Do I imagine it or have the faces of the Facebook generation become faceless, except on-line?
Of the many young families I see every day, in my elevator, on the street, here and there, very few engage their faces in conversations with their young children, or with each other. The eyes do not light up; the muscles around the mouth that might turn some tissue up or down, depending, seem inert, unused.
Affect is the root of so much music. Think of it as taste, not the kind associated with esthetic experience, but associated with carrots or chocolate. Yum or yuck--it's as simple as that.
At the outset of a Tonal Refraction working arrangement of three sessions I ask whether the individual has a favorite note. I wish I had a collection of photos of the answering blank looks. A bit of prodding is usually all that is required to unearth deep emotion associated sometimes with a note, like G; sometimes with a note in a specific composition, like the first G-sharp in Chopin's E-minor Piano Concerto; and sometimes with a note played on a specific instrument by a specific person. For one it was E-flat, the key of a hymn her grandmother used to play on the piano; for another, E on the D string of his first full-sized violin.
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Is Classical Music in Danger?
Last week a letter to the NYTimes from a retired Metropolitan Opera Orchestra violinist suggested that Classical music is in danger of dying out because of rock and roll; he offered as a solution to the problem that young children be taken to animated films in which classical music is featured either as subject matter (as in some Bugs Bunny cartoons and one famous Disney feature-length animation which shall remain nameless) or as background music (as in many Warner Bros. animations set to Rossini).
Readers were invited to contribute to a dialogue to appear on Nov. 25. I submitted the following response:
That my letter was not included among the published responses was most likely due to the Times's commitment to commercialism -- not surprising in the light of their revenue stream.
Readers were invited to contribute to a dialogue to appear on Nov. 25. I submitted the following response:
Les Dreyer’s suggestion that schoolchildren be exposed to
classical music through animated films is rather like suggesting that they
might learn to enjoy vegetables if fed canned green beans. It is not so much classical music that is in
danger as active, up-close, exposure to live sound.
I recommend locavore listening: Parents engaged with their
children in the sounds of their own singing voices; music teachers enlarging
their own ears to legitimatize the musical expression of the challenged as well
as the gifted; listeners enjoying music of
all kinds in intimate spaces like cabarets and living rooms.
A few well-intentioned flaws will yield more long-term nourishment
than adding to the steady diet of pre-heard, over-processed “music” that has become our
era’s standard. I propose a new
post-commercial-recording standard: Better than perfect.
That my letter was not included among the published responses was most likely due to the Times's commitment to commercialism -- not surprising in the light of their revenue stream.
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
More Moderato
Schubert's piano music has been the subject of many blog posts lately. It is probably the most thought-provoking music I have ever contemplated. it haunts me.
Describing it today to a non-musician who heard my recent performance of the Op. 42 A minor sonata, I remarked that his work is profoundly conflicted between syntax and lyricism. Long before I attached words to this conflict I recognized it in Rocks and Water: Cornwall 2004, the drawing by Joan Farber reproduced here. It is to this conflict that Schubert's moderato testifies.
One audience member asked: "How do you know when a musical idea does not conform to strict syntactical rules?"-- of meter, for instance. Good question. Experience has taught me to respect boredom as a form of question mark. Having accepted that the mere sequence of regular beats is not enough to make the music come to life I look for non sequitors, signs of drunkenness, places where a conspicuous repeated note over multiple measures overrides divisions into bars and beats.
To see more works by Joan Farber go to http://local-artists.org/user/4069.
Monday, November 26, 2012
Giving the Feeling vs. Getting it Right
When I play a Schubert sonata I am no longer concerned about whether or not I'm doing it right.
It has taken a long time to be confident of the content of these works as, judging from the going versions of them heard in concert and on recording, they are large, rather cumbersome and overly repetitive.
Then I recall that, preparing to tour and later record with Richard Dyer-Bennet his English language version of Die Scoene Muellerin (The Lovely Milleress), I worked not on the songs but on Schubert's larger forms. Instinctually I knew that the short forms were condensations of the larger structures. The reverse lesson is just now, over 30 years later, coming into focus. What took so long, you might ask.
Without text and, when performing in English, subtext that the audience clearly feels, the pianist is left alone to discern boundaries between what can be written down and what must be intuited as the composer's intention.
When I play I want the listener to be persuaded of my total acceptance of lyricism at its most exposed and developed.
Rubinstein was over 80 before he played Schubert in public. Surely it was not because he doubted his ability to play the notes.
When Dyer-Bennet first asked me to accompany him I was reluctant to get involved. "Just give it one rehearsal before you decide," he advised. I felt immediately the depth of unconscious comprehension opened by performance in my native language--depth clearly shared by the audience as was evident after a performance in Savannah, GA, when listeners, as empassioned as if they had been at the movies, debated about who was the real villain in this monodrama: the river, perhaps?
It has taken a long time to be confident of the content of these works as, judging from the going versions of them heard in concert and on recording, they are large, rather cumbersome and overly repetitive.
Then I recall that, preparing to tour and later record with Richard Dyer-Bennet his English language version of Die Scoene Muellerin (The Lovely Milleress), I worked not on the songs but on Schubert's larger forms. Instinctually I knew that the short forms were condensations of the larger structures. The reverse lesson is just now, over 30 years later, coming into focus. What took so long, you might ask.
Without text and, when performing in English, subtext that the audience clearly feels, the pianist is left alone to discern boundaries between what can be written down and what must be intuited as the composer's intention.
When I play I want the listener to be persuaded of my total acceptance of lyricism at its most exposed and developed.
Rubinstein was over 80 before he played Schubert in public. Surely it was not because he doubted his ability to play the notes.
When Dyer-Bennet first asked me to accompany him I was reluctant to get involved. "Just give it one rehearsal before you decide," he advised. I felt immediately the depth of unconscious comprehension opened by performance in my native language--depth clearly shared by the audience as was evident after a performance in Savannah, GA, when listeners, as empassioned as if they had been at the movies, debated about who was the real villain in this monodrama: the river, perhaps?
Sunday, November 25, 2012
Moderato
Performing Schubert's A minor Sonata (Op. 42) last evening I let my newly-charged definition of moderato guide my reading. It revealed the extent to which barlines can be ruinous, unrelenting quarter-note beats a disaster.
In the first movement, marked Moderato, the four bar phrases are made up sometimes as follows: 4/4 followed by 5/4 + 3/4, then again 4/4. Especially because Schubert does not do this consistently one's attention is galvanized by constant shifting between balance and imbalance, symmetry and asymmetry.
I would now say with conviction that, in this movement, Moderato means not a strict 4/4.
Dramatically this set up the variations movement designated Andante con moto, as a highly lyrical inwardly-directed 3/8 meter at times divided into 3/16 + 3/16 then, later, when it is in triplets, the triplets may be 3 + 2 + 2+ 2 but are rarely a straightforward multiple of 3's. Con moto indicates movement outside of the arithmetical meter.
The Scherzo recalls us to the physical pull of the dance beat though, because based on the minuet rather than the waltz, it contains many hemiolas.
The Finale moves dramatically, like a storm wind. After all the subtle shiftings of the three preceding movements it wants to fly.
In the first movement, marked Moderato, the four bar phrases are made up sometimes as follows: 4/4 followed by 5/4 + 3/4, then again 4/4. Especially because Schubert does not do this consistently one's attention is galvanized by constant shifting between balance and imbalance, symmetry and asymmetry.
I would now say with conviction that, in this movement, Moderato means not a strict 4/4.
Dramatically this set up the variations movement designated Andante con moto, as a highly lyrical inwardly-directed 3/8 meter at times divided into 3/16 + 3/16 then, later, when it is in triplets, the triplets may be 3 + 2 + 2+ 2 but are rarely a straightforward multiple of 3's. Con moto indicates movement outside of the arithmetical meter.
The Scherzo recalls us to the physical pull of the dance beat though, because based on the minuet rather than the waltz, it contains many hemiolas.
The Finale moves dramatically, like a storm wind. After all the subtle shiftings of the three preceding movements it wants to fly.
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Music's Box
Why educate children to meet the standards set by an older generation when the standards they will have to meet are embodied in the needs of their own generation?
"Far From the Tree," Andrew Solomon's brilliant new book on identity, is really a book about community based on a dynamic of empathetic acceptance by both generations: parents and children. The community of learners I have fostered since 1985 is based on attentive acceptance embodied in music--principally contemporary music, the music of our time, including improvisation.
Children educated in such an environment learn more than subject matter. They learn curiosity about otherness; they learn to find themselves in a diversified culture. This, their future, was for many people in my generation a negative experience, i.e., an experience of having to hide otherness, whether because of brilliance, or intellectual, physical, or perceptual challenge.
Music study has long been associated with conformity. Let's get music out of its box.
"Far From the Tree," Andrew Solomon's brilliant new book on identity, is really a book about community based on a dynamic of empathetic acceptance by both generations: parents and children. The community of learners I have fostered since 1985 is based on attentive acceptance embodied in music--principally contemporary music, the music of our time, including improvisation.
Children educated in such an environment learn more than subject matter. They learn curiosity about otherness; they learn to find themselves in a diversified culture. This, their future, was for many people in my generation a negative experience, i.e., an experience of having to hide otherness, whether because of brilliance, or intellectual, physical, or perceptual challenge.
Music study has long been associated with conformity. Let's get music out of its box.
Friday, November 23, 2012
Conformity at the Beginning
Conformity is an issue for some of us the moment we are born when it turns out that we do not meet our parent's expectations of the facts of our existence.
As a young child, aware of the extent of my non-conformity, I was overjoyed to discover hints of a kindred spirit who had lived 200 years previously, Mozart. It was literally a hands-on discovery, as some of the sounds in his music completely engulfed me as I played them. These sounds were in no way independent of me,but were as if intrinsic to my being. I knew that I was not alone.
This is not to presume kinship with Mozart, not at all, but to assert the power of specific sounds to evoke human recognition beyond the everyday.
I play music of the Classical period because its freshness never ceases to amaze me. But I wonder sometimes what the neighbors make of it. They have young children; do they assume that my involvement with music should be a model for everyone? Do they think that because I play this repertoire I require of my students that they do the same?
In fact, for most children, arriving at fascination with the 18th century comes naturally as they ease into self-confidence at the instrument. The music is truly great and will speak for itself if not forced upon the child.
As a young child, aware of the extent of my non-conformity, I was overjoyed to discover hints of a kindred spirit who had lived 200 years previously, Mozart. It was literally a hands-on discovery, as some of the sounds in his music completely engulfed me as I played them. These sounds were in no way independent of me,but were as if intrinsic to my being. I knew that I was not alone.
This is not to presume kinship with Mozart, not at all, but to assert the power of specific sounds to evoke human recognition beyond the everyday.
I play music of the Classical period because its freshness never ceases to amaze me. But I wonder sometimes what the neighbors make of it. They have young children; do they assume that my involvement with music should be a model for everyone? Do they think that because I play this repertoire I require of my students that they do the same?
In fact, for most children, arriving at fascination with the 18th century comes naturally as they ease into self-confidence at the instrument. The music is truly great and will speak for itself if not forced upon the child.
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