M usic is not just sound or even significant sound. There has to be a genuine love simply of the mechanics and difficulties of playing, a physical need for the contact with the keyboard.”
— Charles Rosen
DSM: Years ago, I picked up a copy of one of Charles Rosen’s collections of essays, Frontiers of Meaning. To me, that was true journalism. It was other things as well, of course.
CMT: His recordings are spectacular. But he writes in an irrepressible way—which I imagine is what makes you say it is true journalism. He holds a Ph.D. in French Literature from Princeton University, and has taught at Harvard, Oxford University, and he’s emeritus now from the University of Chicago. But the way he communicates is in terms of insatiable curiosity. It isn’t ‘mere’ journalism, and it surely isn’t an academician’s prose. It’s Journalism writ large!
DSM: I especially admire his regular contributions to The New York Review of Books. Those are wonderful examples of reaching across market segments in an exciting way.
CMT: Despite his penchant for detail, Rosen’s accounts of how music works are highly readable—any interested amateur musician will be captivated by them. He contends that because music has no fixed meaning, the only conclusion we can reach is that music makes sense when we are comfortable with it. That’s something of a populist notion, don’t you think?
DSM: Rosen’s demonstrations with familiar passages from works by Beethoven and Chopin and Hadyn and Mozart are particularly accessible for general audiences. He argues that, because each new style of music creates its own meaning, methods of musical analysis must constantly change. This is not a relativistic or permissive statement. Instead, it’s an invitation for listeners to engage and make their own assessments over time. It reminds me in some ways of how expert sommeliers and oenologists talk with people who are new to wine. By way of example, Rosen shows how Beethoven’s music—which often perplexed his contemporaries—gave rise to analytical methods that are localized to the works of classical composers. Its like a disquisition on wine by Hugh Johnson . . .
CMT: You’re right. Despite his virtuosity, he’s a populist at heart. For example, in his 03-NOV-2005 review of Robert Philip’s book, Performing Music in the Age of Recording, Rosen noted that, at one time in the U.S., performing music at the piano was, like breakfast and dinner, a routine part of life at home. Yes, more exceptionally, music could be heard in public places. But the public realm was essentially a complement to the private one. The plight of chamber music—and the arts in general—can be traced to the progressively passive, ‘spectator’ culture in western society, where the majority of people do not actively ‘do’ anything. They just watch ready-made productions and consume things. There are those who would chalk it all up to the erosion of arts and music training in the schools. But it’s more than that. The situation that the arts are currently in has more, I think, to do with the appalling passiveness of many people.
DSM: To me, Rosen’s discussion of the physical factors involved in performance are the most illuminating—and maybe the most inspiring. Rosen’s expository writing is as exciting as listening to a star athlete or coach explain sports technique—Rosen’s descriptions of the movements of the fingers, arms, feet, and torso that introduce dance and gesture into the pianist’s interpretations. He comments on the sublimation of technique and how the sublimation affects how the score appears to have been interpreted, at the time the listener perceives it. Possibly he would be offended by this, but Rosen’s play-by-play commentary is consummate sport journalism . . .
CMT: He spends a lot of time detailing the effects of a hall’s acoustics, too—the audience interruptions, the particulars of the instrument played—how all of these affect a performance. In that respect, the play-by-play mimics a classic sports announcer, explaining to the audience the good luck and the bad.
DSM: In recordings, a pianist tends to strive instead for perfection because a recorded performance is ‘forever’. But Rosen’s fastidiousness is not obsessive. His writing—like his playing—is generous, as though he fully expects to live to perform another day. That open, cavalier posture back-handedly enables each piece to breathe.
CMT: Yes, and his writing is the same. His is a special brand of lucid, persuasive prose. Spellbinding reading, even if you’re not a pianist. A wonderful example that’s a worthy model for any music writer to emulate.
DSM: Charles Rosen recently gave a talk on “Musical Ambition in the Eighteenth Century” at the Yale Whitney Humanities Center on March 1. And this Saturday (17-MAR) he is performing at Walnut Creek. And he will give a talk at 11:45 a.m. Sunday (18-MAR) in San Francisco as well.
- Charles Rosen webpage at NYRB
- Charles Rosen website
- Poynter website
- Music Critics Association of America website
- Rosen C. Frontiers of Meaning: Three Informal Lectures on Music. Hill & Wang, 1994.
- Rosen C. Piano Notes: The Hidden World of the Pianist. Allen Lane, 2003.
- Rosen C. Critical Entertainments. Harvard Univ, 2000.
- Rosen C. Piano Notes: The World of the Pianist. Free Press, 2002.
- Rosen C. Beethoven's Piano Sonatas. Yale Univ, 2001.
- Rosen C. The Classical Style: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven. Norton, 1998.
- Rosen C. Sonata Forms. Norton, 1980.
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