How old is HIPP ?

[Chris Newman]

I associate it with the early 1970s, too.

Certainly there was 'Early Music' before that, but women's voices, especially, didn't sound right until singers like Emma Kirkby came along. I seem to remember that April Cantelo's voice never fitted the rest of the Deller Connsort too well, but I may be misremembering.

She's not credited here, but I assume she's the top line:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKIySHHAT70

Honor Shepherd and Eileen Poulter sang with the Dellers whilst using very little vibrato. Shirley Minty (the contralto) eschewed it too for many years. Eileen Poulter and Mary Thomas sing on these famous RVW folk-song settings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzC9MrZ_t_0

Except in Greensleeves most of his singers use very little vibrato at all except at climaxes although Deller himself does more often. Deller was a pioneer, persuaded by Michael Tippett to bring the counter-tenor out of the cathedral into the concert hall. I found his voice very small compared with the likes of Cencic, Daniels and Jarrousky today, who quite happily sing Berlioz and Mahler song cycles with orchestras.

[Tony Halstead]

I found his voice very small compared with the likes of Cencic, Daniels and Jarrousky today, who quite happily sing Berlioz and Mahler song

Yes, Chris, agreed, that his voice was indeed quite small in that very vocal region where female contraltos 'bloom' and often ( heaven help us) 'boom'!
BUT his Deller's unique ( at that time) trait was to do a sort of 'reverse bel-canto' - so instead of soaring into a higher decibel at (potentially) climactic moments he backed-away with his dynamic level, somehow 'compelling' you, the listener, to focus on the words.

[JFLL]

Hmm. I would suggest "evolutionary" rather than "revolutionary" and that to achieve a performance that is closer to that which the composer imagined is to achieve a "better" performance - but "better" than whom is another question ....

Thank you, ferney, you almost convince me!

A concern for historical accuracy is, I think, a rather new thing. Composers of previous ages didn't seem to bother too much about it, if one goes by the arrangements they made of the works of their predecessors, and some respected musicians today still take that view – e.g. Colin Davis, who was quite acerbic about historical accuracy when he was asked in an interview about his Haydn interpretations. I'm probably a bit biased myself, in that I can't, for example, see the attraction of playing Mozart, Haydn or Beethoven on a fortepiano when it sounds so much better (at least in my judgement) on a modern piano. I have a blind spot for harpsichords in Bach, as well.. I sometimes think, too, that Beethoven, for example, would have preferred a modern concert grand to the instruments at his disposal, so maybe 'what the composer intended' shouldn't be overemphasized. Having said that, I do find that I'd now on the whole rather listen to Pinnock or Mackerras (or even René Jacobs, sometimes) in a Mozart symphony than Bruno Walter, Klemperer or Karl Böhm, and Gardiner or Suzuki in a Bach cantata than Karl Richter (though I do still prefer the solo voices of say the 1960s to those of today -- they seem to have more human warmth), so I suppose my ear must have been 'educated' to a certain degree. And there are certainly ear-opening HIPP performances of Romantic works, e.g. a recent performance I heard of Brüggen conducting Weber's 1st symphony, and the Brahms cycle with Gardiner.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I'm happy with "almost" JFLL!

The joy of HIPP () for me is that it that it enriches my listening pleasure. I can (and do) listen with awe to Fürtwängler and Fischer's recording of the Emporer, or Davis' Haydn recordings with the Concertgebeouw - or Ferrier's Bach, Handel and Purcell (I did this yesterday, in fact!) - and revel in the unique insights that these performances bring to the Music. But to listen to "Parrott's" B minor Mass, or Krevine's Beethoven cycle, or McCreesh's Venetian recordings brings its own equally special spiritual, intellectual and emotional joys that show how the composers knew exactly what they were doing with the media they worked with, that "what they intended" is as sublime as it needs to - or can - be!

Best Wishes.

[jean]

Honor Shepherd and Eileen Poulter sang with the Dellers whilst using very little vibrato. Shirley Minty (the contralto) eschewed it too for many years. Eileen Poulter and Mary Thomas sing on these famous RVW folk-song settings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzC9MrZ_t_0

Except in Greensleeves most of his singers use very little vibrato at all except at climaxes although Deller himself does more often. Deller was a pioneer, persuaded by Michael Tippett to bring the counter-tenor out of the cathedral into the concert hall. I found his voice very small compared with the likes of Cencic, Daniels and Jarrousky today, who quite happily sing Berlioz and Mahler song cycles with orchestras.

I fell in love with Deller's voice as a child from a 78 my father had with Fine knacks for Ladies on one side, and In Darkness let me Dwell on the other. I don't think I ever heard him live.

I'd forgotten the other sopranos you mention, but reminding myself via YouTube, I know I never liked any of them much. I thought I was better off not having singing lessons myself because I was afraid of what they might do to my voice. I would now, though. And yet Deller has lots of vibrato. Why didn't I mind that?

Checking up some details about him just now, I find Wiki says that 'he formed the Deller Consort in 1948, a group dedicated to historically informed performance.' I'm sure they didn't call it that! 'Authentic' was used for a time, wasn't it? But not in 1948.

[Chris Newman]

An amusing tale is often told after concerts by countertenors (I have heard it from James Bowman and Michael Chance) of a recital Alfred Deller gave with his son, Mark, in Paris. A lady came up to them and said "Monsieur Deller, vous etes un eunuch?"

Deller smiled and hugged his son to him. "Aucune Madame. Votre prononciation est un peu incorrecte. Je ne suis pas un eunush. Je suis unique."

[doversoul1]

Apologies for bringing up my old thread and for going off the topic but as our thoughts are on Alfred Deller, I thought this may be of interest to some members who did not see the original. Only a short thread but the posts are very moving.

http://www.for3.org/forums/showthread.php?2041-Alfred-Deller-on-In-Tune

[verismissimo]

I can't, for example, see the attraction of playing Mozart, Haydn or Beethoven on a fortepiano when it sounds so much better (at least in my judgement) on a modern piano. I have a blind spot for harpsichords in Bach, as well.. I sometimes think, too, that Beethoven, for example, would have preferred a modern concert grand to the instruments at his disposal, so maybe 'what the composer intended' shouldn't be overemphasized.

I used to see these issues as either/or, as you do JFLL, but I'm much happier nowadays to see them as both/and.

[JFLL]

I used to see these issues as either/or, as you do JFLL, but I'm much happier nowadays to see them as both/and.

No, no! I don't see them at all as either/or (if you mean that people either like or hate HIPP), as I tried to say in my last post in reply to Ferney. I can see the virtues of, say, Brautigam's or Levin's Beethoven, I just think that the fortepiano doesn't do full justice to the music, however good the interpretation. It's a personal thing, I know, but I wouldn't reject HIPP performances out of hand.

[Bryn]

No, no! I don't see them at all as either/or (if you mean that people either like or hate HIPP), as I tried to say in my last post in reply to Ferney. I can see the virtues of, say, Brautigam's or Levin's Beethoven, I just think that the fortepiano doesn't do full justice to the music, however good the interpretation. It's a personal thing, I know, but I wouldn't reject HIPP performances out of hand.

Indeed, and it took Wendy Carlos to do full justice to Bach, eh?

[Panjandrum]

I sometimes think, too, that Beethoven, for example, would have preferred a modern concert grand to the instruments at his disposal, so maybe 'what the composer intended' shouldn't be overemphasized.

As has been well documented, Beethoven continually exhorted his piano makers to come up with bigger, louder and better instruments, and was famous for being dissatisfied with the instruments of the day. In fact, in the whole history of the development of the pianoforte in the 19th century I can't think of a single composer who complained at being given an instrument with greater range or tonal depth than its predecessors. I stand to be corrected but not until Poulenc composed the Concert Champetre for Landowska, Martinu, Ligeti and Xenakis in the 20th century had anyone composed for the harpsichord in over 150 years.

[prokkyshosty]

May I suggest here the influence of the organ in HIPP? Organ building took a complete detour in the 1930s and 40s from the "symphonic" monsters of Ernest Skinner to much more modest tracker-action instruments that could more accurately convey the music of Bach the way 'the master intended it to be heard'.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

As has been well documented, Beethoven continually exhorted his piano makers to come up with bigger, louder and better instruments, and was famous for being dissatisfied with the instruments of the day.

Well, he was quite happy with the Broadwood piano he was given in 1818 and the Graf instrument in 1825. And, no matter what his reservations with his instruments, he wrote Music that "fitted" their "weaknesses"; only when he had access to these "stronger" instruments did he write the "stronger" Music that they could produce. The "twang" and tang of these instruments are a joy unto themselves. Played expertly, they reveal different timbres in the various registers that the composers of the time expected to hear (part of Beethoven's complaint was that these couldn't be heard in larger halls) and that the homogenized sound of the modern Steinway has abolished:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvVbiqyMvGM

... there's also a greater contrast in sound in the early 19th Century Piano una corda pedal (it's a real con sordino effect!) that no modern instrument matches.

This is not "rubbishing" Steinway, or Schnabel, Brendel, Gilels, Gould or anyone, by the way: I have no doubt that Beethoven would've loved the chance to write for the modern Concert Grand. But he would have written different Music for it, just as he always did when presented with technological developments. (I'm equally sure that he would have relished writing for the Synthesizer, and, if he'd met Ravi Shankar, the Sitar. But that's another matter!) I merely wishing to point out that these early timbres tell their own stories - they're emphatically not merely what the composer had to "put up" with.

[JFLL]

Indeed, and it took Wendy Carlos to do full justice to Bach, eh?

That's certainly Either/Or!

[John Skelton]

... there's also a greater contrast in sound in the early 19th Century Piano una corda pedal (it's a real con sordino effect!) that no modern instrument matches.

And one which, once heard in Schubert, reveals a deficiency of the modern concert grand in Schubert's music (which isn't to say that Pollini is 'wrong' to play Schubert on a Steinway, etc.).

Beethoven may have had a characteristically adversarial relationship with contemporary instrumental technology, but Chopin disliked developments which made the piano "bigger, louder." With Beethoven once familiarity had set in I'm sure he'd have been dissatisfied with modern concert grands, wanting to push them beyond themselves into new areas of possibility. That's how Beethoven's music tends to relate to its own sonic materiality, if that makes sense. But he wouldn't have written the 'Waldstein' sonata if that hypothetical situation had been real:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4Ut2a8Bgn4