Klarinet Archive - Posting 000479.txt from 2005/08

From: Tony Pay <tony.p@-----.org>
Subj: Re: [kl] Composers as teachers
Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2005 18:15:41 -0400

On 25 Aug, ormo2ndtoby@-----.net (Ormondtoby Montoya) wrote:

> Joseph Wakeling pointed out the distinction between (not verbatim) 'put
> one's personality into' vs. 'search inside oneself for support of'.
> Tony said the same thing in different words. He talked about (again not
> verbatim) 'changing oneself' instead of 'injecting oneself'.
>
> It's a very fundamental difference, and I believe it is where Tony's and
> my attitudes differ. I personally believe that either attitude can produce
> bad results when enforced in the wrong context or when carried to extremes.

The trouble is that what you describe as 'your attitude', if taken seriously,
is not only damaging to young players, but incoherent in itself.

> Thus, I acknowledge that one should think about what the music is 'saying',
> or what it was meant to say when it was composed,

..yes...

> or what other people want it to say.

I don't understand how that comes in at all. Why should we care what other
people want it to say? (Unless, of course, you mean that we're playing for a
director who demands that it say a particular something.)

> But other aspects, such as what the performer wants to 'say' for his/her
> own satisfaction, are valid also (imo).

The question is, how does 'what the performer wants to say' get chosen? What
is allowed?

For example, does the choice of 'what the performer wants to say' trivially
include changing the text of the work of a great composer?

I mentioned in a previous post that taking seriously *all* the possible
varieties of 'what the performer wants to say' about a piece would make
spitting on the floor, holding a clarinet in front of a music stand bearing
the part of the Stravinsky Three Pieces, 'count' as a performance of the
Stravinsky.

If we're to talk seriously about characterising performance, then we need a
characterisation that *includes* arbitrary performer choices when appropriate
(as in the Cage Clarinet Sonata), *allows* stylistically appropriate
performer contributions (as in classical embellishment), and *demands*
performer fidelity to the score when appropriate (as in the Brahms Sonatas).

'My own satisfaction' nowhere near covers what is required. The
characterisation, 'performer satisfaction' for a great work (like one of the
Brahms sonatas) might suffice for someone who has spent a lifetime working in
the world of performance, and who is part of a tradition shaped by many great
musicians -- what would satisfy *them* would be acceptable -- but it doesn't
suffice for some young whippersnapper keen to look good, flashy and sexy (or,
at the other end of the scale, someone concerned to feel 'comfortable'
playing.)

As Sarah Elbaz pointed out, a johnny/jeannie-come-lately might be satisfied
by lots of audience applause, or a good write-up, or the prospect of being
paid lots of money in the future, or that they win a competition, or that
they become famous...or any number of other things totally unconnected with
the music. (Indeed, they sometimes make all too clear that these are their
concerns.)

I deny that any of that can be part of a proper understanding of what playing
is about.

We need to look at the whole matter in a deeper way.

WHO ARE YOU, when you play?

Great players speak of 'transcending their personalities' in the act of
performing. It is as though the music speaks through them. And though we
cannot all be great players, the germ of that is possible to all of us.

The first step is to allow the possibility that, in Zen terms, 'you are not
the doer' when you play. You have to 'let yourself' play -- which involves
including parts of yourself that are not under conscious control.

Students, and not so able players, are usually rather concerned with
what they call, 'their playing'. They sometimes ask me, "what do you think
of my playing?" even when I have just been describing how what they do falls
short of what the music demands. It is as though they think of 'their
playing' as *themselves*.

But your playing is *not* yourself, in that characterisation of 'yourself'.
You can't have your consciousness, or your ego, or 'how you play', drive your
performance, because music is a partly conscious, partly unconscious
phenomenon, like all art.

Getting your attention off your smaller self, what could be more appropriate
than putting your attention on what you think the music may be asking of you?

In doing so, you set your foot on a road that may lead you closer to
greatness -- if you are prepared to have the great composers be your
teachers.

Tony
--
_________ Tony Pay
|ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd tony.p@-----.org
| |ay Oxford OX2 6RE http://classicalplus.gmn.com/artists
tel/fax 01865 553339

... I like cats, too. Let's exchange recipes.

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