Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: tuba musical performance - pet peeve


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Posted by Rick Denney on September 03, 2002 at 22:12:43:

In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: Re: tuba musical performance - pet peeve posted by Brandon Ostrom on September 03, 2002 at 16:23:31:

The key here is not to judge it as a musician, but as a music lover. When technique gets in the way of the love affair with music, then it has gone too far. This can be either good technique or bad technique, it seems to me. The point of technique is to serve the music--the moment it becomes technique for its own sake it undermines the music. Of course, some music isn't really written to be musical, but rather to demonstrate technique, in which case it's an amusing parlor trick.

Or so it seems to me.

I have never heard of a live performance of musicians that was without some technical error. As a musician, I notice them. But in many cases that detracted absolutely nothing from the musicality of the work, and I didn't really register them in the part of my minds most engaged during the performance.

If a blatty low note brings attention to itself to the point where the musical mind is interrupted, then it is not serving the music. If, on the other hand, a blatty low note adds to the music, it won't be noticed as such. Perhaps the Penderecki (which is so far out of my reach that I'm unfamiliar with it) is that sort of work.

Gene Pokorny recorded some unaccompanied Bach flute pieces on his Big Boy CD, and I've been listening to those recently. They are beautifully interpreted, and I note that those occasionally inserted low notes carry the tonality of the phrase as smoothly as possible. Of all Bach's works, the unaccompanied works seem most suited to the tuba, which seems to always fight the piano as accompaniment. Hearing Gene play these is why I dug out my Peters Edition of the Cello Suites. I figure I'll have the easier ones down with another couple of decades of practice.

I don't think Joe was saying that musicians should necessarily agree with him, but that they should do what they do on purpose, at least to the extent they are able. I would go further and say that the decision to use any special effect should be based on the artistic result. Hearing Pokorny play Bach as he has, and hearing Galway and Ma and other top-flight musicians play similar works, a strong case has been made in my mind for playing these notes smoothly and tonally in line with the rest of the phrase. I can imagine other works where an edgy low note effect is musically useful. In any case, it shouldn't be done just because the player can.

Rick "who, again, is happy if he can make the notes come out at all" Denney


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