From the peanut gallery…
Hi, Mike (Hawley), It’s Ken here.
So, I was not assigned to blog this afternoon, but the whole experience of being immersed in music kept me from straying too far.
I too have deep connections to much of the repertoire performed this afternoon, also with the exception of the Carter. To me, the most fascinating aspect of the performances is the individuality in interpretations, as most composers did not have an opportunity to leave a recording of themselves, or detailed instructions on how the pieces should be played. Even those who recorded their own performances were limited in many ways: say, Ravel’s attempt to slog through his own Gaspard, for example. So, it is always fascinating to see how the vague outlines and dots presented in the score are woven into music.
Differences of opinions have already led us into some heated discussions about Kunz’s Scarlatti, Myer’s Debussy, and of course Kudritskaya’s Chopin. What makes blogging, and having conversations with other music lovers so worthwhile is how we often disagree on such issues as tempo, dynamics and style. Differences of opinions are what makes life so much more fun and meaningful.
Just as Maestro Giordano has stated often, there are always a few stand-outs in both ends of the spectrum, but there is a grey area in the middle where most of the heated discussions occur. We have seen a lot of different shades of grey in the last 9 performances so far, but we do occasionally see some white and black.
As with Mike Hawley’s writing, at the risk of antagonizing some people, and causing further furor, I have to confide with you dear readers that Varvaresos’s Liszt was such a stand out.
I have performed the work myself a number of times, always paired with what I consider is the masterwork that propelled Liszt to compose the sonata: Charles-Valentin Alkan’s “Grande Sonate” written some 5 years earlier. Not only is the Liszt sonata the one of the largest single works of the composer, it is perhaps his most introspective work. The music itself evokes Faust (which is also the subject of the second movement of Alkan’s sonata) along with the agony, torment, tenderness and triumphs in the tale. Just like Alkan’s sonata, or Goethe’s Faust, Liszt’s B-minor Sonata explores emotional states well beyond the imagination of mere mortals. As such, the range of dynamics, colours, textures contained in the work is there to expand our horizons. Whenever I listen to someone performing it, I ask myself: “does the performance enrich my life experience? does the performance change me in anyway?”
The bar is set at different heights for different pieces, of course, but the profundity contained (barely) within the 35 or so pages of the score is so titanic that I expect to become enslaved to the performance, whether in a live performance, a recording, or via Internet. Was it one of these performances? If I ask you the question, “did it change your life?” what would you answer be?
I will stop here for now, until this evening’s performances. Let the debate begin.
Ken Iisaka
May 23rd, 2009 at 5:53 pm
Ken, many thanks for your insightful and entertaining commentary. I am much enjoying what you have to say, as well as comments from the other bloggers and the public responses.
I have possibly some odd or rather ignorant questions to ask that maybe the Cliburn siteadmins. or someone might have some info on: Are all the camera operators in some way possibly musicians, or even some of them by now know many of these pieces they film quite well? Do ALL of them get some or even a lot of advance coaching and “heads-up” prep-work concerning what is in the score of each piece they are filming? I realize that is a LOT to ask given all the pieces they must film in such a short time.
My hat’s off to all involved in this wonderful gift of being able to watch The Cliburn LIVE online. But I ask the above questions because of some concerns I have which may well seem very trivial and picky but-
1. For me super-closeup of the keyboard from the left-hand side is wonderful for the slow, poetic passages of a work. But to stay THAT close-up during the very most rapid octave passages of the LH and while the hands are furiously crossing each other is utterly insane and a total mess on my screen. My connection is thankfully glitch-free, but at these moments the camera seems to clearly not be able to handle the excessive hand speed and loses focus. It CAN stay in focus and handle it when pulled back just a bit more. The times that these passages happen to be filmed from RH side just above the pianist’s right shoulder a bit less than the super close-up angle is a FAR superior way to view these passages and visually evaluate the pianists technique.
2. The angle of seeing the pianists back is interesting for a moment or two, but again some of the most fascinating parts of the scores performed concerning the use of both hands has been completely missed when the camera stays too long on the pianists back catching only glimpes of just one hand.
3. I appreciate seeing the facial expressions of the pianist from the far end of the piano, particularly the most musically singing, sensitive or poetic moments of a piece. But when the camera just stays there even though the performer may be looking down with harly any expression change, or when some of the most interesting passage-work of the score is occurring is simply frustrating and imo not the best planning of camera angles.
I respect each has one’s own perspective of how to film a piano recital, and that some purists might say one should be far more focused on only HEARING the performance and not be so concerned about camera angles. But as long as we have this wonderful technology to see the pianist’s actual technique on the keyboard I’m throwing out these comments at the risk of sounding petty, spoiled and myopic in how I want to see a performance.
Thanks for any insights or feedback any associated with the competition might have on these comments.
May 24th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Dave,
I totally agree with the overall quality and professionalism of the live web casts. Hats off to all the Cliburn technical staff!
I also agree with your three points, especially #3, when during Tsujii’s performance of the Chopin Etudes, there were several moments when the camera lingered too long on his face while there were some very interesting things happening on the keyboard.
Roger