Author: mrn
Date: 2008-10-10 00:52
EEBaum wrote:
> I do agree with what I think both Lelia and Ed are saying,
> though, that listening to something just to copy it in whole
> (carbon copies) or in part (disorganized jumble) can tend to
> miss the point. Rather, listening to a bunch of different
> interpretations, I think, is more useful to offer ideas for the
> *type* of thing you might interpret differently. A sort of
> give a man a fish vs. teach a man to fish situation.
I think the important issue is not whether or not to adopt ideas from reference recordings, but rather, whether you know *why* you're doing one thing or another, irrespective of whether the idea (or the inspiration therefor) came from someone else's performance or not. (Or "how to use recordings" rather than "whether to use recordings")
I think it's more important to ask questions like: Does this make musical sense? Is it compatible with the other interpretational choices I've made? Does adopting this performance practice put me at odds with the composer's ideas?
In respect of the last question, there is a difference between ideas and notational details. For example, virtually nobody follows Debussy's exact tempo indications in the Premiere Rhapsodie--much of the piece would seem too slow and much of the spirit of the piece would be lost if everybody played it that slowly. Notation is an indication of the composer's intent, but it is not perfect. It's up to us to find deeper musical meaning behind the notation--we have to make the notation make sense musically. Sometimes recordings can help us find that meaning, occasionally they can throw us off track, but the task is still the same, regardless. But in any case, my philosophy is that the written score is still the primary source--everything else is commentary/interpretation.
> In other news, I tried playing the cadenza with some Carmen
> Miranda flavor the other night. It's really tricky to keep up
> the momentum, especially since I haven't worked on it in a
> while and usually tend to fermata and rubato the living
> daylights out of it. I like the feel, and I think it can, erm,
> work really well once I get it back up to performance level.
Personally, I think it's a lot trickier to play it "Brazilian style" (or my interpretation of Brazilian style, anyway)--especially those bars 107-109 I mentioned earlier. Playing that altissimo A that quickly and staccato, for instance, is really hard to do. So I have a way to go on it, myself, before I'm going to be happy with it. When I pulled it out the other day, I hadn't played a note of Copland since I worked on it as a high school student 14 years ago. I think I appreciate this piece a lot more (and Copland's work in general) as an adult, though--even if my "Copland fingers" are a bit rusty. 
Post Edited (2008-10-10 04:21)
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