Thursday, June 09, 2005
first performances
Marc Geelhoed asked this question for discussion:
-----------------------
"Well, you want a topic, you'll get a topic. This one is a real bugbear among critics of both the enlightened and unenlightened varieties, so perhaps composers can shine some light on it: Is it possible to tell at a premiere performance to tell how well the new work was played, w/o prior access to a score or attending a rehearsal? I posit yes, but I know others who are more doubtful.
My theory is that if you've heard a great deal of music (and are a waste as a critic if you've haven't) you should be able to compare the work in question to other works of that style and base yr. decision on the performance accordingly. If it's in a completely foreign style to you, A) you don't know enough or B) someone's written something totally radical, which doesn't happen very often. I myself have never heard a work I was writing abt. that I couldn't assimilate somehow w/ other works I'd heard.
Any ideas on this? To bring it in line w/ the discussion, are there any performances of any composers you felt unable to evaluate on first hearing?"
Marc Geelhoed | 06.09.05 - 5:02 pm | #
-----------------------
My personal response is probably complicated. On first thought, my feeling is that if the performance sounds as if the musicians are comfortable with the piece (whatever that means) and that the tempi and nuances are such that one likes the music, it's probably ok. The real answer is to check with the score, but I'm really not a fan of the "the performance must adhere to the written score" concept. Until I had to specify metronome markings for computer playback, most of my handwritten scores had comments regarding the tempo (fast, slow, etc) to give the performer leeway to interpret.
The more I think about it, if I like the piece and it makes sense to me, then the performance is ok. Example: I have always preferred Louis Goldstein's expert performance of Feldman's Triadic Memories to any other, and I have never seen more than the first two measures of the score. His performance communicates something to me, so that's why I prefer it. I would also add that I became fond of Goldstein's performance early in my exposure to Feldman's music, so I really had, at most, his second string quartet on which to base any sort of opinion.
As far as whether or not there are any particular composers for whose first performances I really don't feel comfortable evaluating, none comes to mind. I think if the music is very transparent, which is true of Feldman, Satie and many others, it's easy to screw up the performance and hard to do it right. But I'm speaking as a listener and as a composer, not as a performer (because I'm not).
Thoughts on Geelhoed's question?
posted by David Toub
5:28 PM
|
