Author: WhitePlainsDave
Date: 2016-02-12 02:11
"I'm surprised at the level of disdain some people are feeling for some of these coaching sessions."
I appreciate why you'd say that Marty: I really do. I can't speak for others, but I feel the way I do because my radar's out for gimmick over substance, in all aspects of clarinet, whether than be cryogenic ligatures or worthless advice.
But it's true, the master class listener may be infused with wisdom, even never intended by the master class teacher. Sometimes that wisdom even comes in the form of "okay, that's NOT how I'd teach/play it."
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Robert:
Ms. Sarmiento, the clarinetist in the thread that started this, I thought, did a wonderful job, phrasing and all. I thought the pianist, as I said, was the one that needed work when she took over the piece's voice after a few bars--but again, she may not be familiar with the work.
Should Ms. Sarmiento have better matched the pianist, or met her halfway...I guess that's open to argument. Should the pianist (a.k.a. the accompanist) have matched the clarinet...who went first??? That's a better question for me, and especially heightened here by my belief that Sarmiento was spot on in interpretation and the pianist was not.
If Zander's advice was good, to me, it's negated by my opinion that the soloist was already well doing what Zander suggested, and I wouldn't be the least surprised to find the soloist to have more experience with this work. Of course though, the maestro is always right. I guess I also found Zander's conducting thereafter, as if something were to be musically gleaned from his hand gestures at the time to be...more theatrics than substance, or too much theatrics relative to substance.
More theatrics than substance: that's what gets me, whether it's in product or teaching form.
I found this with Gilad too--much that he's a sort after teacher. I feel like the man has attempted to carve out a space for himself as the "pulmonary clarinet teacher" that feeds into Wind-o sales. (I'm sure his knowledge of clarinet is in countless areas.) This, by the way, is not to sell short the importance of our breath in sound, or to categorically say that new products can't possibly come along to help players, but rather to ask "how did we manage all these years to get along without it," and how if it was so great, vendors wouldn't be able to keep the product in stock even with no endorsers--in fact it would need no endorsers.
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As for interpretations of works are concerned, I'm certainly fine with those who know far more than I do, like Mr. Pay, offering their two cents on how to interpret a work, as long as their interpretations of the work are no more pedantic than the flexibility nearly all pieces allow in subtle changes to interpretation among players, and even withing the same player with the passage of time.
One more gripe and off the soapbox I go. I've seen Drucker, a personal hero, rip to shreds in Master Class some player's interpretation of a piece that they would approach they same way I would---and not because I'm the last word in interpretation, but because I got my interpretation imitating (or so I thought) Drucker's approach to it on a recording he did.
Ed was right above about a player's need to be like a burglar in a Master class: stealing from it only the content that speaks to you.
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