Thanks so much for your great stories and thoughts about conductors – keep them coming – I could use a few more! This blog on conductors will be fun to write.
With grading final exams and preparing for the holidays, I don’t have time to do a “real” (as in “never-ending”) blog entry this month, but here are a few videos I’ve found on YouTube recently that may be of interest.
This one of our next guest artist, Lynn Harrell, is absolutely wonderful. (That's him on the right. The concert is on Saturday, February 7th at the Cohan Center) This is his "e-greeting" to his teacher, Orlando Cole, for Cole's 100th birthday.
Here’s a very young Julie Andrews as Cinderella, from the 1950s television broadcast.
Fast forward to 2008, and here is the most musically talented Hennessee – my brother Paul – playing one of his compositions on a fundraising video for his school in New York City. (You’ll have to click through on the link below.) BTW – don’t give money – I’m sure the Spence School has plenty of donors!
Here’s a video set to Michael Buble’s version of “My Grown-Up Christmas List.”
And finally, here’s the late, great Odetta, movin’ it on.
Happy Holidays,
DH
PS. Since it’s the Holidays, here are several viola jokes:
How many positions does a violist use? Three: 1st, 3rd, and oh *@#%! What’s the difference between a viola and a lawn mower? You can tune a lawn mower. What's another difference between a viola and a lawn mower? The lawn mower vibrates.
What’s yet another difference between a viola and a lawn mower? Nobody
minds if you borrow their viola.
Why are viola jokes so short? So violinists can remember them.
For the promised entry on conductors, I’d like to gather anecdotes from the rest of the orchestra. I’m sure we all have lots of stories– inspirational, humorous, or horror – about conductors. So “C is for Conductors” is forthcoming.
But first, here’s something to brighten your day. C is for Clark, Petula:
Now on to more serious matters...
Anyone working in the arts has encountered...
"The Dreaded Critic."
Criticism can make or break, or it can be dead wrong. Capote’s In Cold Blood became a cultural phenomenon largely because of universal praise in the media. Keats’ early poems were panned; he was crushed, and then he died, yet his stature has grown ever since. All those critics who ran screaming from the first performance of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring couldn’t know that his music would one day accompany animated images of dinosaurs in Fantasia.
Musicians are no strangers to criticism. It starts from day one: no, hold the bow like this… position your arm like that… breathe here, not there… play louder… softer… faster… slower… it’s a treadmill of criticism.
I got on this treadmill early, like a lot of us. Beginning at age 11, I started going to solo and ensemble competitions. I’d play my piece for a judge, then they’d give a rating and a written evaluation of the performance. Over the years I got lots of helpful criticism: “work on speeding up your vibrato,” “your bow technique is weaker than your left hand,” “practice scales and arpeggios,” and “give the piece room to breathe” (at 14, I had no idea what that meant. I’m still not sure I do. But 20-something years later, I still work on vibrato, bow technique, scales and arpeggios).
As a young violist, I didn’t know that I’d grow up to be a teacher/critic myself (at 14, I wanted to be the next William F. Buckley, Jr. -- this was during my Reagan phase). Teaching in any field involves criticism. It’s your job to praise students when they do something well, but also point out what could be improved. “Constructive criticism” is the goal. Destructive criticism comes more naturally. It’s like the dark side of the Force… easier, instant, more seductive. How many times am I tempted to write on a student essay “Your ideas are simplistic and superficial” but check that impulse and write “this is a good start. Think about how you can complicate the analysis by considering…” When criticizing, I always ask myself, “what would Yoda do?”
Harsh criticism sometimes works, though. A teacher once said to me: “You’re a viola-playing machine.” Ouch. He meant that I was all technique. I took it personally, but afterwards I did work on musicality. On the other hand, it’s frustrating when a teacher never criticizes. A high school teacher peppered my essays with comments like, “wonderful!” and “wish I’d written it myself!” Where do you go with feedback like that? The David-Hennessee-Is-Perfect Ride at Disneyland?
I think a lot about criticism because, technically, I’m a critic myself: a literary critic. My job involves writing hardly-ever-read analyses of hardly-ever-read literary texts. Come to think of it, grading student essays (which I should be doing right now) is a form of criticism. Hmm. What does it mean to be a critic, anyway?
And what is criticism for? Would my students write good papers if they knew they would all get A's? Would I work so hard at teaching if I knew that student evaluations would all be marked “excellent”? Would Britney Spears ever wear underwear if she weren’t constantly stalked by paparazzi? If a tree falls in the woods and no one hears it, can I still save 30% on auto insurance by switching to Geico?
So what exactly is criticism? According to Dictionary.com...
the act of passing judgment as to the merits of anything.
2.
the act of passing severe judgment; censure; faultfinding.
3.
the act or art of analyzing and evaluating or judging the quality of a literary or artistic work, musical performance, art exhibit, dramatic production, etc.
4.
a critical comment, article, or essay; critique.
5.
any of various methods of studying texts or documents for the purpose of dating or reconstructing them, evaluating their authenticity, analyzing their content or style, etc.: historical criticism; literary criticism.
6.
investigation of the text, origin, etc., of literary documents, esp. Biblical ones: textual criticism.
So criticism can involve description, analysis, or judgment. Academic criticism is mostly descriptive/analytical. For example, when writing an article on Dickens’ Great Expectations, I spent not one moment considering how well the book is written. Instead, I analyzed how Pip’s coming-of-age represented and commented on mid-Victorian British debates about the nature of gentlemanliness. If you have a couple of free hours, I’d be happy to hold forth on this topic. Just give me some advance warning -- I’ll need to get my Pip and Estella sock puppets out of storage and make sure my Miss Havisham dress still fits.
The kind of criticism we encounter in the arts involves analyzing and evaluating quality, but it also includes description and context. I love reading theater reviews in The New Yorker. It’s almost as good as going to the play itself. There’s information on the playwright, some background on the play’s performance history, a plot summary, and then the red meat: evaluation of the sets, costumes, and acting. Carnivores, vegetarians, vegans – it doesn’t matter – this is the protein we need. Should we spend our hard-earned money on this thing? Or will we want those three hours of our lives back? Should I switch to Geico and save 30% on auto insurance so I can I afford to take my niece Chloe to see The Little Mermaid on Broadway this Christmas?
A critical article on a classical music concert is different. It’s basically an autopsy: retrospective, not prospective. It’s not done primarily for the purpose of encouraging or warning off potential patrons. What’s it for, then? Raising the profile of the group? Recreating the event for those who weren’t there? Helping concert attendees relive the experience? Giving them another point of view to put next to theirs? Encouraging musicians always to play their best, knowing their performance will be evaluated? Aspiring to be itself a work of artistic merit (as Oscar Wilde suggests in “The Critic as Artist”), before it ends up catching parakeet droppings or disappearing into the internet ether?
I got some early experience confronting these questions. When I was 16, playing in my hometown’s orchestra, the local paper got a new music critic. She was a good writer, but highly critical of our playing, and not used to the politics of a small town. People in the orchestra – and the community – got quite upset with her critical reviews. After all, we were lucky to have a symphony orchestra in an Oklahoma town of 80,000, and no one came to our shows expecting to hear perfection. So she toned the reviews down. By contrast, a few years later, the critic for the newly formed Oklahoma City Philharmonic didn’t pull any punches. His candor, many of us felt, was appropriate, as the orchestra strove to raise performance standards.
"Criticism isn’t criticism without some element of judgment and evaluation, even if that’s negative. That’s what separates it from advertising."
An issue that recurs with criticism: who are you to judge me? One hears this question all the time on American Idol (I have a lot of ideas on American Idol – be warned, and be afraid... very afraid). In post-audition interviews, rejected contestants who sing like cats with amoebic dysentery always say things like, “what do the judges know? I’d like to see Simon get up there and sing. @###%$! %%$$##@, ^&%%*!” This is fallacious reasoning (I once knew a drag queen named Fallacious Reasoning... OK, not really). One’s inability to do something doesn’t mean that one can’t judge others doing it. I can’t write or direct films, but I can perceive that Woody Allen is a superior filmmaker to, say, Judd Apatow. Annie Hall vs. The 40-Old-Virgin? Come on.
Recently I came across this article in the Tribune. (click the link below) The orchestra critic for the Cleveland Orchestra lost his job because he was too consistently critical of the Music Director.
As a writer and writing teacher, I pay a lot of attention to the conventions of various genres. I've noticed that reviews of classical music concerts include description and evaluation of the performance, some context on the composer and their times, a few words on the audience’s response, and perhaps some discussion of past or future concerts.
The SLO Tribune’s classical music critic, Jim Cushing, incorporates these elements in his reviews. He also discusses the visuals (like what the soloist wears) that make a live concert such a radically different experience from listening to a CD on one’s stereo at home. What I particularly appreciate about Jim’s reviews is that he draws on his knowledge of Western history and culture to locate our concerts within ongoing conversations about human nature and artistic expression. To me, these ruminations are more worth reading than blow-by-blow accounts of what was technically right or wrong about our performance. But that’s just my perspective. There are no doubt others.
A problem with criticism can creep in when one is asked to criticize someone or something in which one has some degree of personal and emotional investment. Some folks favor absolute honesty, a “cruel-to-be-kind,” “tough love” approach. I’m more of a utilitarian, and most people I know are. To us, one has to weigh the pros and cons of absolute candor. Will any purpose be served? Will anyone be made happier? Will future problems be avoided? Will I save 30% or more on my auto insurance by… AHH! Get thee behind me, gecko!
I’m reminded of a situation with a good friend years ago. He had just gotten a great new apartment. He invited us over to see the place, which he’d spent a fortune decorating. It was like Ikea had thrown up. A soulless, pre-fab nightmare. Two days there and I would have been reaching for a shotgun – not for me – for the furniture. Did he need to know all that? No. So I said, “the furniture is perfectly arranged to manage traffic flow.”
Though not entirely up front, I would call such criticism a deliberate act of kindness. Love, even?
DH P.S. almost forgot the viola joke:
What is the main requirement at the "International Viola Competition?" Hold the viola from memory.
Hi everyone, here’s a blog where I’ll shut up for a change.
This old Cass Elliot song "New World Coming" has been on a loop in my internal soundtrack for the last several days. I can’t think why. Must be because we’re playing Dvorak’s New World Symphony this Saturday. I just can’t think of any other explanation. It's Been A-wRACKing the Ole BrAin of MineA lot.
Here’s Mama Cass herself singing one of her post-Mamas and Papas hits about music and individualism. Love the dress!
Here she is with John Denver singing an American standard and expressing some timely sentiments about the importance of voting:
And here she is as Witch Hazel in the classic children’s show H.R. Puf’N’Stuf:
Here’s an except from John Ashbery’s poem, “Episode,” that appeared recently in the New York Review of Books:
Yet I will be articulate
again and articulate what we knew anyway
of what the lurching moon had taught us,
seeking music where there's something dumb
being said
And here’s Maya Angelou back in 1993, speaking of the United States of America, of reality, and of hope.
I’ve been thinking that these blog entries could be more concise. In MS Word, they’re Bruce Banner; online, they’re the Incredible Hulk. As we know, online attention spans are shorter than those for print media. I can read a ten-page New Yorker article in one sitting, but online, anything beyond one screen seems like too much. So I’m determined to tighten up this blog. The other day, talking with friend and colleague Jim Cushing, I expressed confidence that this entry would be short, maybe even too short: “I just can’t think of what to say about bowings.” After some hysterical laughter, Jim replied, “Dear David, you have too much to say about bowings.”
He was right. Strap in, kids. This will be a long ride.
Bowings. Have you ever wondered how string players know to move their bows in the same direction? Read on to find the answer to this and other burning questions about bowings. (String players may want to scroll down, as what follows might be like detailed instructions on how to tie your shoes.)
In this clip of the Berlin Philharmonic playing the last movement of Dvorak’s New World Symphony (on the program for the November 8 Classics in the Cohan concert) notice how they don’t just move their bows in the same direction; they also play in the same part of the bow, with the same bow stoke, the same bow speed – it’s as if they were part of the Borg Bowing Collective.
Here’s a breakdown of how this uniformity is achieved. There are (thankfully) only two ways to move the bow, down or up.
Downbow: You pull the bow down toward your lap.
Upbow: The upbow goes up toward the ceiling.
String players mark these “bowings” in their music: a downbow is indicated with a mark like an upside-down U, an upbow with a V. Simple. There’s a little more to it. Generally, pickup notes and upbeats are played upbow. There’s more anticipatory energy with an upbow. Loud chords (like at the very end of a piece) are downbow. The bottom part of the bow (the frog) is heavier than the top part (the tip), so playing at the frog gets a louder sound. You also have to decide how many notes to play in one bow, what part of the bow to play in, what kind of bow stroke to use, and above all else, bowings have to feel natural and achieve specific musical effects. All these bowings have to be decided, marked in the parts, and practiced so that at the concert we’re all bowing together.
This is getting too technical already. Let’s back up further. There are two ways to make a sound on a string instrument – plucking the strings, or using the bow. Beginners start with plucking until they can read music and make a few notes with the left hand. Only then is the bow introduced. Each instrument has its way of holding the bow. For the violin and viola, the hand is perched on the bow; for the cello, it’s more draped; there are two kinds of bass bows; one kind is held overhand, the other underhand.
The bow hair is actually that – horsehair – and the little barbs in the hair catch the strings and pull out sound. We have to get our bows “rehaired” (isn’t that a great word?) -- because those barbs wear off with use. When your bow needs rehairing (did I just make up a word?) it slides around and won’t pull out a good sound. You can compensate by applying more rosin (a hardened sap-like substance that helps the bow grip the string) but that’s not a real solution. Here in SLO County, worn-out bow hair means a trip for you and your bow to Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, or San Francisco (or you can live dangerously and send your bow UPS) because there are no locals who rehair bows.
Learning to use the bow is vital because that’s how you get sound out of the instrument. You can have the best left hand technique in the world, but without good bow technique, the sound won’t be good. There are lots of different ways to bow, and each requires years to master. Legato, Detache, Martele, Marcato, Jete, Sautille, Spicatto… and others whose names I don’t recall. I was never good at memorizing musical terms. In music history, I failed the test on the Requiem Mass. I still can’t keep the movements of the Requiem straight. Pie Jesu Domine Sanctus Lux Aeterna Salon…umm… Agnus Moorhead Doris Dei Sic Transit Gloria I think they got your number, I think they got the alias that you been living under… in Excelsis Deo? (I know, I’m going to hell.)
I learned a new bow technique when I joined the SLO Symphony – “brushy.” “Brushy” is hard to explain, but it makes sense when Michael Nowak or Kathleen Lenski demonstrate it. We’re very lucky in the SLO Symphony to have a conductor who knows bowings. Conductors always have ideas about how they want the music to sound, but if they don’t understand the technical issues of the instruments, those ideas can get lost in translation. This is especially true for the string section, the heart of the orchestra. In the past, I’ve played under conductors who might say, “this needs to sound like a foggy, gloomy sunrise after a long night of storms, leaving everyone in the sleepy hamlet uncertain about the new day.” OK. Poetic descriptions can be helpful, but it’s even more helpful when a conductor like Michael can tell us -- and show us -- how to make that sound happen: “play at the tip of the bow, over the fingerboard, with two bow hairs, and no vibrato.”
Like John McCain and Sarah Palin on energy independence, I’ve observed that Mike has an “all-of-the above” approach to bowings. The first time I played for him I murdered a Bach minuet, but he gave me a second chance, and I played some of the Handel Concerto with a “grande detache” bow stroke. He asked me to play it again with the “brushy” stroke and demonstrated it. I mimicked him, and that’s how I got in the SLO Symphony. Blame it on “brushy.”
A few years later, when I was “guest principal” and playing Hindemith’s “The Four Temperaments,” Mike had very specific suggestions about bowings for my solos. But what really made the style of the piece click-in for me was when rehearsing the solo movement – reminiscent of bohemian café culture – he mimed having a drink and a smoke in a café (I spent most of my 20s drinking and smoking in cafes – or Seattle beer bars, rather). After that demonstration, I knew exactly how to play. There’s technique and there’s poetry, and I guess the challenge is to figure out how to marry the two.
Conductors who don’t know string technique can be either frustrated or amused by bowings. A few years ago during a recording session for PCPA, violinists Carol Kersten, Tanya Streder and I would sometimes need to have little “bowing summits” before the session could continue. The conductor took it in stride, saying he was always amused when “strings players go into their own little world” – bowing world.
On the other hand, some conductors are sticklers about bowings. Our conductor at the University of Oklahoma, a fine violinist and Diet-Coke fueled dynamo named Akira Endo, would bow every part himself. In rehearsals, he’d tell us exactly how to play his bowings. I remember his yelling at me during one rehearsal, “David, get to the frog! You’re the only one not at the frog!”
My teacher, Wayne Crouse, had great respect for Maestro Endo because Mr. Crouse had played for years under another string-player-turned conductor: Sir John Barbirolli. Sir John was a cellist, and obsessively detail-oriented about bowings. He imported the carefully marked parts from his Halle Orchestra (of Manchester, England) to the Houston Symphony. When a bowing change was made, it was a moment of high seriousness. There was a meeting of all the principal players. Prayers were said, incense burned, animals sacrificed, and then the Maestro insisted that the change be marked in every single part. From Sir John, Mr. Crouse also learned the importance of playing pianissimo passages at the tip – the very tip – of the bow. Sir John said, “only those with advanced cases of arthritis will be excused from this practice.”
Mr. Crouse had had a quite different experience earlier in his career, performing under Leopold Stokowski. After WWII, flush with oil money and hope, the Houston Symphony wanted to raise its profile, so they hired a slew of East-coast-conservatory-trained musicians, but still needed a big name to draw crowds. Who better than Mickey Mouse’s costar in Fantasia: Stokie, as they came to call him. He ruled the orchestra with an iron fist, and he insisted that they adopt “free bowing” -- he didn’t want the strings to bow together. He thought “free bowing” produced a sound that was more open, unstructured -- “free,” I guess. This technique posed a problem for the Houston Symphony strings, who’d been trained, as everyone is, to bow together. Stokowski would lose patience and cry out at rehearsals, “don’t bow together! You Americans, with your canned soup and your Social Security!” (These stories come from personal communication and from an article Wayne Crouse wrote called “When the Maestros Came to Houston.”)
The SLO Symphony is a bit more relaxed about bowings. We don’t have anyone to copy in bowings beforehand, so we get them at rehearsals. I put in bowings before first rehearsals, but often one has to wait to see what other sections will do, or what Michael might have in mind. He can be as detail-oriented as anyone. Before the opening concert last season, he called me up at home.
Mike: “Oh hey, Dave, it’s Mike Nowak.” (Me: “Crap, what have I done now?”) Mike: “I’ve been thinking a lot about it, and trying it out, and you guys' opening line in the Brahms – (singing) duh-duh-duh-duh-duh – I think it’s better down/up than up/down.”
Whew! Then we talked about other viola issues on the concert. It’s so great to play under another violist who can talk in detail about the viola part. Somewhere in my youth or childhood, I must have done something good.
I told Ina Davenport (a pianist friend of mine and Mike’s) about this down/up, up/down conversation, and she replied with her trademark wry humor: “Oh well, I hope poor Mikey didn’t lose too much sleep over that.” As the pianist in our group, the Lumiere Quartet, Ina’s left out of “bowing summits,” and I think she gets bored. She’s figured out, though, that when we go into bowing world, that’s a good time to stretch her legs, use the restroom, hop down to the Inn at Morro Bay for a martini, or at least call someone on her cell phone. “Hi honey, what are you doing? Oh me, nothing, those guys are just talking about the bowings again.”
I’ve learned a few things about bowings since becoming principal violist. It’s not always possible to bow with every other section all the time. Just last week, there was a minor mutiny over an awkward bowing I’d put in to keep us with the violins. I should have taken to heart Mark Hatchard’s exhortation: “they can be be the violin section, and we’ll be the viola section.” To quote Mary James’s wardrobe: Viola Power!
Also, it’s important to get the bowings set as soon as possible so the section will be able to practice them and feel comfortable. This is not something that comes naturally to me, for two reasons. First, I was trained to mark up rented parts as little as possible. Second, I’m more of an intuitive than an intellectual musician. Too many markings in the part actually mess me up, so I prefer not to write in a ton of bowings, and I’m pretty flexible about them. When I first started as principal, this flexibility posed a problem in that I would sometimes change the bowings right before a concert. These eleventh-hour changes ceased when I learned that the other violists had constructed a David Hennessee voodoo doll, complete with miniature Steve Madden shoes, tiny sideburns, and a melancholy countenance.
One way to think about bowings is vis-à-vis the Myers-Briggs Jung Typology. You can take the test here: www.humanmetrics.com (I’ve learned from my students that no blog is complete without a personality test.)
Sometimes a bowing just feels right for the music and you do it. I think this is iNtuition being expressed. Other times you really need to think bowings through and mark everything. This sounds like Judging. I feel a lot of tension between these two approaches since I’m an INFJ. It’s kind of challenging to take in information about the world through non-linear, non-rational imagination and still want that world to be ordered and decided. I guess it’s the same with bowings – remain open to inspiration, or attend to every little detail?
I guess the best solution to questions about bowings – as for so many of life’s other burning questions – is an “all-of-the-above” approach. (This is not an endorsement of McCain/Palin.) If it feels right, do it. If it doesn’t, figure something else out. If a metaphor or an image helps get it done, go with that. If nothing comes to mind, fall back on details and technique, and hope for inspiration.
At last, the ride through bowing world is over, and I didn’t even cover ponticello, sul tasto, col legno, Baroque bows vs. modern ones, carbon fiber vs. pernambuco, or why really good bows can cost more than some instruments, or why Lisa Davidson’s bow broke from the heat at last year’s Pops-by-the-Sea-in-Hell Concert.
Here are some parting gifts. Unfortunately, the soloist for the November 8 concert, Alyssa Park, isn’t on YouTube yet, but here’s Anne Akiko Meyers (who’s returning for the May 2, 2009 Season Finale) playing the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto (on the program for November 8.)
Hello again ―David Hennessee here. I heard that the opening night concert was wonderful. I was heartbroken that I couldn’t play because of illness. Here’s a “shout out” to Karen Loewi-Jones, who heroically filled in for me.
To read Jim Cushing’s review of the concert, click here.
You may have heard that Jim has been named Poet Laureate of San Luis Obispo. (Click here to read about Jim and about Poetry Month.) We’re so lucky to have Jim writing such informed, insightful, and poetic reviews of our concerts. There’s no more appreciative fan of the SLO Symphony.
Bernstein and West Side Story I was going to post this link before the first concert. Here’s Bernstein conducting West Side Story:
And here he is conducting Beethoven’s Overture to “Egmont,” which is on the November 8th concert at the Cohan Center:
During my recent bout with death-flu, I had an idea to do a series for the blog: “playing in the orchestra from A to Z.” (I have no idea what the Z entry will be – Zoroastrians in classical music?) What follows is the first entry. Be warned: it gets moralizing toward the end. Recently I’ve been teaching Jane Austen, Mary Shelley, and the Romantic poets, and when you’re steeped in those guys, moralizing happens. So, A is for:
Auditions. A necessary evil for anyone in the performing arts. You practice your music, your monologue, your dance routine, but it comes down to whether or not you perform your best, on the spot, in front of folks there to judge you.
For musicians, auditions start early. In school bands and orchestras, they occur at the beginning of the year, for chairs: a ranking of all the kids playing the same instrument. These auditions place students in the right ensemble or section for their ability. School auditions don’t stop there. Oftentimes, you can “challenge” -- you and the person sitting ahead of you play the same piece for the conductor, or even the whole group. If you win, you move up. If not, you don’t. Challenges can tap into kids’ competitiveness as way to help them excel. For example, my sister JoLynn was a very fine clarinetist in her younger days, in part because she and her rival Denise constantly challenged each other for first chair in their high school band.
I never had to worry about challenges. Growing up in Oklahoma, I was the only violist in the school orchestra whose playing didn’t peel paint off walls. In high school we lost our cellist, so I had to learn the cello. You can’t challenge in a section of one. Since this time I’ve had enormous respect for cellists. For me, playing the cello was like wrestling an alligator.
In Oklahoma, statewide, it was a different story with auditions, and I quickly got drawn in to their competitiveness. There was, as in many states, an “All-State Orchestra.” High school students from around the state auditioned in November, and those who made the cut got to travel to Oklahoma City in January, stay in a hotel, and spend the week rehearsing for a concert. The first year I auditioned for “All-State,” I practiced my fingers to the bone. Everyone was surprised when I got second chair (in a section of fourteen violists), “beating out” a bunch of older kids. I’ll admit I was proud of myself. I hadn’t expected to do so well. Most of the proficient string players were from Tulsa or the Oklahoma City area – not out-of-the way places like Lawton – and they all knew each other. People kept calling me a “dark horse” (I thought they were referring to my tan).
I was in for a major let-down. In January we had to re-audition, and I was demoted from second to fourth chair. Two whole chairs! This demotion happened for a couple of reasons. First, we were playing two movements of Hindemith’s “Symphonic Metamorphosis.” I hadn’t heard, so I worked on all four movements, wasting a lot of time woodshedding weird chromatic scales. Second, right after I played the second audition, the older violists descended upon me, turning a dank hallway in a three-star Oklahoma City hotel into a viola-feeding frenzy. Those hot-shot 17-and-18-year olds could smell blood. They demanded that I relate what the judges thought of my playing. Shy, naïve, just-wanting-to-be-liked, 15-year-old-me confessed, “well, they said the Copland should be more staccato, and the Rossini a little faster, and…” Armed with this advice, they knew what the judges were looking for, and I lost my chair. Oh the agony!
I got my adolescent revenge, and at the time, it was sweet. The next two years, I was first-chair violist in the All-State Orchestra. I reveled in my status as the best teenage violist in the great state of Oklahoma (in retrospect, I realize this is an honor on par with being the best pig farmer on the Upper East Side.)
My adolescent narcissism was further stoked when I won a statewide string competition. The best part: I beat out my dreaded rival, a lean-and-hungry violist named Matt. He knew he was better than me. I knew I was better than him. We were always seated on the first stand of the Oklahoma Youth Orchestra and the All-State Orchestra, and our rivalry turned every rehearsal into a combat zone.
I suppose I had a right to be proud of winning this contest -- I did practice a lot, and there was a cash prize that helped pay for college – but largely I was thrilled to have finally defeated the dreaded Matt. I felt like Luke Skywalker blowing up the Death Star. Poetic justice was served on me for my hubris, though. I had won by playing the first movement of the Stamitz Concerto, a flashy little 7-minute bonbon. For the recital featuring the winners, my teacher felt that I should push myself and perform Schubert’s Arpeggione Sonata. The whole thing, from memory. All 30 minutes of it. It came at the end of a recital featuring the other winners, all six of them. Now, Schubert’s great, but his idea of development is to play the same exact thing in a different key, and then repeat it in a few more keys. I pulled it off, but afterwards the weary audience’s compliments included: “that sure was a lot of notes!” “how did you memorize such a long piece?” “you look so handsome in your tux!” and “is it a long drive back to Lawton?”
In college, I learned that auditions are about more than expressing adolescent narcissism. When you’re auditioning for a paying gig, the pressure is ramped up, and it’s all about details. In auditions for professional orchestras, there may be hundreds of people competing for one spot. How can the judges make the tough calls? These are musicians who’ve been trained at the best music schools, and they’re all highly qualified, brilliant players. It’s a real shame that they can’t all find work and instead some have to find part-time day jobs or even change careers. I had a friend in Seattle, a very fine violinist, who trained at the North Carolina School of Performing Arts and the Brooklyn Conservatory. She tried to “make it” in New York for several years, but eventually gave up, moved to Seattle, and became a landscaper and later an ultrasound technician. One silver lining to this situation: the competition for limited jobs is making regional orchestras better than ever. (Click here to read an article from the New Yorker that describes this trend.)
As I mentioned, I got a taste of the competitiveness of professional auditions in college. In the late 1980s, the Oklahoma Symphony disbanded, and the Oklahoma City Philharmonic was reformed in its wake. To replace the string players who’d moved way, they hired college students from the area. A freshman at the University of Oklahoma, I auditioned for a spot on the sixth stand of the OKC Phil. I lost it to an older OU student, Kelli, because the conductor felt that my high e-flat was a little too flat (I still got to play as an “extra/substitute.” When you’re 18, you take what you can get.) A few years later, I lost another audition to Kelli, for a spot on the OKC Phil’s fifth stand, because the judges felt her ricochet bowing was a little bouncier than mine. Kelli and I were always good friends. She could do some things better than I, and vice versa – but at the auditions, we were competitors, and it came down to what we did at that moment and the finest of points.
I’ve done a few more auditions since then. Unlike when I was younger, for these auditions I didn’t think about “winning” or “beating out” anyone. I just wanted to play my best. I knew I was competing against my own limitations. Consequently, these experiences felt a lot… cleaner, somehow. Practicing for them felt like trying to get as close as possible to my viola. I did wonder, though, where was that devil-may-care, egotistical, competitive, hot-shot violist I was at 15? Maybe he’s still alive and well in some parallel universe where it’s still 1986, and I hope he’s happy. Maybe living on the West Coast for 14 years has mellowed me, because these days, for me, music isn’t about winning, “challenging ,” or “beating out” others, or showing off (unless you’re a professional soloist – a lot of them have Hummer-sized egos, and they need to).
One great thing about the SLO Symphony is its lack of competiveness, politicking, rivalry, or hierarchy. The strings rotate seating; principal players don’t boss around section players; anyone can ask Michael a question, and he leads with encouragement and humor, not with the intimidation and condescension that too many conductors employ.
In a way, I’m glad that I was more competitive and egotistical when I was younger, as I’m sure that motivated me to practice harder. But these days, I feel differently about playing music. For example, recently I performed Schubert’s Trout Quintet with Margaret Berrio, Jan Carpenter, Clif Swanson, and Ina Davenport. We’ve done the Trout many times now, and it’s started to “gel.” When performing with these guys, I felt as if I wasn’t playing music, but being played by the music. Time stood still. The only reality was Schubert’s music and the people I was playing it with. I observed our playing, feeling a sort of purposeful, fulfilling, peaceful-but-exciting joy. It’s a hard feeling to describe. I think Wordsworth describes it in “Tintern Abbey,” where he writes about...
...that blessed mood, In which the burthen of the mystery, In which the heavy and the weary weight Of all this unintelligible world, Is lightened:--that serene and blessed mood, In which the affections gently lead us on,-- Until, the breath of this corporeal frame And even the motion of our human blood Almost suspended, we are laid asleep In body, and become a living soul: While with an eye made quiet by the power Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things.
Maybe I’ve read too much Romantic poetry lately, but I often feel something like this when playing the viola, alone or with others. I imagine I’m not the only one. As Wordsworth would say, these feelings, are, for me, “abundant recompense” for my younger, egotistical, competitive ideas about performance.
But then, in the real world – a place quite different from David Hennessee’s thousand-points-of-light imagination – there are competitive auditions, and you have to perform well, or else. When you’re a kid, if you blow an audition, you still have friends, school, YouTube, MySpace, Facebook, Clearasil, and dating. Auditions are just a part of the game, and if you lose one, you can always challenge.
Growing up, we learn that life is not a game, and the audition itself is the challenge. We all face on-the-spot pressures – auditions -- musicians and non-musicians alike. Job interviews and performance reviews, presentations to the board, sales pitches to prospective clients, paying taxes, or just a family waiting to be fed dinner. The best advice I’ve heard on facing pressures like these comes from Frances McDormand’s character in Almost Famous: “be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.” Recently, I heard this advice echoed when visiting with principal French hornist Jane Swanson. She related Jennifer Dodson’s teacher’s advice on stage fright: “Just shut up and blow.”
Auditions – in whatever form – can be intimidating, but we can take away their power if we just “shut up and blow” – if we just do something. Something is better than nothing. It negates nothingness, despair and fear. It plugs us into the vast network of something-ness all around us, what Wordsworth calls the “mighty sum of things forever speaking.” And maybe our efforts add to that sum.
Perhaps that competitive, narcissistic 15-year-old boy trying to win auditions, get first prize in competitions and beat out others -- perhaps he added to that sum. If we’d had Facebook and MySpace back then, he probably would have been online, “friending” people. Instead he was befriending the forever-wooden Pinocchio who would someday help him become a real boy.
Well, that’s enough knock-off Wordsworthian moralizing. Here’s a viola joke: what’s the difference between a viola and a vacuum cleaner? You can tune a vacuum cleaner.
Hello everyone, this is David Hennessee. You may know me as principal violist in the Symphony. The Symphony started a blog last season, and this summer Patty Thayer asked if I’d be willing to maintain it. I thought about it. I already have a lot on my plate, but I decided to do it for two reasons. First, to be of service to the symphony, and second, it’s good stay in the habit of writing.
I welcome suggestions for topics. I’m thinking of writing about music on upcoming concerts from a violist’s perspective (viola jokes included), doing profiles of orchestra members, and providing links to other online points of interest. Please let me know if you have other ideas for blog topics, as this blogging thing is new to me.
For this first entry, though, I will write about a sad topic -- not perhaps the best way to get started, but I feel must recognize this great lady. This summer, Patricia Tallman, a longtime member of the second violin section, passed away. Our first concert is dedicated to her. What follows is my tribute to Patricia. Please feel free to add your comments.
I first got to know Patricia in 2003. She and her fellow second violinist, Quin Haus, organized string quartets to perform at weddings and other events. I guess they had heard that I was an OK violist and had had experience playing wedding jobs. Since then, we have played a lot of gigs together. I will really miss Patricia and miss performing with her.
Before going on, let me give you some background on this kind of work – weddings, receptions, parties – where you’re basically playing background music. You get a call for a job, confirm, get an address (maybe directions) and a time, and a promised fee. Most groups don’t rehearse, or do so minimally. You show up, someone gives you a gig book containing light classical, not-very-difficult, crowd-pleasing music (e.g. Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring, Pachelbel’s Canon, maybe some show tunes). Sometimes you’ll throw in some more challenging music to keep it interesting, but let’s face it, no one has ever wanted to hear a Bartok quartet at a wedding. Most of us who have done this sort of work have played the same pieces for years, and sometimes performed with the same musicians for years. For example, after seven years with the same group in Seattle, I had some of our repertoire memorized, which meant I could play and watch the wedding party have fun at the same time.
On the plus side, this kind of work pays well, and it’s fun, and a real honor, to be part of someone’s special day. Here in SLO county, weddings often are held on the coast or at wineries, so one gets to take in some beautiful scenery. Sometimes they let you graze the buffet. On the minus side, the weather may be too hot, too cold, too windy. And in truth, weddings are basically theatrical productions put on by amateurs. Things can go wrong, and often do. One issue that recurs (take note, potential brides and grooms) – some folks want separate pieces for the entrances of the groomsmen, the families, the bridesmaids, and the bride. This can be a logistical nightmare. Unless someone who can tell the difference between Bach and Handel is telling people when to enter, they will walk whenever they want. Then the quartet scrambles to keep up, and there are silences as people walk in, because at outdoor weddings (usually windy), changing pieces requires affixing a byzantine system of paper clips to keep the music on the stand. My advice: one piece for everyone to walk in. Pachelbel’s Canon is nice.
It’s in playing these kinds of jobs that I got to know and respect Patricia Tallman. I’ve been playing for these affairs for about 20 years, and in all that time, I never worked with anyone like Patricia. She was impressively thorough, detail-oriented, and organized. She’d ask about a date, I’d confirm. Then, regardless of how far off the job was, at the next symphony rehearsal, she’d have the gig books for me, in case I wanted to practice. Then I’d get a letter (snail mail, not email) with detailed directions, an even more detailed playlist, and other helpful information. These letters were invariably written in Patricia’s perfectly scripted handwriting. She’d remind me of the upcoming date at almost every rehearsal. The day of the event, Patricia always wanted to rehearse. We’d meet a few hours beforehand to go over the playlist and have a snack. This meeting was the most enjoyable part of the day, as we’d rehearse in someone’s home, where the temperature was regulated, there was no wind, and most importantly, we could really hear each other and enjoy making music together.
At the weddings themselves, Patricia was unflappable. She got everything organized; she knew exactly what was going on and when, and she led brilliantly. She never got flustered; she easily solved problems. If we didn’t have the right chairs, or an umbrella for an outdoor wedding, all it took was Patricia’s talking to the wedding coordinator and five minutes later these necessities would materialize.
It was always a pleasure to perform with Patricia. She was a very fine violinist: excellent intonation, rhythm, and expression – and one could tell she had not only practiced her part, but she knew the other parts, too. Most importantly for weddings, she knew when to start and stop playing. She’d always ask, "what’s the last thing the minister will say?" and after that we’d know when to play the recessional.
I think that Patricia was so detail-oriented about weddings because she really wanted our contributions to these events to be perfect. She was deeply religious and I imagine that she believed we were contributing to a ceremony that was sacred. After the ceremony, we’d review how it went. If something wasn’t quite right, I’d try to tell her that no one noticed (I doubt they ever did), but Patricia would never have it. She was a true perfectionist.
One of the first weddings we played together was at Ragged Point, up Highway 1 at the beginning of Big Sur. We carpooled from my place in Cayucos (where we, of course, had rehearsed). I felt nervous on that curvy road with its sharp drop-offs. Now, I grew up in Oklahoma. "The wind comes sweeping down the plain" there because that plain is totally flat, as are the roads: flat and straight. I learned to drive on those roads. Needless to say, on roads like Highway 1, I’m white-knuckling it. That was me this day, in the back seat, nauseated, white as a sheet. Meanwhile, Patricia is behind the wheel, happily buzzing around hairpin turns in her 50-foot-long Suburban, relaxed, chatting up a storm with Patty Manion and Drew van Duren. If I’d known Patricia better, I wouldn’t have been worried. She was, as always, totally in control.
Recently, several other Symphony musicians and I (Michelle Meyers, Quin Hauss, Tracy Sparks, Randy Garacci, Sharon Holland, and Sally Anderson) were honored to be asked to play at Patricia’s memorial service. It was wonderful to learn more about Patricia’s early life, her lifelong devotion to music, and to hear stories from so many who had been touched by her violin playing over the years. It was moving to hear the tributes given by friends and family. As someone who lost his father in 2004, my heart goes out to Patricia’s family.
Sandi Sigurdson spoke at the memorial, referring to Patricia as "a stalwart musician." On the tours to Carnegie Hall and Australia, she never complained about challenging travel situations. She was at every rehearsal and performance, ready to go. Based on my too-few years of knowing her and playing gigs with her, I can confirm that "stalwart" is the perfect adjective for Patricia. Stalwart in her religious beliefs, her love for friends and family, her attention to detail, and stalwart in her devotion to music. I think she knew that music is a path to God, and I’m honored to have walked that path with Patricia.
On Sunday, June 8, 2008 at 2 pm, the San Luis Obispo Symphony, under the direction of Michael Nowak, will make their debut at Walt Disney Concert Hall. Tickets for this landmark event will go on sale TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5TH beginning at 10 am online at www.ticketmaster.com and locally through Gulliver’s Travel in San Luis Obispo (details below.)
The concert will showcase new music by Los Osos, California composer Dr. Craig H. Russell and will feature special guest artists performing with the orchestra in three different Russell compositions: Concierto Romántico, a guitar concerto featuring Spanish guitarist José María Gallardo del Rey; Rhapsody for Horn and Orchestra with acclaimed French horn virtuoso Richard Toddand Ecos armónicos with violinist Kathleen Lenski (premiered at Mission San Luis Obispo on January 12th.)
Tickets and complete travel packages to Los Angeles for the concert, including transportation, lodging, meals and extras, are available locally through Gulliver’s Travel in San Luis Obispo by calling (805) 541-4141. Tickets may also be purchased through Ticketmaster at www.ticketmaster.com or by calling (866) 448-7849 or (213) 480-3232.
On Saturday, January 12th, Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa was filled to capacity for the first San Luis Obispo Symphony concert there in over fifteen years. The reason? The world premiere of Craig Russell's Ecos armónicos.(seen in rehearsal at the Mission on the right) Commissioned by conductor Michael Nowak and written especially for violinist Kathleen Lenski, the piece will be presented at Walt Disney Concert Hall later this year (more on that later!)
For those of you who may have missed the concert, check out the review below by Jay and Marisa Waddell. You can also check out the pre-concert article about Craig Russell and Ecos armónicos, in The San Luis Obispo Tribune from January 10th by clicking here.
And please don't forget to come back often to the "real. live. music." blog for Symphony news, thoughts, reviews and more about our debut at Walt Disney Concert Hall on June 8, 2008.
Symphony Chamber Concert Premiers New Russell Composition By Jay and Marisa Waddell
An enthusiastic audience enjoyed a special concert by the San Luis Obispo Symphony Chamber Orchestra at a packed Mission San Luis Obispo de Tolosa Saturday, January 12, 2008. Titled “Music at the Mission,” the program featured violin soloist Kathleen Lenski performing Ecos armónicos, a new composition by Dr. Craig Russell; The Four Seasons by Antonio Vivaldi; and Battalia (the Battle) by Heinrich Biber. The beautiful mission church, with its gorgeously restored interior, trompe l’œil effects and lively auditory quality, was a perfect place to enjoy this fine concert. Conductor and Artistic Director Michael Nowak’s programming choices were complementary to each other and well suited to the mission setting. Russell’s Ecos armónicos employed thematic ideas from the mission period of Mexico and California. The other two works were European pieces from the 17th and 18th centuries.
The Symphony Chamber Orchestra can be proud of their highly capable presentation of the diverse and challenging pieces. The string players are led by professional and highly competent section leaders who help to unify their sections, playing responsively to Michael Nowak’s knowledgeable and well-prepared conducting. Kathleeen Lenski, an internationally recognized violinist and a SLO County community treasure in her own right, gave us lovely soaring melodies and technically inspiring passages as featured soloist in two of the evening’s pieces: Ecos armónicos, the new work by musicologist and educator Russell, and Antonio Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.
The concert opened with Biber’s Battalia, a programmatic composition in eight short movements, written in 1673. It began with a coordinated and rich string ensemble sound. Then, in a manner rare for its time, the composer had the musicians use numerous unusual devices to create the effects and sounds of an army being assembled and trained. The violinists actually tramped their feet briefly to simulate marching. There were the sounds of fencing and cavalry practice. Dissonances, pounding on strings with overturned bows, and over-layering of folksongs, represented a drunken evening of singing and revelry among the soldiers. At one point, the bass viol had aluminum foil placed in the strings to imitate a snare drum to accompany the principal violin sounding as a fife. Forceful plucking on the strings made the sounds of cannon. Audience members laughed aloud as these effects were carried off with cheerful enthusiasm by our musicians. Finally, beginning with descending melodic lines, in statements and responses between the higher and lower strings, the last movement reminded us of the tragic losses in war. This performance was most entertaining, but could have had tighter ensemble playing, with more definitive starts and stops.
Dr. Russell’s new work, Ecos armónicos (Harmonic echoes), written specifically to feature violinist Kathleen Lenski, had its origins in Russell’s study of music written by monks at the early Spanish colonial missions in Mexico and California. The piece includes passages that feature Lenski’s preferred mode: to make her violin sing. In six movements, it outlines some of the activities of a mission day, including worship, meditation, marching and celebration. Many of the melodies and the themes used and developed by Russell were found during his deep and dedicated research in mission libraries, where he discovered the music of a number of masses and other forgotten manuscripts. The opening passage, taken from the Introit of a Mass, uses the violins to whisper a melancholy and beautiful “Gaudeamus” theme. Low strings fill in the bottom and soar louder in the “Alleluia” section, as if the sun was dispersing a fog. A Swiss march was included, impulsive and jaunty, with bouncing bow effects from Lenski. Russell’s occasional modern harmonies, nicely voiced and resolved, reminded us that this melodious and pleasing work is contemporary. Lenski pulled a high and singing cadenza off of her fine, historic Guadagnini violin in a tocatta section. Then a peaceful O que suave (O how gentle!), a popular song of the mission period, preceded the closing Spanish-sounding Fandango. One could almost hear castanets in the Fandango’s rhythmic patterns in the strings while Lenski’s violin yielded Vivaldi-like flourishes over the orchestra’s pulse. Immediately after the last note, the audience rose and applauded enthusiastically. Russell was called to the front to take bows with the soloist while audience members in the front rows showered roses on the musicians. The capricious Russell celebrated the moment by catching a rose and offering it to Lenski, then caught another and placed it between his teeth. Cheers and laughter rose simultaneously.
In Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, the orchestra members had a chance to show their strengths. The tempos were up where they belonged and the players rose to the challenge. All the effects of cheery birds, languorous heat, thunderstorms, and dry, icy cold were played with good accuracy, speed, and energy. The audience had the satisfaction of hearing a familiar piece well played. Concert master Pam Dassenko played many duets with Lenski and nailed them admirably well. Her bird chirps in the first movement of Spring were right on. Principal cellist Nancy Nagano also was most reliable and frequently featured in a nearly perfect performance. Harpsichordist Barbara Hoff was solid, providing a subdued but vital backbone in the continuo part. Principal violist David Hennessee also had first rate moments. The highlight of Lenski’s solos was the Allegro non molto in the first movement of the Winter concerto. She was precise and drove it like she was driving a Ferrari.
After the concert, several musicians remarked that they love the Vivaldi. Over all, they played together, and on note. One audience person asked; “How can you not be happy listening to this music?” Other comments included; “Thrilling!” Exciting!” In spite of the rare missed note or trouble with togetherness, the evening was a fine success for the musicians as well as the audience.
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