I'm angry at myself." "C'est tout." "So I'm sorry," "I feel like a failure yet again." "What happens is that this becomes very very close to this." "Just playing it slightly off rather than in the middle." "Marika?" "Don't worry we have plenty of time." "What class is this?" "My goal now is to make classical music more accessible." "That is something I can do because of who I am, because of my personality, experimenting with the lighting and the set design, projections on stage while I'm playing, making concerts more interactive with the public," "with other artists on stage, playing in centers, playing for causes," "it's all part of creating and bringing music and sharing music with different people all around the world and whether it's again in big classical venues or if it's in different places in doesn't matter." "It's really bringing and sharing things together through music." "She was as always expected, amazing." "The brightest and the best." "I think Marika is one of those people." "I love music." "Maybe I don't always love practicing, maybe I don't always love myself, but I always love music." "I'm serving something higher, it's my religion," "I really do believe it's the most beautiful thing in the world." "The final scene of the movie."