On Jan 29, 2005, at 5:10 PM, David W. Fenton wrote:
On 29 Jan 2005 at 13:12, Dennis Bathory-Kitsz wrote:
I'm one of those who prefers to listen to recordings or watch films.
But were it not for repeated live performances before audiences, it
would not be possible to get recorded preformances that hold up under
repeated listening. It's the regular performance (not rehearsal)
that, in my opinion, makes musical performances grow to the point
where they gain depth.
Oh yes, oh yes, David! Not until you think you are bored with the piece do you get a chance to dig deep enough for the best performance.
Then, and only then, are you ready to perform it well, and you are stuck doing it multiple times, because that's what you have prepared. Most of the time, I don't mind this, but it is what caused Glenn Gould to renounce performing for the activity of perfecting performances, committing them to recordings, and then going on to other pieces.
Chuck
Of course, I also agree with what is said below.
I have worked with the retired opera singer Olivia Stapp the past twoChuck Israels
years at the California Music Festival, and she was ruminating at one
point about what an impossible task we set ourselves at the Festival
-- last year, for instance, singers started blocking Handel's Alcina
on Monday, and then performed the whole thing in public a mere 10
days later, with two casts, so the two performances were not multiple
public performances for all the singers. She said that when she was
actively performing she never really felt she had a role under her
belt until she'd sung it on stage in public 15 or 20 times.
I couldn't agree with here more.
It takes a long time for one to absorb major works of music (or even
minor ones), and public performance is the crucible through which the
raw musical ideas are converted into something more than just a run-
through.
In my own current performing as a member of the NYU Collegium I
definitely find that second performances almost always have a lot
more in them than first performances. This past fall we gave a
concert as part of the New York Early Music Celebration (we were the
only "student" group involved in any way), and on this concert we
revived pieces that mostly came from our previous two concerts (a
couple of pieces were revived from a couple of years before).
*Everything* went better than the first time around, even though we
had vastly less rehearsal time (one of our performers flew in from
Texas 6 days before the concert, and he was performing 1/3 of the
pieces on the concert).
Perhaps all of this is one of the reasons composers are often
dissatisfied with first performances of their pieces, precisely
because it's impossible in any first performance to accomplish more
than just scratching the surface. If new music works could get 15 or
20 performances by the same group, maybe folks like Dennis would not
be so bitter about the results.
--
David W. Fenton http://www.bway.net/~dfenton
David Fenton Associates http://www.bway.net/~dfassoc
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