Boulez in Rehearsal

Several years ago I had the distinct pleasure of meeting, quite briefly, Pierre Boulez. At the time, I was a college student, just beginning to learn about music of the 20th Century, so I'm sure I didn't fully appreciate the weight of the situation. Boulez, of course, had become since the 1950's one of the most important musicians of the 20th Century, renowned as both a composer and conductor. The time we met, he was a visiting composer at my undergraduate college, presiding over a couple of forums and sitting in on rehearsals of Le marteau sans maitre. I quickly found that, even in his 70s, Boulez was razor-sharp and as bold as ever, still the same man who decried the university situation in the mid-20th century as "incestuous" and a "self-made ghetto." At first glance, I found Boulez to have the look of a grandfather, kind yet grizzled, shaped by a thousand encounters and experiences that I would never fully understand.

With that image firmly in mind, I always wanted to see Boulez conduct, but never had the opportunity to do so in person. The closest I've come was a recent viewing of a recording of Boulez in rehearsal with the Vienna Philharmonic in 1998, during which the orchestra worked on Alban Berg's Three Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 6, and Boulez' own Notations I-IV. The recording showed Boulez as a no-frills kind of conductor, his countenance detached but focused, his gestures clean and concise. When he gave direction, he did so with the same blunt honesty for which he became well-known earlier in his career, remaining professional and courteous all the while. His knowledge of the scores in question was keen and intellectual, and he made no mention of emotional content at any point in the rehearsal. Even without any mention of emotion, however, the orchestra displayed moments of inspiration that belied the calm control of its conductor.

There are many things in this recording that the young conductor can take to heart and apply to her own work--Boulez' firm control of the ensemble without being overbearing, his fine understanding of the score, and the brevity of his comments being the most obvious among them. Those things alone make watching this DVD worthwhile, and as a musician who often gets more out of watching rehearsals than performances, I highly recommend this view into the day-to-day workings of both a world-class orchestra and a world-class composer/conductor. In fact, I would like to challenge conductors to make more recordings of this sort for our younger conductors to study as a sort of living textbook on rehearsal technique and conductor preparation. The more exposure our conductors have to brilliant musicians like Boulez, the more perpared they will be to strike out into the bright future of our art!

Pierre Boulez: In Rehearsal with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, 1998 Spectrum TV and RM Arts. Distributed Exclusively by Image Entertaiment.

Are We The Only Musicians Here?

This past Tuesday, I, along with several of my friends, attended the last concert given by the New York Philharmonic in Central Park as part of the Concerts in the Park series. I was so excited because the concert was all Dvorak, a composer very near to my heart. (My entire high school orchestral bassoon experience can be summed up in his works, especially considering we played his 8th Symphony for two years straight) But just like before when I went to the concert in Cunningham Park in Queens, I wondered; just who exactly is coming to these concerts, and why?

Now of course I can't not give the people of New York City their due --- that's part of the reason why I live here, for the slightly exaggerated myth and persona of the intellectual and cultural elite who spend their time mixing with literati and glitterati alike, drinking champagne at fabulous art nouveau opening night parties and galas. Yes, those people do exist in New York but that's just a small part. So besides the fireworks (which by the way were highly disappointing), the chance to have wine and cheese on the Great Lawn and some damn good music, why go?

Well those are all incredibly good reasons, reason enough for anyone to go but it was hard for me to fathom because for me, as a musician, it went deeper than that. And because of that feeling, it led me to propose a question (or maybe a few questions) to myself --- is there ever a time when I can just go for the fireworks, wine and cheese and is there anyone else out here on this enormous patch of grass like me? Because every once in a while, I'm overcome with the feeling, no the need, to sit with people of the same persuasion and discuss the surprising and disconcerting ritenutos that Maazel orchestrated himself in the second movement of the 9th Symphony, the elegance and flawlessness of Thomas Stacy's english horn solo and how disappointing it was that the crowd roared over Lynn Harrell's powerful performance of the Cello Concerto. I almost wish that everyone around me is thinking these things, just waiting to put in their two cents. But that leads me back to the first question. I pose this to many of my other collegiate musician friends. Can we ever divorce ourselves from that of our calling? And if we could, would that be wise?

Now I'm sure you're saying, "Imani, I'm sure you can listen to classical music just to enjoy it and not analyze it like a musician." and of course I can but that "listening" is predicated on all of the things that I've ever learned over the past eleven plus years that enable me to enjoy the music even further. Because I know Dvorak, I love listening to it even more. I think back to when I was in third grade learning about Haydn's "Suprise" Symphony and learning what made it a suprise. After I knew that, the second time around was much more enjoyable than the first with which I had the horrible experience of being scared so much that I fell over in my chair.

So yes, there are days when it's all about the fireworks, wine and cheese and I relish those days but there is a voice in my head, constantly nagging me, asking, 'are we the only musicians here?'. Well, little voice, maybe not but even so, its not that bad of a thing. Maybe someone sitting behind me will be as anxious to hear the second theme in the exposition of the first movement of the 9th Symphony or maybe they'll just be drinking their glasses of merlot, looking at the stars. But in the end, the most important thing is that they're all there --- the laypeople, the struggling music students, the noveau-riche --- for some reason or another, under the opening sky, enjoying a little Dvorak.

Anything Goes

A colleague once told me that the most unique characteristic of art music of our day is a prevailing compositional spirit in which, as they say, anything goes. In a way, this is true: only in a time like ours can one find such a wide range of compositional aesthetics on simultaneous display. In the last century, composers were wont to blaze more or less one compositional trail at a time, as was most notably the case in the last century with the oft-contrasted Arnold Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky. Critics and historians have at times gone so far as to place Schoenberg and Stravinsky in diametric opposition to one another, the yin and yang of 20^th-Century compositional methodology and intent. Surely, while the differences between the two men’s approaches sprung from the same essential quandary—that of how to speak meaningfully about the human experience after the First World War brought Romanticism to a crashing halt—the end result of those approaches differ in a number of important manners that make each composer’s work essentially singular.

The single-mindedness with which earlier composers developed their ideas has, in a certain sense, allowed contemporary composers to create the musical smorgasbord that we now enjoy. The radical nature of the innovations of Schoenberg, Stravinsky, Cage, Varese, Stockhausen and others required such devotion in order to be sharpened individually with any degree of sufficiency. Now they help form the wide collection of musical tools composers carry in their bags and often use in conjunction. Western common-practice tonality, bitonality and post-tonal dodecaphony now freely mingle, and one is now more likely to find two or all three in a newly-composed piece than just one. One can now expect any manner of formal scheme in a work, executed by myriad combinations of musicians. In inexperienced hands, the use of so wide a range of tools can sound convoluted; in the hands of an innovator, they can be brilliant.

For just one example: only by following the “emancipation of the dissonance” to its logical conclusions did Schoenberg answer his own musical questions and help make dodecaphony a valid compositional tool—indeed, it was the rule more than the exception in academia through a fair portion of the 20th century. Since then, thankfully, we have learned an important lesson: dodecaphony is just one of many answers to the musical difficulties of these complex times. One by one, such has become the case with all of the innovations of the 20^th century; they have all become diverging roads that still, somehow, lead to the same place. That is, in fact, exactly what they should be—and that is why today’s music must be championed.

Critics often speak of an ever-widening gap between the listener and the composer, complaining that the ears of the audience are not as open as they once were. Surely, many listeners were (and still are!) apprehensive of almost everything composed post-Stravinsky, panning it as irrelevant and esoteric. The onus, therefore, falls on us as musicians to bring listeners along, to show them that there is nothing to fear in having a willing ear. After all, why should listeners be fearful when today’s composers write from so many diverse and exciting influences? How would these fearful music-lovers feel to know that when he composed The Death of Klinghoffer, in addition to minimalism, John Adams drew on such far-flung ingredients as “Berg, Stravinsky, rock and roll, doo-wop music, Arabic music and Jewish music?”

Solely on the strength of the diversity of its sources, art music of our time has the potential to bring old listeners back onto the edge and new listeners into the fold. Therefore, it is our job as performers, conductors, critics and listeners alike to encourage our young composers, those brilliant musical toddlers who are only beginning to realize their powers, to perform their works, and to help remake art music into the vital part of cultural life that it can be once more.

More Evidence of New York's Love for Gustav

While I was looking around the New York Philharmonic site, getting more information on the last Concert in the Park concert in Central Park of which my friends and I will be attending (and I will be writing about here on Wednesday) I saw an interesting little button on the sidebar of the page entitled "Mahler in New York" so I clicked on it. Lo and behold, it's a wonderful site talking about the uproar behind Mahler's stay here, work with the New York Philharmonic and again, the 1st Symphony.

Mahler In New York

I suggest looking it over, it won't be up for long.

A Love Affair With Mahler

Last fall, as I walked around school, I listened to the buzz coming from my fellow students. For some reason, they all seemed to be talking about the same thing --- Mahler. I didn't understand how so many people could be so desperately in love with one person, all at the same time.

Now don't get me wrong, I always love Mahler.

But during this November, there was an overabundance of Gustav, and not just among my friends but throughout New York City. Everyone I knew was going to see performances of Mahler's 1st, 4th, 5th, 6th and 9th symphonies (I personally attended a fantastic performance of the 1st Symphony with the New York Philharmonic with my then boyfriend that reaffirmed my undying love, er, for Mahler, that is) and it was the thing to do. During classes we talked about rediscovering symphonies, how we felt on Mahler as an orchestrator, rewriting the works of Beethoven and the following backlash, Gustav as a conductor and the German Romantic Legacy.

As fun as all of this was, I couldn't figure out why everyone was going Mahler crazy. Then I remembered back to my senior year of high school when the exact same thing occured --- everyone I knew was discovering Mahler. It was then that I fell in love with Das Lied von Der Erde after analyzing it in my AP music theory class and really went back to listening to again, his 1st Symphony. As soon as I thought about this, it came to me. When I was a high school sophomore, all of 15 maybe, my youth orchestra decided it would be a good idea to play, in our spring program, the 1st Symphony. I remember being outraged thinking a little girl like me was not capable of really playing this piece no matter how talented I may have been at the time. I hadn't experienced enough in my life emotionally to be able to convey the passion withheld in this work. And I was scared out of my mind when I realized that it would be me playing the bassoon solo in the second movement. We were all so young, so fresh and innocent, naïve to the ways of this music and we had no idea what were getting ourselves into.

I realized that we can play the music of different composers at different stages in our lives. For example, any child can play Mozart but no matter how tired you may get of those tunes you know so well, the older you get, the more you can come back to Mozart and realize that you've only nicked the tip of a massive iceberg --- I've been playing Mozart's Bassoon Concerto in Bb Major, K191 for almost 10 years now and it's still revealing its secrets to me. And then there are composers like Mahler, with which I honestly believe that you have to live a little before you can really dive into it. When I played the 1st Symphony, I knew nothing of what that symphony was trying to tell me. When I studied and fell in love with Das Lied von Der Erde, I was three years older, had lost my best friend and found the love of my life. Three years later when I rediscovered the 1st Symphony and fell in love with the 2nd and the 5th, I was in my first relationship after the messy end of my engagement and had just learned what it was like to wake up in the morning with someone and hear the fourth movement of the 5th Symphony. When I first heard it at 14, there's no way I would have known just how much love is expressed in the Adagietto.

So it was then that I understood that every couple of years, after our triumphs and tribulations and after we've learned a little more about ourselves, we find Mahler anew and fall in love with him all over again. And the best part is, he'll always be there waiting --- waiting for us to discover more of ourselves through his music.

Don't Clap! A Layman's Guide to Concert Etiqutte

Now first off, this is no elitist musician’s take on how one should behave at concerts --- it’s very simple. When i’m on stage and someone does something at an inopportune moment, say clap, I become very distracted. And then, I think to myself, wasn’t there a time when everyone knew what to do at concerts or was that something that faded away while the stigma of rich intellectuals attending stuffy concerts grew? Well no longer. Attending concerts of any sort, be they orchestras, chamber music or opera is supposed to be enjoyable and easy. So in this short essay, we’ll talk about what to do when you go to the recital hall.

Now I was inspired to write this after attending an outdoor concert given my the New York Philharmonic. On the program was Wagner’s Overture to Der fligende Holländer, Lalo’s Symphonie espagnole and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No.5 and multiple times during the five movement Lalo and four movement Tchaikovsky there was clapping --- clapping during some sort of pause or quiet moment, some point of uncertainty. I looked over to my friends, other musicians, to see what their reaction was to the mass adulation that couldn’t really stop except by some loud chord given by the orchestra. It made me wonder, why exactly did these people clap? Did they really think it was over? And I really want to believe that you don’t have to be a musician or some kind of cultural savant to know when to clap. So here’s the first tip: read the program. the program for that New York Philharmonic concert looked like this:


Wagner (1813-83) Overture to Der fliegende Holländer (The Flying Dutchman) (1840-41, rev. 1860)

Lalo (1823-92) Symphonie espagnole for Violin and Orchestra, op. 21 (1874)
Allegro non troppo
Scherzando: Allegro molto
Intermezzo: Allegretto non troppo
Andante
Rondo: Allegro

Tchaikovsky (1840-93) Symphony No. 5 in E minor, op. 64 (1888)
Andante -- Allegro con anima
Andante cantabile, con alcuna licenza
Valse: Allegro moderato
Finale: Andante maestoso -- Allegro vivace -- Moderato assai e molto maestoso


The words under the title of the piece (i.e. allegro non troppo) are the movements. If there are five lines, that means five movements, four distinct stops not including the end. So for the most part, it’ll sound like it’s over four different times before you get to the very end. If you know that, that’s a good start.

The second tip, which can’t always be accomplished, is just to watch the conductor. If those hands are down for a good 10 seconds then the piece might be over. The conductor will let you know (they want that silence more than anybody) I’ve even been in concerts where the conductor waved off the audience at the sheer thought of clapping because it wasn’t over. They tend to be the nitpickiest out of all of us and the idea of that silence inbetween movements is close to sacrasant.

My last tip and I think is the best under any situation is simple – don’t clap! If you think it’s over and you’re not sure, don’t clap. If other people around you are clapping, don’t clap. Even if you’re positive it’s over, don’t clap. Better to be safe than sorry, right? And believe you me, we do want you to clap – we hope that we’ve done something worth clapping about so trust me, it doesn’t irritate us too much (it’s better to hear clapping at the wrong time than to hear no clapping at all) but we don’t want anyone to miss out on hearing anything, no matter how small.

Now there are lots of other things that people do during concerts that common sense can fix like answering phones (that is a pet peeve, one of the biggest) talking to people in the audience (we’re in an acoustically reinforced hall, we can hear you) getting up/coming in/leaving during a piece (we can see you too, no matter where you are) things that maybe people may take for granted. Maybe it bothers us musicians because it makes us feel like people don’t appreciate what we’re doing, what we love so much. But that is a completely different essay.

When I give my concerts at the college I attend, a very unique problem we have is the opening of candy and food that make the loudest noise that we can hear throughout the entire hall. I start to laugh to myself when I think about how silly of a distraction that is but it is unnerving. think about if you were giving a speech you had prepared for days and someone has opened a big bag of fritos and starts munching away. Not the best.

I would like to talk about why people feel the way that they do when it comes to seeing classical music performed but as I said, that’s an entirely different subject. So until then, follow those three tips and you won’t go wrong. You and your fellow attendees might hear something they’ve never heard before. Happy listening!

Contrary motion is now up and running. I hope to write my first entry tonight but it's always when you want to be busy you're not and, well you get the idea. I hope this gets it up and running!