Music Lessons...

Foodie day off...

A carefully orchestrated (intended) day yesterday, trying to juggle ferrying MFO to the tire place, then Leonardtown, a mow of the grasses at the digs, cleaning of the kitchen, all carefully scheduled to arrive at the Concert in Montgomery hall, exactly at 4:30 for the concert which I did (with some creative driving). I arrived to a very packed room, with pretty much every seat taken except for one in the (old) front row. So, with as much dignity as I could muster, I strode to the front and sat down just as Brian Ganz began talking. I was so close to his piano I could have touched it, and not much more from the orchestra. Any closer and I should have had a violin. Room 25 in the hall is not an auditorium, and the audience and performers are all on the same level. So, as close as I was, with the grand piano’s lid up, only after the music began was I aware that there was a conductor leading the orchestra as occasionally a mop of gray hair and a couple of hands appeared above the lid. Thankfully, Brian figured that out and lowered the lid revealing Mr. Silberschlag.

Alert readers will remember that I attended a performance of Bach’s Piano Concerto last Tuesday in St. Mary’s hall. That one had Beverly Babcock (very nicely) playing the “orchestra” part on another piano, so I was eager to see the difference with a real orchestra. I won’t get into the “best” game, this was just different. I think the orchestra served to highlight the soloist more, just because the strings are, well, not another piano and provide a different musical experience. I suppose this was more how Bach intended the piece to be played.

I think they played through the complete movement, and then a surprising thing happened which proved to be a real insight for me. You know, I/you go to a concert and the conductor stands there, keeping time with his baton, occasionally pointing to a section, and at the end gets all the accolades. How hard is that? Yesterday really opened my eyes to what a real job it is to be the conductor. After the applause subsided, they didn's start again, and Jeffrey began talking to the cellists, asking them if they could hear Brian and if they couldn’t they were playing too loud. He then asked them to be more “fluid” with a few notes, and had them play several measures until he thought it about right. He worked with the first then second violins, wanting more vibrato with this stroke, more “joy” in the first few bars, and so forth. He had the violinists play very slowly (I’m sure there is a musical description) to make sure they got the timing right, then had them play real time with Brian only playing the right hand. Then the cellists again with Brian playing only the left (bass) hand. Then Brian alone, with both hands. Then everybody. Then just the violins again. Violas. Cellos. Piano. Over an over. Stopping and starting, always with Jeff asking for this and that, occasionally sort of singing/humming for demonstration . And, apparently Jeff and Brian had different editions of music with different annotations, so when Jeff said “let’s start again at F”, Brian would have to figure out where that was, because his set of music had no “F”. This generated a series of trips back and forth between the podium and piano stool and got to be quite fun, especially when they started in different places. In the end, they played the complete movement again and I really think it was much more polished.

It turned out that this was more of an “open rehearsal” rather than a concert, and as Jeff explained it was only the second time they had played with piano and orchestra. It was another peek at what hard work it is to produce this wonderful music, obviously a work of love for them. Stuff you don’t get to see that reveals what talented people they really are. I'll revise my appreciation of conductors now. It wasn’t all hard work either, at one point they had fun talking about a cadenza, with Brian explaining that he could improvise (especially with this Baroque piece), and how this sometimes left the conductor “hanging” with baton in the air, while the soloist played on. Jeff demonstrated. Great fun.

At the end, Jeffrey talked to us about how we should listen to a piece more than once, and that the musicians by playing a piece over and over during rehearsal and so forth develop a real appreciation of some of the nuances and discover things one might not at first hear, and what a wonderful part of music that was.

All this took place between 4:30 and five, and only after it ended did I learn/remember that it actually started at four. Sigh, early dementia keeps creeping in. There is supposed to be another session sometime in October. Although the flutters will be spending a lot of October on the road, pay attention. It is well worth your time. Makes you want to

DFD