jwilzewske: cadenza

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Tuesday, March 8, 2011

NEC First Monday: Buvant à la Source, Laurence Lesser Explains a ‘French’ Program

T onight’s program is… ‘French’. Stravinsky? French? Well, yes, at least part of him is.”
— Laurence Lesser, cellist, introductory remarks.

T he New England Conservtory ‘First Monday’ program featured, among other things, Belgium-born violist Dimitri Murrath introducing each movement of Couperin’s ‘Le Parnasse’ homage to Arcangelo Corelli by reading aloud the movement’s title and subtext, in impeccable French. Quel réalisme! Quel charme! Vive l’authenticité!

Couperin – Le Parnasse, ou L’apothéose de Corelli (James Buswell, John Holland, violins; Laura Blustein, cello; John Gibbons, harpsichord)
Stravinsky – Apollo (Masuko Ushioda, Wanzhen Li, violins; Dima Murrath, Sarah Darling, violas; Laurence Lesser, Natasha Brofsky, cellos; Donald Palma, double bass)
Ravel – Piano Trio (Hung-Kuan Chen, piano; James Buswell, violin; Laurence Lesser, cello)

L esser gave a 15-min pre-concert talk, explaining various things to us… about his experiencing the then-elderly Stravinsky’s pungent advice to him first-hand, when he was a young cellist just starting out in the mid-1960s; about how Couperin was enthralled with what was shaping music in Italy in the 17th Century and early 18th… the unifying, glorious transnationally-strategic possibilities of it. Parnassus, the home of the Muses, is where the soul of Corelli is conducted—ascension (‘remerciment’) to join the god, Apollo… who is the subject of the second work on the program by Stravinsky. And the piano trio after that… Ravel, who in his own time meditated upon his musical predecessors and the debt owed to them (‘Le Tombeau de Couperin’, etc.).

T he violin cadenza performed by Masuko Ushioda in the Prologue of the Stravinsky was spectacular… indicative of the sonic aggressiveness and beautiful iconoclasm ahead.

I love that the words ‘analysis’ and ‘performance’ have such wide purviews. The ensemble surely ‘analyzes,’ in preparing and interpreting each work, examining the score and its style including notational idiosyncrasies (e.g., ‘void’ functions, expanded tunings, etc.), music theory, historical practices, and so forth. And ‘performance’ may refer to the live performance, to recordings, to practice, to memorization, to improvisation, and to aesthetic, hermeneutic, social, psychological, cognitive, or motoric/musculoskeletal/neurophysiological aspects of all of these.

U shioda’s cadenza served the rhetorical function of announcing the Apollo character in the story and establishing that figure’s authority. It clarifies which key that character operates in, and transforms the thematic material that has preceded the cadenza. The cadenza provides convincing proof of Ushioda’s violinism prowess. But the supervening ensemble members’ parts reveal that there will be disagreement ahead—Apollo may be a god, but he doesn’t rule the Universe.

T his piece was originally orchestrated by Stravinsky for a 28-piece chamber orchestra. Last night’s performance was arranged for string septet. Both orchestrations have their merits, but I especially liked the septet last night. How clear everything is! How much more intimate, compared to the larger version!

T hought #1: Each of these three pieces is characterized by motives and phrases, repeated and massaged and turned round and round through the whole piece and all the movements and variations... Is this particular delight in variational permutations psychologically an archetypically ‘keyboardist’ thing to do (i.e., composers who are not primarily keyboard artists tend not to do it), or is it in some way idiomatically ‘French’, across these centuries?

T hought #2: Each of these three pieces is ‘cinematic’ in terms of structure and narrative. Is the fondness for the picturesque a distinctively ‘Gallic’ trait, or is this feature more an artifact of what it takes to make a living as a musician/composer in each century, in an exchange-economy, market-driven society?

Saturday, November 1, 2008

Amuses Bouche, Amuses Oreilles: Williamson and One-Minute Wonders

T his concept, of one-minute piano compositions, arose as] a component of the first-year piano test in which all students are required to learn a short piece without assistance in seven days [at University of Surrey School of Music]. Though the students find this demanding, it is actually a very good test of their musicianship. The ‘Spectrum’ series deserves mention too: compiled by Thalia Myers and published by the Associated Board, it is a collection of short piano pieces by distinguished composers presented for students at a variety of levels of ability. I was also aware of the component of the composition course to write a piece of one minute for one instrument: it is a challenge for a composer to be able to communicate a sense of personal style within this time-frame. For me as a performer with a great deal of experience of working in new music as well as with student composers in workshops, there was clearly something personal which I felt able to contribute.”
— Clive Williamson, Professor of Keyboard, School of Music, University of Surrey.

Their small size belies the big challenges that ‘miniatures’ present, both to the composer and to the performer. ... And, come to think of it, to the listener.

Subsequent to the University of Surrey program referred to in the blockquote above, Clive Williamson recorded 36 of these on a disk released on Cadenza Records two years ago. His performance of each one is meticulous and empathetic, brilliant.

Clive has been a soloist at the Barbican, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Wigmore Hall, and many other venues throughout Europe and America. He has performed on BBC2 (‘Music in Camera’) and Channel 4 (‘Scipio’s Dream’). Additionally, he has been a guest artist with the London Sinfonietta, the Composers’ Ensemble, Sinfonia 21, and Sound Intermedia. He records for BBC Radio 3, West German Radio, and Netherlands Radio, and on the Col Legno, Wergo, Hyperion, and Cadenza labels. He trained at York University and the Royal Academy of Music with Ruth Harte, among others.

The technical and emotional palettes represented in the ‘One-Minute Wonders’ collection are tremendously diverse. Some of the pieces are ‘novelties’—humorous responses to the one-minute compositional challenge, performed in a jesting manner. But other of the pieces are serious, just as some so-called ‘microfiction’ (ultra-short stories, generally less than 250 words long; 2 min) or ‘nanofiction’ (complete stories in 55 words; 30 sec) is serious. [cf. ‘flash fiction’ (500 to 1,500 words; 4 to 10 min) and ‘sudden fiction’ (1,500 to 4,500 words; 10 to 30 min).]

Harold Edgerton, MIT, high-speed photo, apple and bullet

For the composer just as for the microfiction author, it’s a huge challenge to say something worthwhile in so small a space. The ‘density’ of expression entails big risks, of turning out contrived or forced or trite. Assuming that the composer succeeds in creating something that’s emotionally genuine and aesthetically interesting, for the performer it’s then a monumental challenge to enter into the piece and effectively deliver authenticity in so short a time. For the audience members, it’s a huge challenge to quickly apprehend what’s being set before them.

The beginning sentence is difficult. Who are you? Somebody! Do you want your piece to open with notes evoking a character doing something or thinking about something? You haven’t the luxury of putting a theme forward and letting it register with the listener/performer for a goodly number of measures; you have to figure out crystal-clear cues, ones that orient the listener/performer quickly.

What’s more, you have to have some sense for the neurophysiology of context-switching and memory, how fast the listener/performer can adapt to new ideas you introduce, or to transitions between ideas. You have to consider the diversity of your listeners/performers, in terms of their attentiveness and receptiveness to the ideas you are laying down. When people become charcters, they’re no longer fully ‘human’; they're symbols to be ‘pointed out’. Indicial/referential icons, nothing more.

Begin your one-minute wonder:

With a generalization or pastiche of something that's familiar (like Michael Finnissy does with his send-up of Chopin’s Op. 64 No. 1);
With a narrative summary that sketches and encapsulates the whole piece;
With a syntactical curiosity, a palindrome, or a chiasmus that begs the question as to whether we fully understand things that are conventional wisdom or second-nature—or that intrigues the listener by way of inviting consideration of a seeming absurdity;
With a dramatic morsel of dialogue;
With several characters already in-action but no dialogue;
With a vivid setting and a solitary character;
With a performer/narrator reminiscing or establishing a point of view in first person;
With the performer/narrator describing something in third person.

Are ‘arch’ shapes the way to go, to create bomb-proof coherence and continuity? Is instead a sense of fragmentation a good way to induce a strong desire for continuation? Or, yet another angle, is a vegetative repetition (for example, Skempton’s ‘Stroking the Keys’) a good way to induce a curiosity about the psychological state of the main character?

B revity and Conciseness are the parents of Correction.”
— Hosea Ballou.

The coincidence of the registral and (experienced) dynamic shapes of the music in the first few bars almost have to generate a strong cadential feeling, or the piece will fall apart before our eyes (ears). But how far should we go in terms of ‘tessitura’?

And how about the dynamics? What to do to insure that we capture the aural attention of the listeners, and yet not devolve into clichés and cheap theatrics?

The resolution/ending is just as challenging as all the rest. Actually, G. Thomas has some wonderful suggestions that are as useful for composers as they are for authors.

Here are some example 30-sec MP3 clips from his ‘One-Minute Wonders’ CD. The accompanying books containing sheetmusic for these compositions are inexpensive (£10) and nicely laid-out and printed. You may find miniatures like the ones represented on Williamson’s disk are useful in your repertoire. Some, like the Benjamin Hooper one, have virtuosic qualities that are well-disposed to serving as encore material. Other ones are coloristic and bonbon-like but are more contemplative or enigmatic than is usually suitable for an encore.

Composers may likewise find these instructive, emblematic as they are of a variety of gestures and tropes and architectures in miniature.

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Paul Archibold, ‘Coronae’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Colin Matthews, ’60-Second Waltz’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Michael Finnissy, ‘One-Minute Wonder’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Gordon McPherson, ‘Se voce puder dizer algo em um minuto e ele [worth] dizer’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Howard Skempton, ‘Stroking the Keys’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Sebastian Forbes, ‘Toccata’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Mark Sambell, ‘Crossing the M4 (as a spider)’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Benjamin Hooper, ‘University Challenge’, 0.8MB MP3]

[30-sec clip, Clive Williamson; Sadie Harrison, ‘Sleeping with Fishes’, 0.8MB MP3]

Harold Edgerton, MIT, high-speed photo, milk drop

W hoever exalts himself will be humbled,
and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”
— Famous flash ‘chiasmus’, Matthew 23: 11-12.

Saturday, December 22, 2007

Bach’s Polysemy: Happy Ambiguities, Joking, and Civility in Ensemble

Kenneth Cooper, with twinkle of 18th-Century humor in his eye

The prolonged seicento-style harpsichord cadenza in the first movement of Brandenburg No. 5 has been much remarked-upon: it’s said to disrupt or intrusively challenge the movement’s formal order. That seems wrong to me. This past Tuesday evening I had an opportunity to rethink this while enjoying Kenneth Cooper and ensemble perform the Brandenburg Concertos at Lincoln Center’s Rose Theater in New York.

[60-sec clip, Berliner Barock Solisten, cadenza, Christine Schornsheim, 2.4MB MP3]

E nergy dipped during the opening movement of the Fifth Concerto, until Mr. Cooper’s mercurial harpsichord solo restored momentum. The flutist Paula Robison and the violinist Ani Kavafian offered dazzling interplay in the closing allegro.”
— Steve Smith, The Gifts of Bach’s Melodic Generosity, NYT, 19-DEC-2007.

T he harpsichord part in Concerto No. 5 is a] wild card in this deck that calls all other parameters of the piece, and their attendant ideologies, into question... finally overthrows the other forces in a kind of hijacking of the piece... Bach composes the parts of the ensemble, flute, and violin to make it appear that ‘their’ piece has been violently derailed. They drop out inconclusively, one after another, exactly in the way an orchestra would if one of its members started making up a new piece in the middle of a performance.”
— Susan McClary, 1989, p. 27.

A rebellious harpsichord solo comes close to wrecking the collaborative process.”
— Susan McClary, 2001, p. 116.

The harpsichord cadenza and the subsequent statements the harpsichord makes seem to me to be a coherent continuation of the No. 5’s musical narrative instead of an interruption of it. Rather than just a two-tiered hierarchy—concertino and ripieno—there is another layer. Each concerto gives a single concertino instrument the most responsibility for virtuosity. In the No. 2 Brandenburg, it’s the trumpet. In the No. 4, it’s the violin. And in the No. 5, it’s the harpsichord. But even with this consistent division of labor, the declamation by the harpsichord in the No. 5 is not a conquest, in the way that some analysts portray it. The flute and violin do not ‘own’ the piece, nor do they abandon their property rights. And the harpsichord does not ‘appropriate’ the piece or ‘steal’ it in the cadenza. No such robbery occurs. The good-natured discursiveness of the various parts’ counterpoint is in fact incompatible with ‘power games’, if the concerto is being thoughtfully performed. The transgressions of the cadenza are joking pseudo-transgressions among friends. Kenneth Cooper’s jovial treatment of the No. 5 Tuesday night (re-)convinced me of this.

The 1973 William Dowd instrument that Cooper played is voiced relatively loudly, but it has a sweet sound. Its color scheme is vermilion interior and black exterior, with an upbeat excerpt from an Alexander Pope poem decorating the underside of its lid.

T o wake the soul / with tender strokes / of Art.

[To raise the genius, and to mend the heart;
To make mankind, in conscious virtue bold,
  Live o'er each Seene, and be what they behold:
   For this the Tragic Muse first trod the stage. ] ”
  — Alexander Pope, Prologue to Mr. Addison's Cato, 1713.

Cooper’s warm touch, the Dowd instrument’s sweet voicing, and the symbolic invocation of Pope’s exhortation to mindfulness, virtuousness, and communitarian ‘be-what-we-behold’ soulfulness—these all conspired to refute the prevailing ‘power games’ musicological understanding of the No. 5.

T he harpsichord unleashes elements of chaos, irrationality, and noise until finally it blurs almost entirely the sense of key, meter, and form upon which eighteenth-century style depends. The harpsichord only allows itself to be reabsorbed into the final ritornello when the alternative seems to be madness.”
— Susan McClary, 1989.

In fact, the prevailing musicological ‘power games’ sense of the cadenza in the first movement of the No. 5 Brandenburg seems inconsistent with Bach’s score. And the ‘power games’ meme is also inconsistent with what it feels like, to play in ensemble with players who are friends and colleagues and equals.

I n a concerto grosso, the soloist enters between statements of the ritornello (Concerto No. 5, first movement)... almost invariably a virtuosic exhibitionist, the individualism of which flaunts the collectivity of the larger ensemble. It is the active agent in the piece; it is primarily responsible for dynamic motion, for destabilization,, the striving toward and achievement of each successive goal, which the larger group greets and punctuates with a ritornello. The convention itself, then comes with an agenda attached. Given the high value placed on closure in 18th-Century style, we already know prior to any particular piece (1) that the group will represent stability and the soloist, individual mobility; (2) that the two forces will operate dialectically, with the soloist providing movement, desire, and noise, the group acknowledging and appropriating the soloist's achievements; (3) that regardless of the oppositional tensions between the two in the course of the piece, the tonic key area and the group ritornello will have the last word, thus containing or absorbing the excesses of the soloist; and (4) that individual expression and social harmony will finally be demonstrated to be compatible... But the movement starts to present its own problems when the soloists enter. It begins as though it is going to be a concerto for solo flute and violin, but it soon becomes clear that there is a darkhorse competitor for the position of soloist: the harpsichord.”
— Susan McClary, 1989, p. 24.

It seems to me that the harpsichord comes forward drolly and gradually, not belligerently and suddenly. The harpsichord comes forward gradually over the course of more than 20 measures. The harpsichord executes the amazing cadenza and then resumes later with convivial demisemiquaver arpeggios, recapitulating the narrative that the harpsichord part had gently articulated earlier in the movement. The demisemiquavers continue for six measures before the dominant pedal returns. Of these measures, only two contain any chromaticism, and they’re a non-aggressive chromatic descent in diminished-7ths. In other words, this cadenza is in no way a ‘revenge of the frustrated continuo player who ain’t gonna take it anymore’. The harpsichord is not a mere accompanist, continuo-only. But neither in Concerto No. 5 is the harpsichord a terrorist.

Yes, the cadenza is dramatic, but it does give way to reprise the first movement’s cheerful main ideas. And the Allegro finale third movement resumes in rollicking high spirits, perfectly conveyed by the 2/4 triplets. The cadenza embodies multiple meanings simultaneously—it is polysemous, in the way that joking banter between friends is often polysemous. If you insist on taking the text of the No. 5 at its face-value—reading it in a doggedly literal, superficial way—then, yes, maybe it does look like a power struggle, or merely Bach’s way to show off the capabilities of his new toy from Berlin. But instead please consider the rollicking discursive style of it—and consider that the some of the statements may be comedic meta-references to the strictures of baroque concerto form and how those can produce funny, stilted relationships between the voices—and you may see the No. 5 in a different light, as I have. This Brandenburg No. 5 is, I think, Bach’s short, egalitarian, satirical essay on the absurdity of conventionality and conventional concerto politics. I’m happy to be wrong about this. That’s fine! I simply don’t think the No. 5 is anywhere near as serious or irrational as some musicologists think it is.

Brandenburg Concerto No. 5, Mvt. 3, mm 37-42, Berliner Barock Solisten

[30-sec clip, Berliner Barock Solisten, mm 37-78, 1.2MB MP3]

The Allegro finale of No. 5 also has detaché chords on the beat. Such detached chords don’t suit a 2/4 time-signature if the phraseology is longer than eight beats. But this finale is not long-breathèd music. The ‘stateliness’ of 2/4 time is there, surely. But the detached beats, the short phrase-lengths, and the unhurried charm of this movement are typical of a cheery 2/4.

Brandenburg Concerto No. 5, Mvt. 3, mm 43-49, Berliner Barock Solisten

What’s more, the roll-ick-ing tri-pl-ets and demisemiquavers for decoration are entirely in-character for a cheerful, satirical piece. These are the ambiguous, casual gestures of an ensemble member who is entirely ‘at home’ with the other members. They are friendly gestures—not aggressive ‘shots across the bow’ by a renegade or tyrant, but playful teasing by a friend and colleague.

Brandenburg Concerto No. 5, Mvt. 3, mm 50-58, Berliner Barock Solisten

Rollicking, jolly, sporting/sportive, merry, festive, playful, diverted and diverting. Mingling wit and wisdom and exploring their own fancy, Kenneth Cooper led the ensemble to indulge in some lively risk-taking Tuesday night. But, immaculate playing and all, their pace was never excessive. We were not rushed through the high-spirited Allegro so swiftly that there was not enough time to appreciate their wit, nor so swiftly that the joy in their boisterousness was weighed down.

Brandenburg Concerto No. 5, Mvt. 3, mm 59-66, Berliner Barock Solisten

Cooper and the ensemble play in such a responsive manner with each other that they continuously re-earn each others’ friendship, admiration, and respect. It’s obvious to anyone in the audience that the ensemble members are comfortable with each other. They’re compatible personally, technically, and musically—and seem unanimously to look forward to a long association with each other. Balance between the voices was impeccable, and throughout there was cheerful give-and-take between the parts. Not McClary’s imagined belligerence and acquiescence; not fait accompli hijackings and recoveries.

Brandenburg Concerto No. 5, Mvt. 3, mm 67-75, Berliner Barock Solisten

Attentive listening dispels the notion that the harpsichord part is the persona of a passive-aggressive virtuoso or a once-submissive accompanist gone berserk. Will you too discover that the harpsichord part can carry a sense of fun and self-mockery? Will you, too, find that in Cooper’s hands it can be slyly satiric of the culture-at-large and the concerto idiom in particular? After all, humorous or satirical mimicry denotes a confidence and emotional security that enables limits to be stretched and conventional bounds to be declared as absurd, without irreparably violating those bounds. No one was injured in the making of this concerto, nor the other Brandenburgs that were so beautifully performed this Tuesday evening.

I t was the same, of course, as the Brandenburg he he had listened to so often in the past—the same and yet completely different. This Allegro—he knew it by heart. Which meant that he was in the best possible position to realize that he had never really heard it before. To begin with, it was no longer he, William Asquith Farnaby, who was hearing it. The Allegro was revealing itself as an element in the great present Event, a manifestation at one remove of the luminous Bliss. Or perhaps that was putting it too mildly. In another modality this Allegro was the luminous Bliss; it was the knowledgeless understanding of everything apprehended through a particular piece of knowledge; it was undifferentiated awareness broken up into notes and phrases and yet still all-comprehendingly itself. And of course all this belonged to nobody. It was at once in here, out there, and nowhere. The music which he had heard a hundred times before had been reborn as an unowned awareness—which was why he was now hearing it [as though] for the first time. Unowned, the Brandenburg had an intensity of beauty, a depth of intrinsic meaning incomparably greater than anything he had ever found in the same music when he’d regarded it as his private property. ‘Poor idiot’ came up in a bubble of ironic comment...”
— Aldous Huxley, Island, p. 329.

I n effect, each member of the group is an internal coach. This, however, is a problematic role. If you come on too strongly and self-righteously, you may find yourself evicted from the room to contemplate the error of your ways.”
— Abraham Loft, p.185.

N o musical rehearsal or performance preserves its real character when exposed to the eyes and ears of an onlooker... Paradoxically and depending on the character of the musicians, the enactment can become one of bravura display rather than of restraint. Those members who in the privacy of unobserved rehearsal are ready to impose their viewpoints on the rest of the ensemble can—under the gaze of the microphone or the ear of the live listener—present their opinions even more strongly than usual. In sum, an ensemble rehearsal reflects the personalities of the participants, and is true to life only when unobserved.”
— Abraham Loft, p.185.

H ere’s an interesting instrument. I was looking through William Dowd’s essay on the extant Blanchet and Taskin harpsichords in the first volume of Howard Schott’s Hubbard Memorial series. Dowd was describing the Couchet-Blanchet-Taskin (1680-1758-1781) in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and he wrote, ‘The nuts bow away from the gap.’ Aside from the sheer unusualness of this, my interest was caught by the fact that I’m rather fond of deep-plucking-point instruments. There are those who call plucking point the soul of a harpsichord design. A close plucking point produces a nasal sound, a deep one produces a sweeter, plainer sound. It’s the difference between a front 8’ and a back 8’. Incorporated into a full design, plucking point will determine an instrument’s character. Factors influencing plucking point include bridge position and whether the string-band is closer to the cheek or the spine, but nut position is a clear and simple indication. The nut is straight, for instance, on the Smithsonian Stehlin, and it curves towards the gap on the 1769 Taskin. The Stehlin design produces a sweet sound; the Taskin design produces a sound with a cutting edge.”
— Edward Kottick, 1997.

[Cooper got his PhD in musicology from Columbia University, where he is on the faculty as well as the Manhattan School of Music. As a harpsichordist, pianist, musicologist and conductor, Kenneth Cooper is world-renowned for his expertise in the music of the 18th century, particularly for his expertise in ornamentation. As Music Director of the Berkshire Bach Ensemble, Kenneth Cooper has made a tradition of the holiday season performances of the Bach Brandenburg Concerti and has instituted a series of Concertofests in the style of Bach’s Collegium Concerts at Zimmermann’s Coffee-Haus.]