Yes, Sam, vacation indeed

Sam beat me to it. Summer hiatus for both of us for the next two weeks, but September (and the new season) will be here before ya' know it!

Summer Vacation

It's getting to be that sleepy time of summer, when everyone's either on vacation or dying to be, and as we did last year in mid-August, Sarah and I are going to take a bit of a break, too. I'm heading out East to my favorite music camp later this week, and Sarah and her husband are frantically getting their house ready for sale and preparing to move to a new one, so it seems a good time for a few blog-less weeks. We'll be back in early September with plenty of new content, so don't go far...

DIY Music

I've been thinking a lot lately about the culture of music and musicians, and how distinct the line seems to have become over the decades between those who play an instrument and those who don't. Time was that everyone and his sister played something, mainly because the array of entertainment options available didn't yet include many passive activities like TV, so hobbies that involved actual skill were still something people considered fun.

But these days, when someone I've just met asks what I do for a living, the response I get is either a glazed look, or an enthusiastic endorsement of my career choice, followed by a timid admission that the questioner also once played some instrument or other, back in school, but hasn't picked it up in years. The obvious implication is that, if you aren't a full-fledged musical expert, you can't possibly hope to really tap into the culture of musical performance, and that's just sad, because it's so untrue, and so antithetical to what the arts are supposed to be about.

Consider, for example, what's happened with the culture of food and cooking over the last decade or so. Where once Americans drew a bright, shining line between those who cook fancy, upscale food for a living, and those of us who dump slop out of a can and heat it up in the microwave, "real" home cooking has made an astonishing comeback, and restaurants and professional chefs have benefitted immeasurably as a result. Say what you want about the Food Network, but that little marvel of cable niche programming (along with many other influences, of course,) has brought a New York level of foodie sophistication to countless smaller American cities, and allowed even the humblest of home cooks to toss around terms like "julienne" and "gazpacho" without feeling like a snooty wannabe.

Then think about what the internet, that most reviled of all cultural levelers, has done for the world of reading and writing. Yes, a lot of the junk that you can read online isn't really worth anyone's time, and yes, many of the people who write online seem to need a serious remedial-level English course, but that's not the point. After decades of decline in the number of Americans who bother with words at all, ordinary people are reading and writing again in huge numbers! And that can't be anything but good for those who write for a living.

So that brings us back to music. The online world has led to an explosion of renewed interest in listening to music (if not paying for it,) but for classical music, which is so dependent on the devotion of listeners who really understand the little interactions and turns of phrase going on during a performance, we desperately need to rekindle a culture of amateur interest in not only listening to what we do, but playing the music oneself. There are pockets of amateur musicians around the country who still get together to read quartets or four-hand piano arrangements, but they're few and far between, and for most of the population, musical instruments have become relics of childhood, something fun you did in junior high, but nothing you'd ever consider pursuing into adulthood.

So what about it? When's the last time you picked up your old clarinet or trombone? Do you think you appreciate music more because you once knew how to play it yourself? And if so, why'd you stop? What would it take to get you to start up again? And what can those of us who do this stuff for a living do to help break down the barrier between we as professional performers and you as potential amateur ones?

Action, reaction

Last month I posted my response to Lawrence Johnsons "review" of the video screens at Ravinia. Now, reaction from the audience, and it is -surprise, surprise - positive. Whaddiditellya?

Don't Worry. Be Happy.

Every few years, someone does a study of orchestra musicians, and comes up with the staggering result that many of us are deeply unhappy. Or if not actually unhappy, at least deeply dissatisfied with our work life. These studies are always duly reported by the arts media with the requisite degree of incredulity (How could people who are getting paid to play great music possibly be unhappy? What is wrong with these people?), and there are usually a few backlash commentaries appended in which unhappy people who get paid to write about great music order those of us who get paid to play it to cheer up and grow a sense of perspective.

I've always been fairly skeptical of these studies, partly because I just haven't met all that many unhappy musicians. Cynical, yes; jaded, sure, but not actually unhappy on the whole. Also, I've noticed that a lot of these studies seem to come out of the UK, which makes sense, because while Great Britain boasts some of the world's finest orchestras, those orchestras are, by and large, notorious for low pay and lousy working conditions, as compared with their peer orchestras in the US, Germany, and Austria.

But if there is a kernel of truth in these studies, it can be found in the conclusion that orchestral musicians can grow to feel stifled by the very nature of orchestral life. As an article I read last week put it, "orchestral musicians are, in a sense, the assembly-line workers of the arts world. Like their counterparts on the factory floor, they're asked to execute the exact same task again and again — a method that may be efficient for producing consumer goods, but hardly one that promotes inspired performances."

Now, I would argue that if we're actually being asked to execute the exact same task in the exact same way again and again, someone in charge [looking meaningfully in the direction of the podium] isn't doing his/her job correctly. But the point is well taken - unlike soloists or chamber musicians, or even freelancers who leap from gig to gig, full-time orchestra players have to get used to a lifetime of following orders, and having little to no say in the nuances of any given performance. We don't get to pick the repertoire we perform, we have very little say in who the conductor or the soloist will be, and while over time, our ensemble might develop a certain group style of playing, we're always subject to the whims of whoever is waving the baton.

There's a reason for this, of course, and it's that, when you have nearly 100 musicians on a single stage, someone has to be in charge. Democracy is simply not a viable option for a symphony orchestra. It's barely a viable option for string quartets, many of which spend endless rehearsal hours bickering over everything from bowings to the proper way to play a trill in Haydn. So I've never much minded trading my voice in the process for the simple pleasure of knowing that the rehearsal isn't going to be derailed by two opinionated violinists butting heads. And if I think the conductor is an idiot, I can blow off that particular head of steam over a post-concert beer, and remind myself that he'll be gone next week. (Unless, of course, he's the music director, which is a whole different problem that, thankfully, I don't have at the moment.)

In the end, I think that these orchestral happiness studies tend to get more attention than they really merit. They're interesting to people largely because they shine a bright light on the fact that the orchestral workplace is, after all, a workplace, subject to the same stresses, personality conflicts, and political gamesmanship as any other office. But unless an orchestra is truly being badly mismanaged (and certainly some are,) the vast majority of the musicians tend to be pretty content with our lot, even if we think there's room for improvement. In other words, it's probably a lot like where you work, except that the last few hours of your work week probably don't include formalwear. Lucky you.

Notes and neurons

Early this year I posted about a Bobby McFerrin concert at Orchestra Hall - in the last few paragraphs, I was marveling at the fact that McFerrin got the audience to sing along on a pentatonic scale without a word of explanation or even teaching all the notes in the scale. Which turns out to be a conscious tactic on his part, as we see below:

World Science Festival 2009: Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale from World Science Festival on Vimeo.

Again, I marvel; understanding of the organization of pitches in the pentatonic scale seems instinctive. McFerrin provides the context of the scale through his "descant" above the audience. The audience understands the tonal context both unconsciously and automatically. Another clear-cut example of how our brains are hard-wired for music.