Music in Trains

I ran across this interesting quote that is very illuminating:

“In playing for contemporary composers, I’ve always felt that the ones I respected were not inflexible about what you did to their music. They permitted a certain degree of freedom. I’ve found that the lesser composers were the ones who insisted, no, I said mezzo piano and that’s not my conception of mezzo piano. I think the great composers believe their work will endure even if one does not adhere to the exact indications of the music.”
Isidore Cohen (quoted in Nicholas Delbanco, The Beaux Arts Trio: A Portrait)

This is not the first time I have written about the flexibility of scores (see “Who’s in Control?“), but it I thought it was worth bringing up again to post thoughts from a performer’s perspective. My wife commented on that previous post, pointing out this quote from Roger Norrington:

“…tempo indications, like all other expressive markings, are meant to guide and inspire the performers, not dictate to them.”

I do hope that composers will take this sort of thing seriously. Our art is an interesting one that requires multiple specialists. It is not the result of one person learning to sculpt clay or write a poem. Rather, it is the composer-performer collaboration in which two heads are truly better than one.

Engraving is a production step that went from the individual to the pros and is now creeping back to the responsibility of the composer.

Early-music composers had quite possibly the most difficult job: engrave each piece AND develop a system with which to notate. It wasn’t until around at least 800 that music began to be notated in any systematic way and it was a long time (about another 800 years) before the modern system became fairly well developed.

Around 1500, shortly after Gutenberg developed a movable type printing system, music engraving became the job of professionals. Notation was more or less becoming standardized and composers were more easily able to produce multiple copies of a piece of music by handing it over to an engraver.

We are now seeing this responsibility swing back to the composers. It often can be too complicated to work with publishers of contemporary music as the market is not that large. Many composers have turned towards self-publishing (I’ve recently learned of Mark Phillips’ Coolville Music and it’s hard to not recognize the success of Stephen Paulus’ Paulus Publications.)

This means that composers must learn to tame the engraving software programs such as Finale or Sibelius to make quality, aesthetically pleasing scores. Daniel Wolf, on Renewable Music writes:

Even more unsolicited advice to young composers: if you use a computer engraving program, don’t use the default text fonts.

What seems like a small thing of which to take notice may be a great first step toward great engravings. This makes me think of the parsley placed on each plate at Denny’s—I have heard that it is a reminder for the employees to consider the personal touch necessary for each and every guest. Similarly, composers must take into consideration each and every part or score that performers will eventually need to navigate. A clearer, more beautiful score will inevitably mean a better first reading and, perhaps, a better ultimate performance.

Composers, the ball is back in our court!

By the way, my font of choice is Georgia.

About three years ago, when my then-future-wife was just moving to Akron in preparation for graduate studies, her grandmother said that some distant relatives happened to live in northeast Ohio. Over the course of the next two years, she—and subsequently we—became great friends with these ‘cousins’ (actually a much more complicated relationship, but this is how we refer to it for simplicity).

Last night we had the pleasure of visiting with them and taking in a concert at the Copley Bandstand. It was a fun night of big band music, courtesy of Swing Machine. Great memories of playing second tenor in a big band came rushing back to my mind as I listened to charts such as Basie’s “April in Paris.”

After the concert, we talked to a couple who was friends of our relatives and a friend of theirs. The couple was from Puerto Rico and the friend was from the Dominican Republic. The began talking about music and Bob, the husband of the Akron “cousin” remarked, “This couple taught me the samba.”

I responded, “Oh, that’s fun!”

To which the couple asked me, “You know the samba?”

At this point I got confused. I thought, “Sure, I know the samba. I’ve played plenty and heard even more.” But I knew that I was missing something.

The other man then offered to teach us all the calypso and gave a quick sample as he shuffled his feet.

I got it: they meant “Can you dance the samba?”!

It’s amazing to look back at how many style or genre terms originated as names for dances. It would perhaps even be fairly safe to say that instrumental music began as dance music.

We’ve come a long way since then—and I don’t necessarily mean in a one-way track of improvement. Popular music still knows how to dance; some of these musicians may be making some of the best dance music ever. “Classical” music, on the other hand, has two left feet. I think we are starting to see a little swing (pun partially intended) back in the other direction, especially as the neo-romantic-post-minimalist trend seems to have hit it big with audiences. I wouldn’t be surprised to see well-crafted, quality dance music reappear in the next couple of decades as composers begin to reconnect with culture, and the “hidden language of the soul.” [Martha Graham, American dancer and choreographer]

As many conductors and music educators have often said, “Let it dance!”

My wife came across this video of a Swan Lake presentation that is a must see!

I am amazed that these dancers have achieved the ability to move in ways that I would not have even considered (not that I am by any means a very well trained dancer).

This reminds me again of the value of consistent practice in any endeavor. Clearly, these dancers have put in a great deal of work and have probably been dancing their entire lives.

Similarly, any performing musician worth their salt is the result of a great deal of practice.

What makes young composers think that they are somehow exempt from this? Is there something I am missing? I don’t think so.

There seem to be 3 general components that go into making a great composer

1. High levels of creativity, i.e. the capacity for, or state of, bringing something into being
2. An incredibly large mental library of music by great composers
3. Continuous practice and hard work

Can you doubt the results of the hard work from these dancers?