"C" is for Conductors...

Living as we are in the age of Obama, I’m going to step away from my Bush-era role as “decider” of this blog’s content, and instead let a “team of rivals” do my work for me. As in, incorporate some other perspectives.

We all know the conductor is the only guy (or increasingly, gal) onstage who’s not playing an instrument. Well, they actually are playing an instrument: the whole orchestra.

With 70+ musicians in an orchestra, we need someone to keep us together. Musicians learned as much hundreds of years ago. As choirs grew in size during the Middle Ages, it became apparent that someone needed to keep the beat with a large staff. This led to tragic results in one case:

“The large staff was responsible for the death of Jean-Baptiste Lully, who stabbed his foot with one while conducting a Te Deum for the king's recovery from illness. The wound became gangrenous, and despite the efforts of doctors the gangrene spread to his leg and he died two months later.” (from Wikipedia, “Conductors”)

Some things never change. Oboist Dawna Davies recalls:

“repeated experiences of having the baton slipping out of the fingers of various enthusiastic band conductors and flung at me, thankfully not as a weapon.”

(Those of us in the SLO Symphony who sit near the podium experience the runaway baton with some regularity, though it’s more like baton-pong than anything dangerous.)

As orchestras grew, the concertmaster or harpsichordist would sometimes function as conductor. By the 19th century, orchestral music was getting more complex; the orchestra was expanding, and so it became necessary to have a separate conductor. There are several things a conductor has to do:

Tempo
Conductors make patterns -- “beat patterns” -- with their hands/arms/batons to indicate the tempo of the music. The tricky thing is the “ictus” – that’s the exact moment in the gesture when they expect the beat to occur. This can vary from conductor to conductor. Tempos vary from group to group – some play “on the beat” – right with the conductor – but some play “behind the beat.” And some do both at the same time, which is always interesting.

Dynamics
How loud or soft to play. Some conductors will keep time with one hand, and use the other to indicate dynamics. Raising the hand up usually means louder, putting it palm down (as in “shush”) means quieter. Or they can just shout “Too much viola! There’s way too much viola!” (Stop smiling, Tanya). The scope of the conductor’s gestures also indicates dynamics: big gestures mean loud; tiny beat patterns mean soft.

Cues
Telling us to wake up and play, when we’ve zoned out, worst-case scenario. Best-case: gesturing in a way that indicates our part is important and needs to be heard. Cues can be really important for brass, winds, and percussion in some repertoire: for example, Mozart, Haydn, and many operas. I’m not sure I could count 200 or more bars of rest, like they have to do, without actually going to sleep. The viola part can be soporific enough.

Musicality/Expression/Articulation
There’s a lot variance here among conductors and musicians’ preferences. Some like conductors to keep the beat, be clear on cues, and to be very precise about expectations. Others prefer more dramatic, Romantic, expressive conducting.

Conducting isn’t all about technique. The conductor is like the coach or spiritual leader of the orchestra. They’re the one who convinces us to drink the Kool-Aid. Conductors do so by different means. Some are nice and encouraging; others are demanding, and some can be intimidating. Each approach has it benefits and drawbacks.

My teacher, Wayne Crouse, told a story about Sir John Barbirolli that shows the maestro to have been encouraging, but still demanding. The Houston Symphony was playing Elgar’s Enigma Variations, one movement of which ends with a delicate viola solo (red flag!) – buh-buh-buuuuum. Mr. Crouse was nervous, and at the Friday concert, the solo came out – buh-buh-scratch-buuuuum. Sir John spoke to him before the Saturday show (I’m paraphrasing, of course):

“My dear Wayne, what I love about your playing is its human quality. You don’t play like a machine. So mistakes will be made from time to time.” (Dramatic pause.) “Just don’t make that mistake again tonight.” (And he didn’t.)

On the other end of the spectrum, some conductors can be mean bastards. Some can be insulting, inadvertently or deliberately. Oboist Linda Ashworth recalls a performance of Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto #1 (which has a 3-oboe soli section) with another orchestra. Afterwards, the conductor said to her and the other two oboists:

"Well, three oboes in unison is better than two oboes in unison."

Linda was a recent convert to the oboe (from clarinet) at the time, so you can imagine these weren’t the most encouraging words to hear.

Sometimes conductors can be intimidating. Here’s another story from Dawna Davies:

“So I was a teenager, playing 2nd oboe in California All-State band, and had the honor of turning pages for the 1st chair oboist. I inadvertently turned 2 pages simultaneously, instead of one. The 1st chair messed up the solo, and points vindictively at me. When I apologized and tried to explain, the conductor raged at me, ‘What are you going to do? Stand up and tell that to the audience?’ I shrunk, and still recall the shame pounding in my ears and the audible gasp from the woodwind players around me.”

Cellist Tracy Sparks tells a great story that illustrates the differences between inspiring and intimidating conductors:

“I think the greatest assets a conductor can have are respect and a sense of humor. I have been to and played at concerts where the orchestra members are so stressed out about making a "mistake" that the pieces sound as tense as the musicians looked. I respect a conductor wanting to bring the best out of a group and musicians need to stay focused, but degrading, humiliating and tearing apart a musician is not the way to get it. Sometimes allowing the musicians a few brain-burp moments can have great rewards.

For instance, I played in an orchestra where there were ten cellists. It felt good to play in this section, because you felt like someone was always covering your back if you were having an off day. Well, during one dress rehearsal we were playing a piece where the cellos had a soli that built up to a glorious climax on a note that was two-thirds of the way down the fingerboard. A risky jump, but we had been making it, albeit tentatively, at every rehearsal. The moment comes and we built up to -- nothing! We all missed it -- we didn't hit the wrong note, we just didn't play it! We were all so uncertain that we thought we'd let the "other guy" get it.

Our conductor kept going, not missing a beat, finished the movement, stopped to talk over a few things with the other members of the orchestra and nonchalantly said, "and cellos, you may want to play that "F#" a little louder next time, it seemed a little, (dramatic pause), weak" (he did have a twinkle in his eyes when he said it -- or were those tears?). We went home and practiced it for hours and when the time came for our big "moment" during the concert, we nailed it -- every single one of us! We laughed about it for years and vowed to NEVER let that happen again!

Of course it could have been a nightmare, but because our conductor had a sense of humor, a lot of patience and an understanding that "poop" happens, we went home to practice the piece, not out of fear, but out of respect for him. He trusted us to bring our best game to that performance, just as we trusted him to consistently guide us through the piece. It was a win-win situation, the biggest winner being of course, the audience. Because of course, that's really why we are there!”

Tracy’s thoughts about trust and communication between conductor and orchestra remind me of this interesting fact Randy Garacci shared:

“Years ago there was an article in Psychology Today comparing orchestra conductors and animal trainers. After observing both, the author concluded that conductors and animal trainers both communicate using gestures. As training progressed, the gestures became increasingly subtle so as to be barely noticeable except by the “trainee.” I think the best conductors I have worked with talked less and expressed more through gesture.”

Here’s an image to keep in mind the next time you attend a concert:
The Conductor as the Dog Whisperer. http://www.cesarmillaninc.com/dogwhisperer/

BTW, if you’d like to read about Mike Nowak’s thoughts on being a conductor, check out this interview: http://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/moebius/vol6/iss1/11/

He speaks about several topics I didn’t have room to cover here: programming, working with soloists, music education, conducting professional vs. community orchestras, etc. Here’s a sample:

“At the free dress rehearsals I’ll look out at the auditorium and think ‘there are 1100 people here who want to hear us. There’s a real desire for what we do. And it’s just a rehearsal.’ I’ve been here 24 years, and my goal is to stay here long enough that the next conductor, to beat my record, will have to live to be over one hundred years old!”

How’s that for encouraging?

Best, DH

PS...
A conductor and a violist are standing in the middle of the road. Which one do you run over first, and why?

The conductor. Business before pleasure.

Alternate version:

A conductor and a violist are standing in the middle of the road. Which one do you run over first, and why?

Neither. Take evasive action, and look for a music critic standing in the middle of the road. ;)