Having played a lot of early music and a lot of American experimental
music in which a "no vibrato" instruction is common, I used to be very
adamant about turning the vibrato off. However, I had a few experiences
in Hungary and Romania with Roma violinists -- who might reasonably be
described as maintaining by aural transmission at least some aspects of
historical performance practice -- that have changed my point of view
considerably. Among these players, the use of vibrato is ubiquitous and
is, typically, extremely wide and fast. In ensembles (the largest of
which are, admitedly, recent innovations), there is essentially no
coordination of vibrato style, but apparently a general expectation that
it be used. A lack of vibrato would probably be heard as displaying
inadequate technique, and although the best players are certainly
capable of playing without it, the inherent competition between
musicians would likely prevent them from using it frequently. The
effect in an ensemble, especially when combined with completely
uncoordinated bowing (going even further than Stokowski in this
dimension), is a characteristically lively, indeed wild, sound. It is
the sound of an ad hoc ensemble, playing a repertoire in which many
aspects are transmitted aurally, including a large variety of affects
and ornaments which are played _ex tempore_, and it is a sound
unmediated by any set of formal aesthetic goals, a received sound.
While I do not wish to go so far as to claim any direct connections
between contemporary Roma musicians and the performance practices of
centuries past, I do think that one can conclude that some of the
aspects of performance practice are and were the inevitable results of
the combination of aural transmission and ad hoc ensemble composition
which are indeed shared features. When an 18th century treatise demands
less use of vibrato, the best assumption one can make is that vibrato
was not absent from the music, but rather was used so much that the
writer felt compelled to comment on it. The question -- and this returns
us inevitably to the main thread here -- remains: does one attempt to
recreate the music in the performance style and quality that the
composer would have received in her/his time and place, or does one
attempt to get closer to the ideal performance imagined by the composer
(or even a platonic ideal, perhaps even more than the composer
imagined), or does one accept the changes (both additions and
subtractions) that time and tradition accumulate in performance
practice. The exciting thing about music making today is that we can
investigate these extremes as well as the entire spectrum of
possibilities in between the extremes.
When I am fortunate to work with younger players, I can see no advantage
in taking one hardline or another with regard to vibrato, or any other
skill. The essential issue is developing control over vibrato, the
ability to turn it on or off and to control its speed, depth and
dynamics, so that it can be used to best advantage in any given musical
environment.
Daniel Wolf
Johannes Gebauer wrote:
<div class="moz-text-flowed" style="font-family: -moz-fixed">On
07.09.2007 Andrew Stiller wrote:
1) No vibrato
Why? Certainly no modern vibrato, but no vibrato would be just as
wrong...
In fact I am absolutely more vibrato was done in Bach's time than
between 1750 and 1850. A controversal view, I know.
Johannes
_______________________________________________
Finale mailing list
Finale@shsu.edu
http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
