Klarinet Archive - Posting 000338.txt from 2002/01

From: "Jim Hobby" <jhobby@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Conductor question; strange beat pattern (or -wheeere's the beat?")
Date: Sat, 12 Jan 2002 20:06:23 -0500

>From: Alexander Brash <mactrek@-----.com>

>I think I know the reason for this:
>I forgot the guy's name; but someone stipulated that if you give
>directions to the orchestra at the time they are to happen (that is, giving
>crescendos when they should be starting, giving downbeats at the moment
they
>occur), you are not DIRECTING what you WANT the orchestra to do, merely
>ILLUSTRATING what they are already doing. By give your directions before
>they actually occur, you are truly showing the orchestra what you want them
>to do.

Of course, I don't know who the guy was or with whom he was stipulating, but
I can't agree with this.

Hopefully, the majority of preparing the orchestra to play, whether it be
the notes or the various marks of expression, was done during rehearsal.
Giving the cues early, IMO, would only serve to confuse. As an example,
many years ago, I was playing 1st clarinet, replacing a regular player who
was ill. The conductor, a Hungarian, whose name I can't remember, was a
guest conductor. At some point during rehearsals of Pictures at an
Exhibition, he kept giving the 1st trumpet a cue. The trumpet made a jump
to try to come in, thinking he had miscounted, and finally asked, "Why are
you cuing me in the middle of a six-measure rest? The conductor said it was
to tell him to get ready for to enter. Lukily the conductor's English
wasn't too good, considering what the trumpet player called him.

Yes, you look at someone a few seconds before an entrance or whatever, but
the cue should be where the music is. I find conducting in advance very
muddy conducting.

>Yes, Masur does conduct like this.

>From his videos, yes and no. I have just watched the Brahms cycle (with
theLeipzig). It appears that he does make the initial downbeat into an
upbeat, but he gives a full wind-up and sets the tempo with a single beat
before the orchestra enters. Much of the time, throughout the performance,
his downbeat coincides with the downbeat in the music. He is definitely
conducting the expression markings where they belong; not before. I realize
one can't make a fast rule of what someone does from viewing one set of four
symphonies. And I suppose he may do things differently with different
orchestras.

Jim Hobby

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