Klarinet Archive - Posting 000028.txt from 1999/03

From: "Steven J Goldman, MD" <sjgoldman@-----.com>
Subj: RE: [kl] Craig Hill's comments on Steve Goldman's note
Date: Mon, 1 Mar 1999 15:02:14 -0500

Dan's definitions are very good and useful when discussing performance
practice. If only the early writers and composers were as careful about
terminology, things would be a lot clearer today.

There were some ornaments that were considered as such by musicians, were
NOT written out by the composer, but still not really considered
improvisation. One such was the flattement (a type of vibrato not used, or
even possible, on modern instruments). There were specific occasions when a
performer was to use it, but it was almost never written out.

Italian music tended to rely on performer improvisation, particularly in the
slow movements, and French music tended to rely on ornamentation. Most
contemporary writers mentioned that, depending on the composer and/or
copyist, not all ornaments were written down even then (pieces meant for the
amateur had more detail, while those headed for professional players assumed
a common vocabulary where it was known where to put what).

Steve

-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Leeson: LEESON@-----.edu]
Subject: [kl] Craig Hill's comments on Steve Goldman's note

I notice that in Craig's note, he kept a snip of Steve's original
posting in which Steve commented on Sabine Meyer's "ornamentation."
(and since I don't have the note in front of me, I can't be sure
that he did not say "embellishment").

We need some more rigorous terminology here. The words at issue
are "ornamentation," "embellishment," and "improvisation."

"Ornamentation" is what the composer does. He or she writes a mordent,
a trill, a grace note, a turn, etc. and the performer is obliged to
interpret what should be done in response to the composer's notation;
i.e., should the trill begin on the tone or above it, should the grace
note be on the beat or before it, should the mordent go up or down,
should the turn commence with the lower note or the upper, etc.?

So performers do not ornament. They simply interprete the composer's
ornaments all of which are written down and all of which must be
intepreted in a historically correct fashion; i.e., the inclusion or
exclusion of a nachshlag at the conclusion of a trill, for example.

"Improvisation" is what the performer does as s/he deviates from what
the composer has written down; i.e., the composer writes a single note
pickup which the performer choses to play as a series of pickup notes,
the composer writes a note, the performer plays a trill instead, etc.

Improvisation is supposed to be spontaneous but it is not always so,
unfortunately. It's purpose is to permit each performance to be
characteristic, unique, personal, one-off. In general it is a skill-
oriented element of playing.....

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