Klarinet Archive - Posting 001376.txt from 2000/12

From: "Tony Wakefield" <tony-wakefield@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Technique and Musicality
Date: Sat, 30 Dec 2000 16:51:11 -0500

Hello America,
I hope you all enjoyed your holiday.

Re Tony Pay
Look at <this> 30 Dec. mail carefully. Read it thoroughly. Note it`s <tone &
manner>. And do reply to it sensibly, calmly and intellectually. It <has>
within it quite a lot of substance.

Best,
Tony W.
P.S. I have only <just> come to think, (a bit late, but let that be) and
believe that the <real> millennium was the beginning of <this> year. If
Jesus was born in <say> year nought,(Christian calendar), i.e. on his 1st
birthday, the year which would have elapsed would have been <one> year.
Therefore the following has some logic - year 0 to 1. Year 1000 to 1001.
Year 2000 to 2001. Therefore year 2001 is a celebration of his 1st birthday.
2000 years hence. Yes? No? It seems so to me.

From: "Tony Pay"

> On Sat, 30 Dec 2000 07:38:31 +1100, redcedar@-----.au said:
>
> > To Messrs Garrett, Leupold and Pay (rendered in alpha-order),
> >
> > I am trying to make sense of the mountain of words on this topic in
> > recent weeks.
> >
> > I understand what has been said to be as follows:
> >
> > 1. Technique and musicality are inter-dependent.
> >
> > 2. The acquisition of technique typically precedes musicality
> > (interpreted here as musical expression).
> >
> > 3. An emphasis on technique typically gives way to an emphasis on
> > musicality as one proceeds in the learning/performance process.
> >
> > [This third point may be understood as much in terms of the raw
> > beginner, as in the case of the skilled professional coming to grips
> > with a new work.]
> >
> > And:
> >
> > 4. The disagreement between the parties is one of degree, rather than
> > a conceptual gulf.
>
> My own view is that the disagreement is a conceptual gulf, because
> musicality is a way of being with the music, whereas the word
> 'technique' applies to what performers actually do. Embodying that
> distinction, as Anne Lenoir says, seems to be a very simple thing for a
> good performer. It's not often talked about usefully, because that's
> difficult.
>
> But surely many things we find simple are difficult to talk about.
> Think of the training eye-surgeons have to go through in order to
> understand how they may help our sight, which must be the most simple
> and immediate 'given' in our world -- when it's working.
>
> With regard to the discussion so far, I'd say the others have either not
> fully understood what I was saying, or have deliberately misrepresented
> what I said in order to ridicule it. This last might seem more
> plausible in the light of Roger Garrett's most recent post in reply to
> you, where he makes his own personal agenda embarrassingly explicit.
> (Just a little more on that later.)
>
> Actually, I was quite surprised to find, on my return (from *work*-),
> that the thread had gone in the way it had. My last post was admittedly
> quite outspoken on the subject of performers who demonstrate hollow
> technical mastery whilst seeming to leave the music itself strangely
> unrepresented: I said it was for me, "the worst thing". And I do think
> it is, as do many other musicians I talk to.
>
> Though it's a world-wide problem, it's a problem to which the US and
> Russia, whilst producing more than their fair share of wonderful
> musicians, make a notable contribution, partly because they have
> particularly well-developed 'schools' of instruction. I find it
> particularly noticeable in string playing. And it's something that I
> think is a concern for all teachers.
>
> With regard to the other side of the matter, it is of course our job to
> make technical problems go away in one way or another. That's best done
> by isolating the problems and working on them. As has been said, all
> good teachers do that, and it is a nonsense to suggest that I think the
> contrary, or do the contrary.
>
> It's important to see that isolating a *problem* is different from
> isolating a whole part of technique -- staccato, say -- and having that
> part be hardwired in, to be done in a fixed way. If you say: of course,
> that's just the beginning, and different staccatos will come later, then
> in one way you're right, because that's the way it most often happens.
>
> But what *also* can happen is that some students fail to understand at
> the beginning that using staccato is an element in a much larger
> enterprise; so that even when presented with examples of different sorts
> of staccato at a later stage, they not only are unable to produce those
> different sorts of staccato, but are *unable to see how and why they
> might be desirable*.
>
> A problem always arises in a musical context; so that, choosing another
> example, what is a problem in one context, not making a resonant, bel
> canto sound, is not a problem in another musical context, where the
> ability to produce wispy yet clear passagework may be exactly what is
> required. Of course, at the beginning of a player's acquaintance with
> the instrument, such a distinction is much too subtle. But there are
> other ways of making the music real, as something we may always be aware
> of as we develop our technique to express it.
>
> Just recently, Neil, off playing toy tanks in the snow with 'chum' Roger
> Garrett and his bottle of Cabernet, shouted across to me (together with
> other affectionate boyish taunts) that he is no longer interested in
> reading what I'd been preparing to say about the question of how
> musicality may be involved in the process of teaching technical matters.
> But others have expressed an interest privately, so I shall probably
> post it in the end.
>
> With regard to Roger Garrett himself -- well, what can I say?
>
> > I wouldn't call it a disagreement; I would call it an obsession on
> > that person's part! Obsession to be the king, the big cheese, the
> > head honcho, the number one guy, the all important, the uno numero,
> > the big guy, the top gun, the omnipotent..........!!! LOL I actually
> > find the time spent vehemently arguing against technique as
> > redundantly stupid - almost like arguing against gasoline when you own
> > a Jaguar, or arguing for recycling paper and then buying
> > Pampers..........
> >
> > 1 dimensional thinking.....perhaps 2 dimensional. Now I have no
> > problem with 1 or 2 dimensional thinking - we have to deal with these
> > kinds of jokers all the time - but give one a gun and watch out!
>
> I could obviously take several lines in replying to this; but perhaps
> I'll just say that, although Roger may think that I want to be all those
> things, I notice that I detect no signs of that, internal or external,
> when someone like David Niethamer makes a post.
>
> That's because what David has to say always makes sense in the context
> of the job of playing music, and he very often has the exactly pertinent
> observation available (or more accurately, the exactly pertinent
> *collection* of observations available) to give to the person who is
> experiencing a problem.
>
> There are others like David here; though, unfortunately, not enough of
> them.
>
> But doubtless Roger will have something to say about my saying that too
> <sigh>.
>
> Tony

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