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The difference between the mountainous, forested landscapes of Banff and the bustling, cultural-filled city of Berlin could hardly be starker. While both are a part of Cristina Gomez Godoy’s artistic community, they both hold different roles in her musical life.
“There are many special sides about this place,” she says of her time at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, “but one of them is this very open-minded approach to programming. I’m always very excited to play new music, to play music from living composers... but I saw that it’s a real important point here.”
While her primary job – principal oboist of the Staatskapelle Berlin – also has plenty of opportunity to share new works, the opportunity to perform chamber works written for the oboe is an uncommon one, and when it comes along, it is often more traditional repertoire.
“When I get to know new pieces here, the good thing is that I bring them with me and I want to play them somewhere else,” says Gomez Godoy. “This adds to my repertoire a lot of sparkle. And also, about this place, what can I say – this connection to nature is astonishing. This is something that I also bring with me when I go somewhere else.”
The brief bit of grounding that Gomez Godoy finds here is something that she welcomes amidst a busy schedule of performing as a soloist with orchestras all over the world. Amidst the hectic nature of her musical calendar, Gomez Godoy is constantly attempting to find balance – a tricky premise at best that she had to learn the hard way.
“At some point, when I wasn’t able to balance so well, I had this kind of burnout,” she shares about an experience she had several years ago. “It was like for three or four months even that I really couldn’t do anything because my body was just not working very well.”
In this time, Gomez Godoy learned about the more vulnerable side of not just being a performer but also being a human: asking for help and not being embarrassed to admit when things are not the sunshine and roses of an international classical music star.
Post-burnout, Gomez Godoy has noticed that her playing has changed. “It’s gotten so much freer,” she observes, noting that she still aims to execute the music at the highest level. “The way I approach, the way I look at music and I look at the profession is a bit different after that. My will is more like to enjoy and make others enjoy.”
Those others include the emerging classical musicians under her tutelage at the Banff Centre. “I try to tell them that it’s something that, I think, you can look inside you and see how you feel about it. If it’s something that you love, it should be not so stressful to do what you do. It’s difficult, of course, but to get to that setting... just try to enjoy it to enjoy the process. I try to encourage them to enjoy the process with other people, to help each other, and this is something that Banff is very special about.”