Percussion has become the sonic centerpiece of much contemporary music. I think it is in reaction to a cleaned-up sound that simply does not excite curiosity. What is more exciting than a gong or a chime or a triangle!
The piano's capacity for magic has all but disappeared from modern playing. Pianists take full pedal with each harmony, changing when the harmony changes whether or not this is called for--and there are plenty of occasions when it is not only not called for but when it is a downright bad idea. When this leads to full pedal changes at every barline, for instance.
The most amusing instrumentation is pairing the piano with vibraphone. It is as if the composer wants to put the pedaled sound back into play and knows that the pianist will not do it (after years of being told not to).
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Monday, October 8, 2012
Lowell Liebermann Wakes Up the Ear
This is an entirely unsolicited post praising the work of Lowell Liebermann. I first knew of him after stumbling on his Album for the Young, a collection of piano pieces that has proved a surprising hit with my students of all ages, and with me. The pieces cover a considerable range of genre and difficulty; but most important, they stimulate instrumental sensitivity, and they relate to the soundscape of our time.
The other evening he conducted MACE, a new ensemble at Mannes, dedicated to the performance of living American composers. Like the pieces in the piano album, his selection of works covered a considerable range, peaking in one that required minutest attention to tuning by the ensemble's individual winds and strings. The students were so obviously really into it that I didn't want to miss an instant of their attentiveness. Afterward some of them said they had had a wonderful time playing that piece.
How unlike the standard fare of everyone sounding like everyone else. Here was music that wouldn't allow the players for a moment to get away with that. Though not a piece of Liebermann's own composition it was clear from his programming that he understands the needs of today's audience and of today's players.
The other evening he conducted MACE, a new ensemble at Mannes, dedicated to the performance of living American composers. Like the pieces in the piano album, his selection of works covered a considerable range, peaking in one that required minutest attention to tuning by the ensemble's individual winds and strings. The students were so obviously really into it that I didn't want to miss an instant of their attentiveness. Afterward some of them said they had had a wonderful time playing that piece.
How unlike the standard fare of everyone sounding like everyone else. Here was music that wouldn't allow the players for a moment to get away with that. Though not a piece of Liebermann's own composition it was clear from his programming that he understands the needs of today's audience and of today's players.
Sunday, October 7, 2012
Sensing and Knowing
Recently there has been some attention in the media on the phenomenon whereby animals, including humans, react physiologically to imminent threats (the presence of a rattlesnake, for example) before knowing consciously what the threat actually is. Sensing precedes knowing.
The process of Tonal Refraction exposes that moment in playing, that nano-second during which we feel that the sound we are about to make is going either to hurt or elate us and we adapt our touch to reflect that feeling. This, I am convinced, is the basis of artistry at the instrument. It has nothing to do with interpretation, since interpretation involves conscious decisions. It is immediate, sensual, and completely transparent.
I have seen young children experience this moment, hovering over the decision as to when to actually play the offending interval.
I have seen adults hesitate to make the first sound at a lesson; by their hesitation I can tell that they are anticipating playing on their own out-of-tune piano.
Do you find this incredible? Please let me know.
The process of Tonal Refraction exposes that moment in playing, that nano-second during which we feel that the sound we are about to make is going either to hurt or elate us and we adapt our touch to reflect that feeling. This, I am convinced, is the basis of artistry at the instrument. It has nothing to do with interpretation, since interpretation involves conscious decisions. It is immediate, sensual, and completely transparent.
I have seen young children experience this moment, hovering over the decision as to when to actually play the offending interval.
I have seen adults hesitate to make the first sound at a lesson; by their hesitation I can tell that they are anticipating playing on their own out-of-tune piano.
Do you find this incredible? Please let me know.
Saturday, October 6, 2012
More on Fast, Faster
For the past 19 years I have been applying the sense of Tonal Refraction in my playing and my teaching. To my surprise, this is what I have found:
The act of listening is so fast that as both player and listener I can hear intention as well as actual sounds. This action between the notes, as Victor Zuckerkandl so brilliantly described it in Sound and Symbol is what turns sounds into music. His work, a huge revelation when I read it in the 1960's, provided the basis for my life as a musician.
In order to listen this quickly I have had to slow myself down. It is a question of forest and trees: The notes were getting in the way of the music. My conscious mind was missing the point.
Tonal Refraction provided a reliable means of getting the point by forcing me to depict the many dimensions of sound, one vibration at a time.
Listening this way has deepened my insights into the music I play and the music I listen to. It makes it possible for me to relate to the labored playing of a less than fluent student--often the one who really wants and needs affirmation of their deeply musical being.
You can find out more about Tonal Refraction on my website www.tonalrefraction.com, which will soon be remodeled; or by contacting me.
The act of listening is so fast that as both player and listener I can hear intention as well as actual sounds. This action between the notes, as Victor Zuckerkandl so brilliantly described it in Sound and Symbol is what turns sounds into music. His work, a huge revelation when I read it in the 1960's, provided the basis for my life as a musician.
In order to listen this quickly I have had to slow myself down. It is a question of forest and trees: The notes were getting in the way of the music. My conscious mind was missing the point.
Tonal Refraction provided a reliable means of getting the point by forcing me to depict the many dimensions of sound, one vibration at a time.
Listening this way has deepened my insights into the music I play and the music I listen to. It makes it possible for me to relate to the labored playing of a less than fluent student--often the one who really wants and needs affirmation of their deeply musical being.
You can find out more about Tonal Refraction on my website www.tonalrefraction.com, which will soon be remodeled; or by contacting me.
Friday, October 5, 2012
Ambiguity
Last week I had the privilege of seeing the Roundabout Theatre's production of Cyrano de Bergerac, which I had never seen before. Talking it over today with an actress friend I found myself praising the actor who played the lead for giving the character the depth and mystery of a late Beethoven sonata: challenging all definitions, risking disintegration, coming together movingly in the play's final moments.
"Isn't that what all art is about?" she asked.
Ironically, at the suggestion of another friend, a literary type, I had just begun reading Melville's Pierre or The Ambiguities, of which I had never even heard. It is hilarious. Off the wall funny. The edition I bought starts with a long introduction written by someone who believes that the reader, left to her own devices, will certainly miss the point. That is always a possibility; history has many examples of readers/viewers/listeners missing the point, some of them in print. (Take a look at Slonimsky's Dictionary of Musical Invective.)
But I enjoy taking the risk of being the only one in the theatre who laughs aloud, as at the showing many years ago of a documentary about the English countryside. At a closeup of a herd of cows slopping up their fodder from the trough, the unseen orchestra struck up the overture to Cosi fan tutti. Upon my bursting out laughing the usher threatened to throw me out.
"Isn't that what all art is about?" she asked.
Ironically, at the suggestion of another friend, a literary type, I had just begun reading Melville's Pierre or The Ambiguities, of which I had never even heard. It is hilarious. Off the wall funny. The edition I bought starts with a long introduction written by someone who believes that the reader, left to her own devices, will certainly miss the point. That is always a possibility; history has many examples of readers/viewers/listeners missing the point, some of them in print. (Take a look at Slonimsky's Dictionary of Musical Invective.)
But I enjoy taking the risk of being the only one in the theatre who laughs aloud, as at the showing many years ago of a documentary about the English countryside. At a closeup of a herd of cows slopping up their fodder from the trough, the unseen orchestra struck up the overture to Cosi fan tutti. Upon my bursting out laughing the usher threatened to throw me out.
Thursday, October 4, 2012
It Takes Too Long
After listening to the less naturally gifted sibling play a Bartok piece from For Children, Vol. II, I am struck by the utter finesse of touch, the profound connection with the affect of every sound, the total genuineness of the playing. Facile? No. Energetic? Definitely, but with an inner energy that would not pass muster in a setting in which everyone plays more or less uniformly.
Why must everyone sound like everyone else?
Whose ear are we trying to please?
Teaching piano conventionally feels like putting words into people's mouths. Granted it takes a long time to process meaning in terms of sound and to trust oneself to play in such a way as not to obstruct that meaning.
When I asked the student to describe what the playing was like, the reply was, "It's breaking through." What an accurate assessment of a difficult and rewarding process.
I could have dashed off the piece without a second thought at the same age, undoubtedly finding the piece too simple, but I could never have been so confident and so candid.
Why must everyone sound like everyone else?
Whose ear are we trying to please?
Teaching piano conventionally feels like putting words into people's mouths. Granted it takes a long time to process meaning in terms of sound and to trust oneself to play in such a way as not to obstruct that meaning.
When I asked the student to describe what the playing was like, the reply was, "It's breaking through." What an accurate assessment of a difficult and rewarding process.
I could have dashed off the piece without a second thought at the same age, undoubtedly finding the piece too simple, but I could never have been so confident and so candid.
Wednesday, October 3, 2012
Fast / Not so Fast; Talented / Not as Talented
It is tempting to get into the real problems underlying our education system, but I will avoid that lure and focus instead on the familial dynamics of talent. In a way it offers a glimpse into the greater societal issues.
Take a family with two children. Imagine that the older of the two is a completely normal (whatever that is) child, while the younger has severe developmental challenges. Imagine that music is the only thing that makes interpersonal sense to the younger child and that, therefore, she is given music lessons. What does this do to the older sibling? It makes them want that. What is that? The music, perhaps; the attention; the specialness; the power.
It makes them work harder than hard to get it, whatever it is.
Dealing with music's intensity is a family enterprise, much too important to be relegated to the conventional achievement associated with facility. This often proves ultimately to be superficial, especially compared to the deep yearning in the less facile sibling.
In my own family music manifests itself completely differently in both my adult children, and differently from me. Music is unquestionably life and health and joy.
Take a family with two children. Imagine that the older of the two is a completely normal (whatever that is) child, while the younger has severe developmental challenges. Imagine that music is the only thing that makes interpersonal sense to the younger child and that, therefore, she is given music lessons. What does this do to the older sibling? It makes them want that. What is that? The music, perhaps; the attention; the specialness; the power.
It makes them work harder than hard to get it, whatever it is.
Dealing with music's intensity is a family enterprise, much too important to be relegated to the conventional achievement associated with facility. This often proves ultimately to be superficial, especially compared to the deep yearning in the less facile sibling.
In my own family music manifests itself completely differently in both my adult children, and differently from me. Music is unquestionably life and health and joy.
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