Hi, With all the talk about conductors, I figure I might as well jump in.
Personally, I have respect for anyone with the brass to get in front of a bunch of musicians who by their very nature can be rather unforgiving. It's pretty safe to say that the vast majority of us will never swing a stick. I used to be just as vocal as the next when I was dissatisfied with a conductor. It wasn't until I got on the podium that it hit me like a Mack truck that conducting is far more difficult than it looks from either side, either the risers or the audience. The first thing I ever conducted was a Sousa march that I knew backwards and forwards. But it's amazing how much you forget when you are facing the music, so to speak. As players, we're so used to following the leader that being the leader is pretty daunting. Fact is, conductors are human too, and even the great ones screw up from time to time. I remember playing under a very well-known and respected conductor; he made a mistake during the third movement of Lincolnshire Posy, and the band followed him to the letter and made the mistake sound like it was intended. The nasty little critic from the paper didn't even catch it. That comes with being attuned to not only your fellow musicians, but your conductor as well. I think that is one of the responsibilities of a good ensemble - you have to be ready to bail out your conductor on the rare occasions that he or she will need it. It's a great thing to accomplish your own mission, but it is truly wonderful to have the ability to support a fellow musician in the accomplishment of their mission. Case in point - the performance of the Strauss Serenade for Winds a few years ago, with me in the principal horn chair. The principal oboe was a freshman, and it was her first big chance in the principal chair, and she was terrified. I told her to just relax and play how she wanted to play, and I would follow her, and catch her if she fell. She played flawlessly, and I refused to share the bow with her at the end. Oh, yeah...the performance was the conductor's master's recital. On another occasion, while playing Mahler 3, the conductor, a very accomplished conductor and interpreter, lost it about 5 bars into the last movement. You could tell the orchestra was trying like hell to hold it together, but couldn't. He stopped the orchestra, turned to the audience, and said, "sometimes, it just doesn't work." He restarted the last movement, and we played it out...probably a little better than we would have if there had been no error. I also could never figure out which is more difficult - being a wind player and knowing nothing about strings, or being a string player and knowing nothing about winds. Maybe it doesn't matter. Gary Get Firefox!!http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/central.html _______________________________________________ post: horn@music.memphis.edu unsubscribe or set options at http://music.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
