Dear All, I have been told on more than one occasion that a big benefit of accompanying a group of singers with theorbo or lute is that THEY can hear you, and it helps keep them in tune and in time. So even if the audience can hardly hear you, you provide a clear benefit to the quality of the ensemble's sound. And wasn't it Weiss who said a theorbo might sound harsh played with nails when one is sitting next to it, but sounds just fine to the audience? Cheers, Jim
Oct 19, 2010 03:45:40 AM, lu...@tiscali.co.uk wrote: =========================================== Dear Howard, I think you are right to say that it is the overall sound which counts with an ensemble. When choosing voices for a choir, a conductor may choose not to invite a soloist with a strong, distinct voice, because it will stick out like a sore thumb. So it is with instruments. There has to be a balance, and it is up to the conductor (if there is one) to get it right. One of the strengths of the theorbo is that it enhances the other instruments of the group, as a catalyst may do in a mixing of chemicals. For example, it covers up mechanical clatter from a harpsichord, reinforcing the bass, and letting the audience hear the sweet, silvery tones of the harpsichord's treble notes. It is often the case that people in the audience do not recognise the sound of the theorbo in a group, because they are unfamiliar with it, but they would notice the difference if it wasn't there. There are times when a conductor may want the audience to hear the theorbo clearly, in which case he asks players of other continuo instruments to sit out. I sympathise with Chris's frustration at playing an instrument which cannot be heard, or at least cannot easily be distinguished. That is one reason why I gave up playing the double bass in orchestras years ago - why bother turning up, if there are five other bass players playing the same notes? The trouble is, if everyone thought that, there would be no orchestra. However, there are circumstances (playing background music while people talk, playing outside in the open air or in too big a room, playing alongside six trombones in a large, modern orchestra) when plucked instruments, particularly lutes, simply cannot be heard at all, and it is futile trying to thrash the instrument into audibility. If that is the case, there is little point playing without amplification. It is sad if one is reduced to contributing only to the visual aspect of a performance, merely for the sake of the cheque afterwards. Best wishes, Stewart McCoy. -----Original Message----- From: lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu [mailto:lute-...@cs.dartmouth.edu] On Behalf Of howard posner Sent: 19 October 2010 05:15 To: Lute List Subject: [LUTE] Re: Lute volume On Oct 18, 2010, at 6:12 PM, Christopher Wilke wrote: > Howard, Huh? Wait, that's me! > Alright, so next time I'll should ask people if they did not hear me as a discrete component, but rather as a subconsciously perceivable part of the composite tonal aggregate? Subconscious, no; part of the tonal aggregate, yes. There's no reason to think the concept was any stranger in 1700 than it was in 1850 or is now. Lots of instruments have the job of combining with other instruments to form a homogenized sound. Listen to a Schumann symphony for an extreme example in its time. BTW, if the violinist sharing the stand with the concertmaster at your concert had asked someone in the audience "Could you hear me?" the answer would have been, "Never. I couldn't distinguish your sound from the other first violinists'". The same is true of the organist in most ensembles, including rock bands, or the rhythm guitarist in a jazz big band (or lots of rock bands, for that matter). The issue in these cases is not whether you can hear the instrument, but how much better the group sounds with it than without it. 35 years ago Rick Kemp, then the Steeleye Span bass player, told me how fascinated he was watching Neil Young's bass player staring at the drummer's foot so he'd play together with the bass drum, making one percussive bass instrument. "I don't know whether it's good or bad," Kemp said. > Frankly, I'm not a believer in this way of thinking for baroque music. There's no evidence that baroque composers thought of blending tone colors into "new sonorities" or Klangfarbenmelodie in the manner of Ravel or Schoenberg. But as you point out in your very next sentence, they very conventionally blended tone colors into familiar combinations of sonorities. > Yes, bassoons double cellos and basses and oboes and violins play the same line in tuttis, but his rather goes to show how little regard baroque composers had for the actual colors of the instruments: I'd be inclined to disagree with this characterization of their regard, but since it pretty much proves my point, there's a limit to how hard I'll protest. In his operas, Handel typically expected one treble sound composed of oboe/violin, and a bass sound composed of cello/bassoon/harpsichord/theorbo/violone. He was obviously unconcerned with whether the bassoons were heard as bassoons: he just wanted a good, strong sound. > "If the part fits your register, play it for all I care." I'd be inclined to disagree with this characterization even more than I was inclined to agree with the characterization above (with which was I inclined to disagree, as noted above in the sentence that started "I'd be inclined to disagree...") but since it pretty much proves etc. ... > If Bach didn't have an oboist on a particular day for an obligato part, he had no qualms about re-writing it for traverso or violin, transposing if needed. I know of no instance in which Bach is known to have rewritten a part because someone wasn't available on a particular day. Do you? > How many times must this sort of thing have happened on the fly, with nothing being written down? Twelve. Thirteen, if you include that time in Frankfurt in 1752. Not a lot, really... > ("We've got a great virtuoso guest chalumeau player with us today, Herr Bach." "Well, I ain't got nothin' fer chalumeau, but tell him to take the traverso obligato on the third aria.") I don't think Handel or Telemann or either one of the Grauns ever thought, "This harpsichord is doing the job fine on its own, but it is a little thin sounding. Let's get a theorbo in here to warm it up, stat! They didn't have to think about it. They assumed the theorbo and harpsichord were both available, for the same reason they assumed the violins and oboes were both available: because they were available. > And tell the guy, even though it really goes without saying, that although the theorbo player CAN play to be heard, he needs to be a part of the musical texture without actually being noticed as a discrete sound. This is a very theorbocentric view of the whole matter. It's more accurate to say that how the audience hears the theorbo, as such, is less important to the director (who needs to worry about the overall sound and overall balance) than it is to the theorbo player. If the continuo sounds good and supports the singers, the director may not care at all if anyone can make out the theorbo separately. And in a lot of venues where the acoustics are imperfect, the subtlety of different continuo colors might be an unaffordable luxury. It could be that your directors are bozos who don't know what theorbos are for. It could also be that they have a much better notion of how things sound than the theorbo player in the middle of the mix does. But worrying about the theorbo player's desire to be heard isn't in their job description. To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
