Sergio Bucheli, a Mexican lutenist at the heart of European Baroque music

At only 28 years old, Sergio Bucheli is principal lutenist with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and The English Concert, and performs regularly with the Irish Baroque Orchestra and Marsyas Baroque. Born in Mexico in 1998, he trained at the Yehudi Menuhin School, a specialist music boarding school, thanks to a scholarship funded by the Rolling Stones (!), before studying the lute, theorbo, and baroque guitar at London’s Royal Academy of Music, and then joining Arcangelo’s New Ensemblists programme. A devotee of unusual musical projects, he also collaborates with the ensemble FIGURE and violist Lawrence Power at the West Wycombe Chamber Music Festival, and frequently performs in duo with soprano Ruby Hughes and mezzo-soprano Georgia Burashko, as well as countertenor Tim Mead. A lover of tea and Virginia Woolf, he tells us about his arrival in England, the purchase of his first theorbo, and the day he cut his fingernails so he wouldn’t be able to play the guitar anymore.

How did you become a musician?

Sergio Bucheli: My family is not musical at all. My mother trained as an architect and my father is a civil engineer, so they met in a “reinforced concrete” class. I have two older brothers, and the middle one played the guitar a great deal. When I was little, he was a huge source of inspiration for me. I started playing the guitar when I was about seven because he played it. We shared a bedroom, and I would simply pluck the open strings of the instrument as it rested on its stand. I suppose my mother noticed and enrolled me in a few lessons. It was just for fun, but very quickly it stopped feeling like an occasional pastime. I practised a great deal. I didn’t even know I was playing classical guitar. I had no notion of genre. During my very first year of lessons, Bach entered my life. My teacher introduced me to the Chaconne, and the rest is history!

Where did you study?

S. B.: At the age of 13, I auditioned for the Yehudi Menuhin School in England. I stayed there for six years. I received a scholarship funded by the Rolling Stones. Having grown up in Mexico City, I was deeply struck by the English countryside. It was so peaceful. My childhood in Mexico had been somewhat solitary, so suddenly finding myself immersed in this international community was incredibly stimulating: I was discovering entirely different ways of life. I loved playing the Latin American repertoire, but there wasn’t really any place for it at the school, and I had to learn how to read music properly and bring some order to my technique. I’d like to say that my playing was instinctive, but in reality, it wasn’t particularly structured. There were a few of us children who came from what you might call “ordinary” backgrounds, and then I suddenly found myself in a place full of musicians who had apparently been practising since before they were one year old and all had perfect pitch… At first, I felt a little like an outsider. I ended up staying for an extra year at the school.

I wanted to study with lutenist Liz Kenny at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and I was already playing a new instrument. Early on, I had seen a video of her performing at the Sam Wanamaker Theatre in London with stage director Bill Barclay, who was talking about one of Shakespeare’s plays. It was the coolest thing I had ever seen: this life as a musician revolving around theatre and these extraordinary literary works. I thought to myself, “Yes, that’s exactly what I want. That’s a life that appeals to me!” I studied at the Royal Academy for six years, completing both my undergraduate and postgraduate degrees, with Liz throughout.

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