Conductors' ear-worms

[ardcarp]

From doing exactly as in my posting, a combination of all mentioned. I would love to hear these thoughts tried out, I could be completely off track, but I'll probably never know.

Only one thing for it, Suffy; grab yourself a stick and an orchestra and give them a whirl.

[Suffolkcoastal]

I'd better hurry up and win the Lottery so I can hire an orchestra for the day.

[Petrushka]

I'd better hurry up and win the Lottery so I can hire an orchestra for the day.

If you do can you please play the last movement of the Brahms 4 as marked: allegro energico e passionato? No-one else does as far as I know which is why so many recordings of it sound 'wrong' at least to this pair of ears.

[Tony Halstead]

If you do can you please play the last movement of the Brahms 4 as marked: allegro energico e passionato? No-one else does as far as I know which is why so many recordings of it sound 'wrong' at least to this pair of ears.

Hmm... what a pity that obviously you weren't at the Bridgewater hall in Manchester in early 2000 to hear The Hanover Band playing the 4th movement 'allegro energico e passionato'!

It's such a very great pity that Brahms 'withdrew' his metronome marks prior to publication of his works.
How wonderful that some of these these indications (for the German Requiem in particular), are now 'in the public domain'.

[Petrushka]

Hmm... what a pity that obviously you weren't at the Bridgewater hall in Manchester in early 2000 to hear The Hanover Band playing the 4th movement 'allegro energico e passionato'!.

Afraid I wasn't. I'm not a score reader or practising musician, just a listener, but that tempo indication seems to lead to expectations of something we rarely, if ever, get. Perhaps conductors think that the old man with the beard shouldn't be either energetic or passionate?

[aeolium]

An interesting thread this one. I don't think it is just as simple as studying the score or reviewing earlier recordings at least generally with 19th century music and earlier. The conductor will for some works, have a variety of editions to examine if he/she so chooses, how much of the finer detail, dynamics, phrasing, bowing, articulation, tempi etc is editorial, conductors will very rarely, if ever, have the chance to see the original score, and of course the earlier we go back the less finer detail is indicated by the composer. How do you judge the dynamics in music that only has the minimum detail? Understanding the structure of a piece and getting a feel for it, whether by playing through a reduction or listening to other interpretations, is key. Something suddenly sticks out and it leads to various other thoughts etc...

I actually relish the ambiguity and flexibility in interpretation which the imprecision of earlier musical scores allows. It allows us to recall a time before the obsessive precision which the age of recording has brought to interpretation, and a time when musical performance allowed for improvisation, ornamentation by singer or soloist and performances would vary according to place or time, with highly differentiated local characteristics, and scores being revised for new revivals of productions (e.g. Rameau's Dardanus). There may be some great music which has never come down to us from the C18 and early C19 simply because it only ever existed in performance, the improvisations of Mozart and Beethoven never committed to score.

Here are a couple of quotations about composers playing their own work*:

1) "Now his playing tore along like a wildly foaming cataract, and the conjurer constrained his instrument to an utterance so forceful that the stoutest structure was scarcely able to withstand it; and anon he sank down, exhausted, exhaling gentle plaints, dissolving in melancholy..."

2) "It was not always perfectly enjoyable to hear [....] play his own compositions, but it was always highly interesting. He played the themes with great emphasis and curiously free rhythms, so that one had the impression of strong light and shade. When he came to passionate parts, it was as though a tempest were tossing clouds, scattering them in magnificent fury."

The first was Beethoven, recalled by Ignaz von Seyfried (from Thayer's biography). The second was Brahms, as recalled in Eugenie Schumann's autobiography.

It is now possible for scores to be notated with a far greater degree of precision than was common two or three centuries ago, and even for a composer to supervise recording sessions for the greatest possible accuracy in rendition of the score. I am not sure that is a great advance. As an example of a case where the conscious deliberation of even a great composer does not necessarily encompass everything that is contained in the score, I put forward the case of Britten's Peter Grimes. This was a landmark work, written with a particular singer in mind, and performed on the stage and in the recording studio by that singer and under the excellent direction of the composer in justifiably famous performances. Yet the appearance of the recording by Colin Davis with the ROH and Jon Vickers in the title role showed a completely different perspective on the character, and on the opera. Britten apparently hated this interpretation, yet I think it's possible to argue that Davis and Vickers brought out something in the work that was latent and which the composer perhaps did not wish consciously to acknowledge: a real darkness and violence in the title character.

Perhaps this is getting somewhat off-topic and away from the specific question posed, but I would always call for flexibility in interpretation, particularly but not only when it comes to the interpretation of works from periods where we really do not know how the music sounded at the time.

*ed: the Beethoven report was of an improvisation, so he was not playing a written-down composition

[verismissimo]

Every time I emerged from deep sleep last night, I had 'the dog stood on the tucker box, nine miles from Gundagai' going round my head.

Is there any known cure for this condition? And is it on topic? I'm not often a conductor.

[ardcarp]

Here are a couple of quotations about composers playing their own work*:

1) "Now his playing tore along like a wildly foaming cataract, and the conjurer constrained his instrument to an utterance so forceful that the stoutest structure was scarcely able to withstand it; and anon he sank down, exhausted, exhaling gentle plaints, dissolving in melancholy..."

2) "It was not always perfectly enjoyable to hear [....] play his own compositions, but it was always highly interesting. He played the themes with great emphasis and curiously free rhythms, so that one had the impression of strong light and shade. When he came to passionate parts, it was as though a tempest were tossing clouds, scattering them in magnificent fury."

One is also reminded of the comment by his pupil (Mikuli?) that Chopin could not bear to hear the piano being played harshly or loudly, thus making it sound 'like a barking dog'. How many players take this into account? Has anyone ever heard, for instance, Prelude Op10 No12 (the Revolutionary) being played anything other than fff ?

[LeMartinPecheur]

Every time I emerged from deep sleep last night, I had 'the dog stood on the tucker box, nine miles from Gundagai' going round my head.

Is there any known cure for this condition? And is it on topic? I'm not often a conductor.

Could you please whistle it to us? - I for one don't recall it

[verismissimo]

Could you please whistle it to us? - I for one don't recall it

LMP, "Nine miles from Gundagai" is not at all the same as "Along the road to Gundagai", wonderfully performed by Peter Dawson, just in case you had them confused.

Here, I'll whistle them both for you...

[ahinton]

One is also reminded of the comment by his pupil (Mikuli?) that Chopin could not bear to hear the piano being played harshly or loudly, thus making it sound 'like a barking dog'. How many players take this into account? Has anyone ever heard, for instance, Prelude Op10 No12 (the Revolutionary) being played anything other than fff ?

Étude, s'il vous plaît - not Prelude! Never mind that, though; I wonder what Chopin would have thought of anyone playing that piece in Godowsky's transcription for left hand alone (and transposed up a semitone into C# minor at that, as Godowsky also did with Op. 25 No. 12, the so-called Ocean étude)? - or, for that matter, Dreyschock playing it earlier in the 19th century with the semiquaver passagework in octaves rather than single notes as Chopin wrote them?...

[Zucchini]

...in Godowsky's transcription for left hand alone (and transposed up a semitone into C# minor at that, as Godowsky also did with Op. 25 No. 12, the so-called Ocean étude)?

Not long ago I heard Boris Berezovsky play both of these as encores, plus Op. 10 No.1. In that context I think Chopin would have forgiven them. Unbelievably difficult - yet rt arm rested on top of the piano, astonishing power and completely relaxed. Very memorable.

[ahinton]

Not long ago I heard Boris Berezovsky play both of these as encores, plus Op. 10 No.1. In that context I think Chopin would have forgiven them. Unbelievably difficult - yet rt arm rested on top of the piano, astonishing power and completely relaxed. Very memorable.

Yes, he's one of still a relatively small handful (sorry!) of pianists who play this repertoire; others who have, over the years, explored some of these Chopin study transcriptions include Ian Hobson and Jorge Bolet, Michel Béroff and Ivan Ilić (who each made CDs of the left hand alone ones) as well as Marc-André Hamelin and Carlo Grante who have each recorded them all and Francesco Libetta who, unbelievably, has performed the entire cycle from memory in concert. I've often thought that any pianist capable of truly mastering these works as well as the Alkan Opp. 35 & 39 studies wuld be just about capable of tackling anything and everything in the piano reportoire yet, even today, their pedagogical value is by no means widely recognised.

[ardcarp]

Étude, s'il vous plaît - not Prelude!

Desolé.