 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: jnguyen
Date: 2018-10-01 09:36
Hi,
I’m a high school student, and in a college interview I was asked if I thought music was either self-expression or a form of acting. I was wondering what others would think. Do you think it’s strictly one of them, both of them, neither of them, etc.? Thanks!
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2018-10-01 14:30
That still strikes me as an odd question for a college interview, however I have in recent years thought about this comparison as an ensemble player. My wife is an actress and over the years have seen similarities in these fields. Actors take all the skills that they develop over the years to give the performance as dictated by the script, the director and the producers. Similarly an ensemble player has the musical road map before her/him, but then there are the parameters imposed by the dynamic of the ensemble itself (and I mean that regarding pitch, style, established tradition etc.) and the obviously the directions of the conductor (the first and last arbiter of how the final product should sound).
We hear all the time about iconic roles in movies that only through happenstance would have been performed by someone else (one example is that Buddy Ebson was originally supposed to be the "Tin Man" in the Wizard of Oz) and can't even imagine how different that would have been. I don't believe anymore that the difference would have been nearly as jarring as I previously thought.
Now if you are speaking more of a composer or singer/songwriter, then you are back to music as an expressive art rather than what would be seen as an interpretive one.
..................Paul Aviles
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2018-10-01 16:12
>> ...in a college interview I was asked if I thought music was either self-expression or a form of acting. >>
What did you answer?
Tony
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Author: GenEric
Date: 2018-10-02 05:01
Personally, I think that we're a bit of both. As classical musicians, we're actors trying to serve the composer of the piece by playing it like composer intended. At the same time, we have our own nuances to the piece which the self expression part. Never thought of it too long but this might get you started.
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Author: Matt74
Date: 2018-10-07 04:49
I’d like to hear what you said too.
They want an interesting discussion. That’s all. It’s a “thought” question. Questions they want a particular answer to are more direct, and more cut and dried. The most important thing is that you can engage with them in a thoughtful discussion about making music.
When you get asked a “thought” question do this: First, you need to understand what the question is really asking. Think about what the question is really “getting at”. It’s ok to ask for a clarification like “Could you say more about that?”. (If they won’t say any more about the question it’s because they have to ask everyone exactly the same thing.) Second, you need to respond directly to the *topic* (not necessarily the question precisely as it was phrased). Third, you need to show your ability to reflect on things.
It’s more important that you can say why you think what you do, rather than that you have a definite strong opinion. You should have a thought to offer, but you don’t have to insist on being right. They just want to know what you think.
Basically, I assume really wanted to hear you say something insightful about making music, that also shows you have thought about what music is and why you play.
I might have said how it is a little like both, but isn’t really either, and then said more about what I think it really is.
This particular question isn’t a very good one because the options are not mutually exclusively exclusive (acting can be a form of self expression); and because music is neither acting nor pure self expression. A better question would have been, “Is making music more about expressing yourself or more about reflecting the composer’s intention?”
- Matthew Simington
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Author: Windy Dreamer
Date: 2018-10-07 06:32
The question is absurd because niether answer is correct. The object of the question is a psychological test. If you answer in defense of either position you demonstrate a combination of ignorance and cowardice in the face of errant authority. The correct answer would be that neither choice is correct and that music is much more than both.
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Author: dorjepismo ★2017
Date: 2018-10-07 07:46
I've frequently been told by chamber coaches and so on that musicians should be more like actors. The intent is to get people to understand that just playing the notes with a nice sound and plausible style isn't enough, and that's a valid point if you listen to, say, really good string quartets. The players try to embody the music itself, rather than representing it somehow at a distance. At the same time, composers like Brahms and Beethoven didn't write symphonies and quartets with the same intent that people write plays. It's fairly clear from reading some of the things Beethoven wrote that he thought he was expressing something greater than himself, and that he wasn't doing it through representing limited "characters," as in drama. To the extent you become your part in the Ninth, for example, you're neither acting nor expressing yourself, but participating in Beethoven's expression of something beyond both. But all music isn't Beethoven 9. As performers, we're responsible for making the stuff we're playing meaningful for people, and what that entails depends a lot on the music and the circumstances. No single answer works for everything.
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Author: Windy Dreamer
Date: 2018-10-07 11:16
It seems that Beethoven and I have something in common.I play in hope of self improvement. I want my music to make me feel better about myself and my world .I also want it to empower me to make a better impact in the outer world. If I played publicly my goal would be to inspire and empower people to be better than they are.
Impression and results can be worlds apart. My son is a kind sweet and gentle soul.He is also a very capable and popular hard core punk rocker .His lyrics are filled with profanity hate and anger .Their music is pure chaos. Yet when the musicians and groupies are in my presense they are the sweetest.gentlest, politest and most considerate I have ever encountered despite their awful appearance.
He says that their whole way of life is an act intended to purge those negatives from themselves and their world.He says my generation sang of peace love and brotherhood then went on to become warmongering ruthless capitalist planet killing psychopaths. He says they want to be opposite of everything we are.
I honestly cannot understand how his methodolgy can be so effective in obtaining its intended results
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Author: Hank Lehrer
Date: 2018-10-07 17:48
Agreed that this is an absurd question. Why ask this to an applicant? The only thing I can possibly think of would be that the committee member was anxious to show what he or she knew rather than find out more about the applicant. What a waste of time.
I've sat on various university review committees over many years and am glad to report that I can't remember a fellow faculty member asking such a totally ridiculous question.
HRL
Post Edited (2018-10-07 18:00)
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2018-10-07 18:06
Well, everybody's had a go except the original poster, whom I would still like to hear from.
I think it's a perfectly respectable question, looked at as Matthew Simington did. In asking it, you're not looking for a 'right' answer: you want to see what the candidate says.
Were I to be asked it, the word I would unpack would be 'music'. The answer depends very much on the sort of music you're playing. One's sensitivity to that might be thought to be a clue to one's range of performance response.
I'm reminded of a programme note to a recital I sometimes give. The terms of the discussion aren't quite 'self-expression' and 'acting', but there is a resonance:
http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/read.html?f=1&i=390717&t=390688&v=t
Tony
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2018-10-08 00:27
>> I've sat on various university review committees over many years and am glad to report that I can't remember a fellow faculty member asking such a totally ridiculous question. >>
Probably aviation technology has different priorities.
Tony
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Author: Windy Dreamer
Date: 2018-10-08 18:55
I am still sold on the idea that the object of the question is personality assessment. I have put a lot of thought into this. Most young college applicants first response would probably be stress and fear. Faculties that have coped with suicide and emotional collapse may want to know how effectively applicants can deal with threatening ideas and situations.
Faculties that wish to graduate moronic echoes and convincing liars would want calm answers from within the available choices. Faculties that want to graduate people that develop new technologies would demand well thought answers outside the box.
Within the given context my first response would have been feelings of anger. I would not have been able to conceal the contempt I felt as I gave my out of the box answer. Both my verbal and emotional responses would reveal that I would be a disruptive classroom influence.I
Both my wife and her friend responded joyfully within the self expression box . Their responses indicate that they are comfortable with who they are and what they project. One very inteligent man turned red and with bulging eyes screamed " That is the most ridiculous question I have ever heard". His responses indicate that he is fragile , easily threatened and he saw the intended trap.
In the coming weeks I hope to use this question frequently.It could be very useful in better understanding the people I know and meet. It may also be a useful defensive weapon against confrontational academics. Refusal to answer is an admission of cowardice while every conceivable answer could be a potential pitfall.
As I write this I pleasantly reminisce upon the memories of laughter and rage provoked from professors as I proved that in some contexts 1 plus 1 does equal 3.
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Author: dorjepismo ★2017
Date: 2018-10-08 20:31
Windy, that might be. I think springing the question on high school students applying to an undergrad program contains a bias in favor of (a) kids lucky enough to be born into a musical family, or one with musical pretensions and money to pay for lessons with a very good, principled and thoughtful teacher, or (b) kids with a ready facility for BS. A thoughtful and talented kid who hasn't spent time considering such a thing before is probably not going to come up with a response they'll be happy with after they've had some time to consider it. From the school's standpoint, going with that bias is likely to produce a higher percentage of success in the program, but from the standpoint of kids who lack those advantages, it can seem unfair. I know I wouldn't have done very well with it in my last year of high school, so I probably wouldn't have wanted to tell Tony what I replied either. It's a good question as a teaching exercise, though.
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Author: Windy Dreamer
Date: 2018-10-08 22:26
I hope this is a forgivable divergence in the area of trick questions. In the context of national political conventiion reception room debates I have often been asked , " In what faculty do you teach ?". Although I can handle myself well in debate with professors and cabinet ministers , my academic achievement ended in grade seven. The first few times this came up I perceived it as an extremely complimentary legitamate question. It has now come up so often that I perceive it as a gentle insult in an otherwise freindly çonversation. Do you think the questioners are asking a legitamate question borne of their perceptiion of me or is this a gentle insult intended to convey their belief that I am talking down to them ? Several professors have also asked this question. It has become a conversation killer for me because I perceive it as either an insult or complaint if it comes from anyone other than a professor.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2018-10-09 01:11
It seems that contributors to the thread have very varied contexts that they project onto what is a very neutral presentation by the original poster. That's why I wanted to know more from him.
For example, if he was being interviewed as a prospective player, perhaps he had played for them, or some of them. Then, the question might have been an attempt to find out what his attitude to performance was in the light of what he'd already produced.
Or, if he was applying for a more academic course, it might have been a way of finding out what his current academic ideas consisted of.
Or, it was only one of a sequence of questions – the others of which of course we're not privy to.
As someone who mostly has been on the interviewing end in this sort of situation, I have to say that I think that the questioners are being possibly unreasonably maligned here.
Tony
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