8. Finis Intermissionis

WEBVTT
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Hello, and welcome back to Beyond the Notation, a podcast
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on the ongoing reading of the personal manifesto
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and doctoral thesis on early music, The Notation
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is Not the Music, Reflections on Early Music
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Practice and Performance by Barthold Kuijken. I'm
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Kenneth Chang, and I'm with Marilyn Gans. We
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are both young, aspiring musicians seeking insight
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into the fascinating and intricate world of historically
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informed performance and early music. Welcome
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back, Marilyn. After a month-long hiatus? I
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think it's been about a month, yeah. Because,
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you know, I remember the last episode that we
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did, we were trying to figure out what's the
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best day to kind of pick up the podcast virtually
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because I moved into college. So we're like...
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We keep, we're like, okay, we're going to do
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it on Saturday and then we're going to do it
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on Friday. But this is entirely my fault because
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I was just talking a minute ago, but like college
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orientation is crazy. I didn't have, I swear,
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like a spare moment basically until like today.
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And that's saying something. It's been like almost,
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what? Yeah, because we were literally like, we
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kept on like basically holding it off. I think
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it was also partly my fault too, because I was
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kind of like. I was kind of busy doing stuff
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on Saturday. I got like, I had a few gigs on
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the side on that day. So I was like, Oh gosh,
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darn it. I can't, I can't come back and do this
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recording on time. It's like, Oh, you offered
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a time. And I was like, Oh no, that was like
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so horrible. It's also the different like class
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schedules because I'm in Ohio. So I'm an hour
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ahead. So an evening time is like earlier for
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like back in at the central time, you know? And
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so it's, it's a whole thing. And also, My classes
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are early, but then I get out earlier, but then
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I have things in the evening versus normal high
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school where you get out and then you have homework.
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It's a whole spiel. It's a whole thing. So Marilyn
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is no longer in Central Time now. She is in Eastern
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Time. That is very bad. I do not like. It's terrible.
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I am not used to it yet. It's so weird. And get
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ready for the fallback, too, in November. That's
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going to be even more fun, I'm sure. Brother,
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I forgot about that. Oh, my God. Get an extra
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hour of sleep. so without further ado we're gonna
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actually like resume with the chapter on ornamentation
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i know after a month of um the last episode being
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just all derek um now we are back um going to
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just back to normal kind of so I'm going to read
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out the little thingy I have to say every time.
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This episode includes content from The Notation
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Is Not The Music by Barthold Kuijken, used with permission
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of Indiana University Press. All right. I guess
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I'll give this a go. This is a very cool topic
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to talk about, especially in music and element.
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Because this is like, if you think of all the
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spices and flavorings of your food, right? It's
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all like the sprinkles on top that kind of like
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make a song what it is, right? So I think this
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is a cool one element to talk about. Well, I
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just want to say this because you ever have...
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Okay, I will out myself and say that yesterday
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I had a cupcake and it was really good, but...
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there were a lot of sprinkles on it. And I, you
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know, I was just thinking to myself, if this
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didn't have the sprinkles, this would be a very
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different cupcake, just in texture. And so I
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think musically, it's the same way. Trills, different
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ornaments, mordants, things like that. It really,
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really changes what you perceive the piece to
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be. And that's kind of, that's a whole other
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thing because oftentimes one edition of a piece,
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especially when you get into like the Baroque
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era, one edition of a piece, which has one written
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notation or ornament. could be different than
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what the player is actually performing. And so
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it really changes your perception of what the
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piece should sound like versus what's written.
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Yeah, that's a great way to explain it for the
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average beginner, especially one who would read
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this book. I guess like consciously as like student,
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like kid musicians, I guess like you wouldn't
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think about it too much, like unless you were...
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doing like because you would only find it as
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um a lot in classical and baroque repertoire
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and whenever you worked on it maybe your teacher
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said uh one or two things about oh just i like
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this this is more flavorful do it uh you know
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upward an upwards trill instead instead of right
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so i I think there's a wide variety of different,
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like, approaches with teachers, how they, how
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teachers, you know, generation to generation
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pass down the knowledge on how to, you know,
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teach exactly, like, ornaments over time. So
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I think that's pretty cool, too. All right. It's
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a lineage, for sure. Yeah, yeah. All right. Neil
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Zaislaw presents an interesting case study, Ornaments
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for Corelli's Violin Sonatas, Opus 5 in Early
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Music, published February 1996. Wait. Quantz's
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distinction, clearly expressed in his Versuch
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between Wesentliche Manieren und Weltkollegische
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Veränderungen, is a convenient starting point.
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The latter can be translated as arbitrary alternatives,
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that is, substitutions of one note or passage
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by another, freely invented by the performer.
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Quants reserves their use for the soloists who
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knows the rules of composition. The former, the
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essential ornaments, on the other hand, are judged
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as being indispensable to all good performance.
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This category includes all ornaments that can
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be indicated by special signs or small printed
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notes . We see that in later 17th and 18th centuries,
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many composers developed their own sets of signs
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for them. In France, more or less up to the French
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Revolution, these ornaments were mostly written
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into the score in great detail. In Germany, much
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less often, except for lute and keyboard music.
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And in England and Italy, even less often. This
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does not necessarily mean that in England or
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Italy, these ornaments were less frequently used.
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They were simply more frequently left to the
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performer's discretion. That was another big
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fact. I was taught that, especially with, you
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know... when i learned like box health food number
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one like the first thing that especially in box
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manuscript and were more like anna macdalena
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box manuscript like you you that there was kind
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of like um there was a kind of like debate between
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like if you wanted to do your trill like or do
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a drill or some sort of spiel somewhere add your
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sprinkle somewhere in the throughout the score
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or don't do it at all like there's some recordings
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like the period recordings that Barely do like
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the minimum in the in a recording, but maybe
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in the performance They'll do a lot more for
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because it's performance Right, you know what
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I get from this too is that I guess he's saying
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that in this time period you have France was
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doing its own thing Germany was doing his own
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thing Italy was doing something so not only is
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it a question of the time period from like the
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modern perspective so if you're Like a cellist
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and you want to play the Bach cello suites You
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have to look at it. I guess not only from that
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Baroque perspective, but also It's the German
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Baroque perspective from Bach and the time period.
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So it's all these different layers to look at,
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I guess, from that historical viewpoint, I guess,
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to be more accurate. So if you were to do something
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maybe in an Italian style of the time, then you
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just know, oh, the composer didn't take as many
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details written in the music, so you just have
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to maybe have more liberty with Italian music
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versus... What did they say, like, France? Yeah,
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I just, you know. Now that I think about it,
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like, if you, like, visualize, like, each of
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the characteristics of, like, you know, like,
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a synthesis of all the composers together from
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each, like, nationality, it's, like, France has,
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like, I can think of France, like, especially,
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like, Lully, like, he, I can visualize a lot
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of trills being used, right? And then Germany,
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like, that was non -existent with, except, like,
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maybe keyboard stuff, but that's what I thought.
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No, for sure. Yeah, it passes down. Even the
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composers like the, oh gosh, like even going
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into the more contemporary, I think French composers
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versus German composers, like the musical stereotypes
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that you get from the Romantic era, I think it
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actually, you can kind of see a connection going
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back to like the Baroque era or Renaissance era
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forefathers, you know, I don't know. It's a line.
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Yes, and that's the thing. That's the funny thing
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we're seeing all throughout this novel. It's
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like, oh, this happened here and this happened
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there. All connected. Then you could make a possible
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conclusion to this. You could, yeah, yeah. Okay.
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Though the rules obviously differ considerably
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with person, instrument, time, and place, the
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correct interpretation, form, length, timing,
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on or before the beat, dynamics, and character
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of these ornaments are explained in countless
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treatises, charts, and prefaces. With some study
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and practice, a sensitive musician should be
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able to integrate them into any non -ornamented
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piece, according to the style of the composer
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and to the instrument. If it is forgotten that
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Kwan calls them essential, even if they are not
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expressively written, we cannot do without them.
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As always, the ultimate rule is good taste. Let
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me continue the comparison of music and language.
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Since essential ornaments usually occur on one
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single note, they operate on the level of the
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syllable, of the articulation. These ornaments...
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So, in this sense, essential is correct. It is
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essential that an ornament is performed, though
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the choice of a particular kind of ornament is
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sometimes less essential. I thought you had a
00:10:29.110 --> 00:10:31.509
comment there. Oh, no, no. So I was just kind
00:10:31.509 --> 00:10:33.590
of thinking. So I'm in a music history class
00:10:33.590 --> 00:10:35.289
right now. And one of the things we're going
00:10:35.289 --> 00:10:38.850
over are like the really early like church Gregorian
00:10:38.850 --> 00:10:41.809
chants and kind of how those started. It's a
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whole thing. I want to do that, too. I can't
00:10:44.269 --> 00:10:46.669
wait when I go. No, seriously. It's so cool.
00:10:46.730 --> 00:10:49.269
It's basically one of the things that my teacher
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is talking about is that when Gregorian chants,
00:10:51.850 --> 00:10:54.690
at least the first documented manuscript paper
00:10:54.690 --> 00:10:58.230
that we have from those compositions have. Very
00:10:58.230 --> 00:11:01.669
monophonic, single line voices. Usually it's
00:11:01.669 --> 00:11:05.490
one person or a choir just singing a very straight
00:11:05.490 --> 00:11:07.710
line, I'd say. There's no ornamentation. But
00:11:07.710 --> 00:11:10.889
once you start to get into maybe the 13th century,
00:11:11.009 --> 00:11:13.850
comparing it to the 9th century, a couple hundred
00:11:13.850 --> 00:11:17.330
years later, you have singers who are singing
00:11:17.330 --> 00:11:19.889
multiple notes over these syllables. And they're
00:11:19.889 --> 00:11:23.409
usually written in Latin. But if you take a word
00:11:23.409 --> 00:11:29.940
like, what's a Latin word? I'm just going to
00:11:29.940 --> 00:11:32.960
come up with something. Mensus or whatever. Instead
00:11:32.960 --> 00:11:37.019
of maybe just one mensus, they'll have the singers
00:11:37.019 --> 00:11:40.179
holding onto the syllable, singing multiple different
00:11:40.179 --> 00:11:43.399
ornamentation styles over it. And I think that's
00:11:43.399 --> 00:11:46.720
kind of what developed into not only as music
00:11:46.720 --> 00:11:49.460
became less church -oriented and became more
00:11:49.460 --> 00:11:51.440
secular, but I think composers started to take
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the idea of adding more notes per syllable. And
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they sort of added that to instrumentation, too.
00:11:57.679 --> 00:11:59.960
So if you're playing the violin, there's no words
00:11:59.960 --> 00:12:02.019
for the violin, but you're still going to have
00:12:02.019 --> 00:12:05.279
a single note and then add other, I guess, additional
00:12:05.279 --> 00:12:09.720
notes onto it to kind of act as that, like, I
00:12:09.720 --> 00:12:11.419
don't know, maybe continuation of the Gregorian
00:12:11.419 --> 00:12:13.080
chants. I'd have to do some research on that
00:12:13.080 --> 00:12:15.059
and see if maybe that's where it comes from.
00:12:15.299 --> 00:12:18.399
Maybe you found your new niche. Yeah, maybe.
00:12:18.539 --> 00:12:20.080
I can write a book on that. I was going to say
00:12:20.080 --> 00:12:23.539
your other... latin examples e pluribus unum
00:12:23.539 --> 00:12:27.600
or something like e pluribus unum yeah but that's
00:12:27.600 --> 00:12:30.000
that's i i find that also interesting too like
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i i don't know like that they had their own systematic
00:12:33.980 --> 00:12:40.120
like procedure right for um singing singing in
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that you know in that fashion so i i i don't
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know it kind of like like i said it always like
00:12:46.820 --> 00:12:51.000
travels on to the next you know people people
00:12:51.000 --> 00:12:54.139
that you know they pass on the tradition to so
00:12:54.139 --> 00:12:56.399
that's true and if there's a question of like
00:12:56.399 --> 00:12:59.980
how how much is actually passing on and when
00:12:59.980 --> 00:13:02.200
it does pass on what direction is it actually
00:13:02.200 --> 00:13:04.080
going in because i feel like sometimes there
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are elements that are completely forgotten um
00:13:06.200 --> 00:13:08.159
like i remember in one of my classes the teacher
00:13:08.159 --> 00:13:11.980
was saying that uh during the the church times
00:13:11.980 --> 00:13:14.039
or whatever you would have these like religious
00:13:14.039 --> 00:13:16.100
leaders coming together and saying we need to
00:13:16.100 --> 00:13:19.539
get rid of musical forms because they were somehow
00:13:19.539 --> 00:13:22.679
i guess like threatening the the church system
00:13:22.679 --> 00:13:25.399
in some way so we actually lost quite a bit of
00:13:25.399 --> 00:13:27.259
musical structures and there's a question of
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what would it have looked like if we had kept
00:13:29.240 --> 00:13:33.480
them in the the canon of like western music and
00:13:34.899 --> 00:13:37.679
Which musical styles maybe secretly got through
00:13:37.679 --> 00:13:39.840
and then have influenced even our modern styles
00:13:39.840 --> 00:13:41.980
today? It's a whole thing. I don't know. And
00:13:41.980 --> 00:13:44.419
it's also hard because we don't have all of the
00:13:44.419 --> 00:13:47.240
pieces of information. We're still finding manuscripts
00:13:47.240 --> 00:13:49.539
from that time period that kind of, I guess,
00:13:49.559 --> 00:13:52.860
influence our ideas of music from the Romantic
00:13:52.860 --> 00:13:57.379
era to today and stuff like that. Big day. Yeah,
00:13:57.419 --> 00:13:59.600
we're always learning something every time. There's
00:13:59.600 --> 00:14:03.759
not going to be like, oh, we achieved our...
00:14:04.059 --> 00:14:10.440
ultimate knowledge of the epiphany of our comprehension
00:14:10.440 --> 00:14:13.539
of Baroque music. You could get more complex
00:14:13.539 --> 00:14:18.259
than that. All right, let's see. So I guess Mr.
00:14:18.360 --> 00:14:21.679
Kaika has another little thing to say here. In
00:14:21.679 --> 00:14:24.379
my experience, the music of Lully and his followers,
00:14:24.639 --> 00:14:27.840
active all over Europe, has suffered fairly from
00:14:27.840 --> 00:14:30.179
a lack of understanding of this principle. The
00:14:30.179 --> 00:14:32.340
score, with only the occasional trill, looks
00:14:32.340 --> 00:14:35.440
dry, simple, neutral, bare for singers as well
00:14:35.440 --> 00:14:38.299
as for instrumentalists. I suppose we really
00:14:38.299 --> 00:14:41.220
have to clothe this music. Fortunately, concurrent
00:14:41.220 --> 00:14:43.379
singing and instrumental schools give us a wealth
00:14:43.379 --> 00:14:46.039
of information about what ornaments were typically
00:14:46.039 --> 00:14:49.360
added in particular situations. These ornaments
00:14:49.360 --> 00:14:51.820
are essential for a just image of lowly style.
00:14:52.080 --> 00:14:55.440
Without them, music is mostly judged unattractive
00:14:55.440 --> 00:14:57.740
by listeners as well as by scholars who only
00:14:57.740 --> 00:15:01.629
read the score. Interestingly, the original orchestral
00:15:01.629 --> 00:15:03.909
parts used by Lilly and other opera composers
00:15:03.909 --> 00:15:06.769
give us a little more information. The musicians
00:15:06.769 --> 00:15:09.049
will have to remember what to play rather than
00:15:09.049 --> 00:15:11.870
having to write it down, and as even today's
00:15:11.870 --> 00:15:13.850
specialist orchestra members might prefer to
00:15:13.850 --> 00:15:16.750
do. These ornaments belong to the unwritten part
00:15:16.750 --> 00:15:19.490
of music, the part associated with common knowledge,
00:15:19.690 --> 00:15:22.190
daily practice, mother tongue, and good taste.
00:15:22.990 --> 00:15:25.450
I want to single out one ornament that was mentioned
00:15:25.450 --> 00:15:28.840
earlier, vibrato. In our modern tradition, vibrato
00:15:28.840 --> 00:15:31.320
is omnipresent, belongs to every note, and is
00:15:31.320 --> 00:15:33.879
essential to emotional expression. Pity the poor
00:15:33.879 --> 00:15:36.500
pianist who must do without. I guess that applies
00:15:36.500 --> 00:15:39.240
to you. Yeah, that's so real, actually. Yeah,
00:15:39.320 --> 00:15:40.980
there are a couple times. Imagine adding vibrato
00:15:40.980 --> 00:15:42.679
to, like, a Chopin ballad. That'd be amazing.
00:15:43.220 --> 00:15:46.039
Oh, that'd be so cool. That'd be so cool. You
00:15:46.039 --> 00:15:48.440
know the clavichord, right? Clavichord? Yeah.
00:15:48.899 --> 00:15:51.220
Clavichords, you can vibrate. You just, like,
00:15:51.279 --> 00:15:53.919
you kind of, like, wiggle the key when you press
00:15:53.919 --> 00:15:56.860
down, but it's, like, possible. the clavichord
00:15:56.860 --> 00:16:00.639
no way yeah you can man you would think in 2026
00:16:00.639 --> 00:16:03.500
i'd make a vibrating like a like a a clavichord
00:16:03.500 --> 00:16:05.960
piano but it just sounds like a piano so you
00:16:05.960 --> 00:16:11.879
can add vibrato yeah that's so good imagine how
00:16:11.879 --> 00:16:14.559
many people will want to buy that too like i
00:16:14.559 --> 00:16:18.580
want to make my i want to make it so i want to
00:16:18.580 --> 00:16:20.860
like yeah i want to basically i want to glaze
00:16:20.860 --> 00:16:23.039
my whole piece That's what I'm saying. You know
00:16:23.039 --> 00:16:25.500
how the Stofan competition in Warsaw has a thing
00:16:25.500 --> 00:16:27.000
where the pianist they pick, either it's like
00:16:27.000 --> 00:16:31.159
a Steinway or a, I think it's Yamaha and a Baldwin
00:16:31.159 --> 00:16:34.460
or something like that. Maybe, maybe five years
00:16:34.460 --> 00:16:36.259
from now or whenever the next competition is,
00:16:36.360 --> 00:16:39.179
there'll be a vibrato piano and they'll play
00:16:39.179 --> 00:16:44.500
all the pieces on there. It's possible. Oh, I
00:16:44.500 --> 00:16:46.500
want to see what the critics think and like,
00:16:46.519 --> 00:16:50.370
and how everyone follows through with that. Martha
00:16:50.370 --> 00:16:54.309
Argerich walks off the panel again. I don't like
00:16:54.309 --> 00:16:59.549
it. I don't like it. Evgeny Kissit. No, I do
00:16:59.549 --> 00:17:04.569
not like it. I do not like it. Wow, yeah. In
00:17:04.569 --> 00:17:07.789
the 17th... Through the 19th century, for singers
00:17:07.789 --> 00:17:10.329
and for instrumentalists, vibrato was not considered
00:17:10.329 --> 00:17:12.549
an ornament to be used on one single long note,
00:17:12.650 --> 00:17:15.329
and not to be misused or overused. Its general
00:17:15.329 --> 00:17:17.970
adoption in singing and playing dates from the
00:17:17.970 --> 00:17:20.190
end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th
00:17:20.190 --> 00:17:22.329
century, Fritz Kreisler is frequently credited
00:17:22.329 --> 00:17:24.950
for it in violin playing, and many instruments,
00:17:25.170 --> 00:17:27.809
like clarinet and brass, only started to use
00:17:27.809 --> 00:17:30.789
it much later. Together with its increasing use,
00:17:30.990 --> 00:17:32.990
the size of the oscillation increased and the
00:17:32.990 --> 00:17:35.349
speed decreased, even at the risk of making the
00:17:35.349 --> 00:17:38.049
intended pitch. As with all ornaments, its use
00:17:38.049 --> 00:17:40.130
in earlier times will have depended on time,
00:17:40.210 --> 00:17:42.710
place, personal temperament, instrument, context,
00:17:42.990 --> 00:17:46.210
function, size of concert venue, and so on. Nowadays,
00:17:46.410 --> 00:17:49.089
Geminiani is often quoted as requesting vibrato
00:17:49.089 --> 00:17:51.609
on every note, and as such, his writing is used
00:17:51.609 --> 00:17:54.230
to infer the general fashion of his time. This
00:17:54.230 --> 00:17:57.089
oversimplification probably originated with violinists,
00:17:57.109 --> 00:17:59.990
who, being used to continuous vibrato, happily
00:17:59.990 --> 00:18:02.849
took up the master's advice. In his Rules for
00:18:02.849 --> 00:18:06.109
Playing in a True Taste, circa 1748, Geminiani
00:18:06.109 --> 00:18:08.869
tells the flute flautists to vibrate only on
00:18:08.869 --> 00:18:10.970
long notes, unfortunately we are not told by
00:18:10.970 --> 00:18:13.769
which means finger or breath. On the violin,
00:18:14.009 --> 00:18:16.930
though, the vibrato may be made on any note whatsoever.
00:18:18.160 --> 00:18:22.299
In The Art of the Playing Violin, in 1751, he
00:18:22.299 --> 00:18:25.160
shows how various kinds of vibrato should be
00:18:25.160 --> 00:18:28.039
used for different affects or for making short
00:18:28.039 --> 00:18:30.759
notes more agreeable. It is somewhat unclear
00:18:30.759 --> 00:18:33.900
whether his concluding remark, for this reason
00:18:33.900 --> 00:18:36.480
it shall be made use of as often as possible,
00:18:36.660 --> 00:18:39.180
is a general advice or refers to short notes
00:18:39.180 --> 00:18:41.880
only. Interestingly, Geminiani appears to be
00:18:41.880 --> 00:18:44.140
quite alone with this statement. He might have
00:18:44.140 --> 00:18:46.680
been as eccentric in his use of vibrato as in
00:18:46.680 --> 00:18:49.940
his rubato playing. When Robert Bremner one of
00:18:49.940 --> 00:18:51.960
Gimignani's former students, republished his
00:18:51.960 --> 00:18:55.839
Master's Violin Treatise in 1777, he left out
00:18:55.839 --> 00:18:59.480
exactly this passage on vibrato. In the 1777
00:18:59.480 --> 00:19:04.019
preface to Chiqui's Quartet's Op. 6, Bremner
00:19:04.019 --> 00:19:06.859
also condemns the use of vibrato except as an
00:19:06.859 --> 00:19:10.220
occasional ornament. See, now right there, that
00:19:10.220 --> 00:19:15.500
kind of thesis right there? Yeah. Vibrato, like...
00:19:16.359 --> 00:19:19.160
we don't like vibrato but it's like it's kind
00:19:19.160 --> 00:19:20.859
of treated as an ornament like i was kind of
00:19:20.859 --> 00:19:23.380
like taught that with like almost any baroque
00:19:23.380 --> 00:19:26.640
music like in general like because when you learn
00:19:26.640 --> 00:19:28.619
like baroque repertoire as like a student like
00:19:28.619 --> 00:19:32.519
it's very um it's very generic and narrow i think
00:19:32.519 --> 00:19:35.660
it's just it is yeah so that's why like i was
00:19:35.660 --> 00:19:38.480
kind of like taught you and it was i think this
00:19:38.480 --> 00:19:42.740
one was a good like lesson that the vibrato was
00:19:42.740 --> 00:19:44.799
kind of like more of an ornament in that sense
00:19:44.799 --> 00:19:48.220
too especially with when I played Bach, but I
00:19:48.220 --> 00:19:51.180
don't know what, like how, what you experienced
00:19:51.180 --> 00:19:53.200
though, but that's what I was like, kind of like,
00:19:53.220 --> 00:19:55.839
um, thinking there. And I kind of like, yeah,
00:19:57.079 --> 00:19:58.960
I'm just trying to think like, especially the
00:19:58.960 --> 00:20:01.920
early, I mean, for me in my case, it's only the
00:20:01.920 --> 00:20:05.140
violin, but basically like during my, my early
00:20:05.140 --> 00:20:07.359
violin days, cause they gave a lot of, uh, Baroque
00:20:07.359 --> 00:20:09.700
pieces to beginner violinists. And I think just
00:20:09.700 --> 00:20:12.140
string players in general. And part of it might
00:20:12.140 --> 00:20:15.140
be that when you're like a beginner, musician
00:20:15.140 --> 00:20:16.799
or string player you're just trying to figure
00:20:16.799 --> 00:20:18.920
out where the notes are on the the fingerboard
00:20:18.920 --> 00:20:21.640
unless I mean most beginner players can't even
00:20:21.640 --> 00:20:23.720
do vibrato yet so it's kind of easier to actually
00:20:23.720 --> 00:20:26.400
play that baroque music versus like giving a
00:20:26.400 --> 00:20:29.160
beginner a Tchaikovsky piece or something and
00:20:29.160 --> 00:20:31.940
you can't play vibrato it's like oh my god yeah
00:20:31.940 --> 00:20:34.099
vibrato is going to be much more difficult than
00:20:34.099 --> 00:20:38.740
that maybe Sibelius is harder I don't know I
00:20:38.740 --> 00:20:41.940
was thinking of the violin concerto you know
00:20:41.940 --> 00:20:44.559
exactly yeah that's a hard piece isn't it The
00:20:44.559 --> 00:20:49.619
Tchaikovsky? No, Sibelius. Ah, yes. Big time.
00:20:49.720 --> 00:20:52.519
Oh my goodness. The octaves. Okay, this is a
00:20:52.519 --> 00:20:54.700
whole other rant, but that piece is hard. It's
00:20:54.700 --> 00:20:57.980
crazy. But no, I'm just thinking like in terms
00:20:57.980 --> 00:21:01.819
of the purist mindset for Baroque music, there
00:21:01.819 --> 00:21:03.279
was definitely that sentiment where it's like
00:21:03.279 --> 00:21:06.220
you don't add vibrato unless you absolutely need
00:21:06.220 --> 00:21:09.200
to. And it's kind of like a point of contention,
00:21:09.200 --> 00:21:12.039
I think, in a lot of... competitions too is if
00:21:12.039 --> 00:21:13.839
you have a string player who's like adding a
00:21:13.839 --> 00:21:16.339
little bit of vibrato it's like some people say
00:21:16.339 --> 00:21:18.740
we shouldn't add vibrato like ever to the pieces
00:21:18.740 --> 00:21:22.000
others are saying no we should add more vibrato
00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:25.420
to kind of bring it into the modern light. Um,
00:21:25.619 --> 00:21:27.799
so yeah, it's, I think it's still like a big
00:21:27.799 --> 00:21:30.160
deal in the classical music world for sure. Not
00:21:30.160 --> 00:21:32.240
just with Baroque music. I also see it a lot
00:21:32.240 --> 00:21:35.180
with classical music too. Like with a Mozart
00:21:35.180 --> 00:21:37.480
violin concertos, that's a huge thing is, you
00:21:37.480 --> 00:21:40.019
know, don't, it's either don't over vibrato or
00:21:40.019 --> 00:21:42.200
don't add any vibrato at all. It's a whole, it's
00:21:42.200 --> 00:21:43.900
a whole thing. It's a really big debate. Like
00:21:43.900 --> 00:21:45.960
you, you could go to like three other different
00:21:45.960 --> 00:21:47.500
teachers and they're all going to like point
00:21:47.500 --> 00:21:53.619
at you for like, they will. Yeah. As we have
00:21:53.619 --> 00:21:56.839
seen, Tartini in his Traite d 'Agriments before
00:21:56.839 --> 00:21:59.980
1756 even requires the long notes performed with
00:21:59.980 --> 00:22:02.220
Massa di Voce to be played absolutely without
00:22:02.220 --> 00:22:04.759
vibrato in order not to disturb the purity of
00:22:04.759 --> 00:22:07.990
tuning. And excuse my French. Throughout the
00:22:07.990 --> 00:22:10.809
18th and 19th century of all over Europe, vibrato
00:22:10.809 --> 00:22:13.069
seems to have moved in and out of fashion. Some
00:22:13.069 --> 00:22:14.869
performers or schools were attacked for applying
00:22:14.869 --> 00:22:17.710
vibrato too frequently. Generally, good taste
00:22:17.710 --> 00:22:19.529
required that it should only be used in solo
00:22:19.529 --> 00:22:21.890
singing or playing, and even that very moderately
00:22:21.890 --> 00:22:25.569
applied on long notes only. Whereas, at least
00:22:25.569 --> 00:22:29.410
one modern conductor, Sir Roger Norrington, has
00:22:29.410 --> 00:22:32.190
his orchestra play without vibrato for 19th century
00:22:32.190 --> 00:22:35.119
repertoire. An interesting case for... of crossover.
00:22:35.380 --> 00:22:37.539
Few of today's early music singers or players
00:22:37.539 --> 00:22:40.119
go very far in that direction. Many are happy
00:22:40.119 --> 00:22:42.400
to just reduce its frequency of use and its size.
00:22:42.819 --> 00:22:45.480
I very much regret this lack of courage and this
00:22:45.480 --> 00:22:47.940
lack of curiosity towards sound ideals that speak
00:22:47.940 --> 00:22:50.519
so clearly from the old treatises. Of course,
00:22:50.579 --> 00:22:53.200
forgetting to vibrate supposes that we focus
00:22:53.200 --> 00:22:55.720
on something else, on the violinist's right hand
00:22:55.720 --> 00:22:57.900
instead of the left, on the flautist's or singer's
00:22:57.900 --> 00:23:00.799
breath, on the invention and sound in its continuous
00:23:00.799 --> 00:23:02.779
creation, shape, and expression throughout a
00:23:02.779 --> 00:23:05.720
longer note. As mentioned earlier, vibrato was
00:23:05.720 --> 00:23:07.759
usually not included on notes performed within
00:23:07.759 --> 00:23:11.579
mezzo di voce. However, it could be present as
00:23:11.579 --> 00:23:13.660
an ornament in the actual performance of a long
00:23:13.660 --> 00:23:16.079
note, provided that this note lies in a solo
00:23:16.079 --> 00:23:20.099
part and has enough expressive potential. Yeah,
00:23:20.200 --> 00:23:22.920
this one's actually kind of a funny one, too,
00:23:23.019 --> 00:23:26.759
because now he points out another person, Sir
00:23:26.759 --> 00:23:30.799
Roger Norrington, and apparently this guy, right?
00:23:30.880 --> 00:23:34.200
What is it? He, yeah. tells his entire ensemble
00:23:34.200 --> 00:23:37.259
not to play vibrato at all i think it's for yeah
00:23:37.259 --> 00:23:40.700
19th century so classical classical um you got
00:23:40.700 --> 00:23:43.079
classical and then up to like uh early romantic
00:23:43.079 --> 00:23:46.299
i i guess you would say yeah like 19th century
00:23:46.299 --> 00:23:50.000
yeah that would be like um i guess maybe like
00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:51.980
those mendelssohn symphonies and kind of those
00:23:51.980 --> 00:23:56.160
early maybe 1830s 1840s yeah for sure that's
00:23:56.160 --> 00:23:58.519
that's i think that's still crazy but that's
00:23:58.519 --> 00:24:01.349
also kind of like I don't know, like, if you
00:24:01.349 --> 00:24:04.170
think, I think it's kind of, like, number one
00:24:04.170 --> 00:24:07.410
polarized to do, but I would want to, like, also
00:24:07.410 --> 00:24:10.509
listen to recordings of this, but that's also
00:24:10.509 --> 00:24:13.650
kind of, like, you know, an island of solitude
00:24:13.650 --> 00:24:16.690
you're taking. It really is, yeah. It's risky,
00:24:16.809 --> 00:24:19.329
I think. Yeah, sorry. And, like, in relation
00:24:19.329 --> 00:24:22.289
to time, you know, because they live closer to
00:24:22.289 --> 00:24:24.950
that time when those pieces were composed versus
00:24:24.950 --> 00:24:31.200
now with our conductors of today. Yeah. That's
00:24:31.200 --> 00:24:34.079
true. Okay. Classical music is such a weird thing
00:24:34.079 --> 00:24:37.319
because you hear like 1700 and you think, wow,
00:24:37.380 --> 00:24:40.759
that's so long ago. But what you start to see
00:24:40.759 --> 00:24:44.259
in this really crazy is that if you look at the
00:24:44.259 --> 00:24:47.920
lineage of people, it's like I was thinking this
00:24:47.920 --> 00:24:51.859
actually today. So Ravel wrote Bolero in 1920.
00:24:52.420 --> 00:24:55.079
I think it was published in 1928 was the first
00:24:55.079 --> 00:24:58.009
performance of it. So my grandfather was born
00:24:58.009 --> 00:25:00.609
in 1928. So you're kidding. You're telling me.
00:25:01.109 --> 00:25:03.109
It's stuff like that where you start to realize,
00:25:03.250 --> 00:25:07.369
like, whoa, this is great. It's all very connected
00:25:07.369 --> 00:25:10.869
and not that far behind. So we actually have
00:25:10.869 --> 00:25:12.630
a lot more documentation about things than I
00:25:12.630 --> 00:25:17.710
think we let onto, if that makes sense. Yeah.
00:25:19.210 --> 00:25:21.710
It's all there. It's just, it's never touched.
00:25:21.809 --> 00:25:24.150
Like, there's some parts of it never touched.
00:25:24.269 --> 00:25:27.589
It's just, like, it exists there, but it's consciously,
00:25:27.690 --> 00:25:30.849
like, we're not looking for that detail until
00:25:30.849 --> 00:25:33.930
we do realize at some point or so. Exactly, yeah,
00:25:34.009 --> 00:25:37.450
yeah. Kwanza's second category, Willkürliche
00:25:37.450 --> 00:25:40.690
Veränderungen. I did it this time. That was great.
00:25:41.650 --> 00:25:44.130
I'm still, I'm getting back into the spiel of
00:25:44.130 --> 00:25:46.490
German, Deutsch. The spiel of German. Ich bin
00:25:46.490 --> 00:25:51.019
sehr gut, yes. Sehr gut. Translated as arbitrary
00:25:51.019 --> 00:25:54.019
alternatives. I'll try to say that more for just
00:25:54.019 --> 00:25:57.079
so I don't screw things up here. Operates more
00:25:57.079 --> 00:25:59.700
on the level of singing than of speaking. When
00:25:59.700 --> 00:26:01.960
one note is not enough to express the full emotional
00:26:01.960 --> 00:26:04.500
undercurrent of the text, adding a florid ornament
00:26:04.500 --> 00:26:08.119
will help us. The arbitrary alternatives should
00:26:08.119 --> 00:26:10.380
thus be suspended from strong syllables and meaningful
00:26:10.380 --> 00:26:13.849
words and be the inner consequence thereof. All
00:26:13.849 --> 00:26:16.250
these ornamental notes cannot sound equally full,
00:26:16.390 --> 00:26:18.630
because when they would all become essential,
00:26:18.769 --> 00:26:21.529
and all would merit their own syllable, hence
00:26:21.529 --> 00:26:24.170
the diminuendo within a vocalese or slur we have
00:26:24.170 --> 00:26:26.930
already spoken about. Even if these ornaments
00:26:26.930 --> 00:26:29.930
were prepared and notated without precision,
00:26:30.390 --> 00:26:32.630
they should sound as if the performer spontaneously
00:26:32.630 --> 00:26:36.210
invented them, and they should possess the emotional
00:26:36.210 --> 00:26:38.910
motivation of the moment. Otherwise, the groups
00:26:38.910 --> 00:26:41.829
of notes become scale or arpeggio exercises.
00:26:42.230 --> 00:26:44.509
Ideally, we should not ornament a passage twice
00:26:44.509 --> 00:26:47.730
in the same way. How different these individual
00:26:47.730 --> 00:26:51.029
ornamentations can look is exemplified by the
00:26:51.029 --> 00:26:54.049
many -extent ornamented versions of slow movements
00:26:54.049 --> 00:26:58.049
from Corelli's Violin Sonatas, Op. 5. To begin
00:26:58.049 --> 00:27:01.269
with, the Amsterdam print of 1710 gives Corelli's
00:27:01.269 --> 00:27:03.650
own way of playing. At least, this is what the
00:27:03.650 --> 00:27:07.539
publisher purports. inviting non -believers to
00:27:07.539 --> 00:27:09.440
come and see Corelli's autographed manuscript
00:27:09.440 --> 00:27:12.579
in his possession. Even so, we should bear in
00:27:12.579 --> 00:27:14.539
mind that Corelli would not always have played
00:27:14.539 --> 00:27:17.319
the same ornaments. Various printed and manuscript
00:27:17.319 --> 00:27:19.559
sources until the end of the 18th century include
00:27:19.559 --> 00:27:21.799
completely different ornaments for some of these
00:27:21.799 --> 00:27:24.059
movements. While these later versions might have
00:27:24.059 --> 00:27:26.940
not been too useful at teaching us about Corelli's
00:27:26.940 --> 00:27:29.279
own practice, they are certainly a good overview
00:27:29.279 --> 00:27:31.740
of the stylistic evolution of ornaments throughout
00:27:31.740 --> 00:27:35.519
the 18th century. See, like... that's the thing
00:27:35.519 --> 00:27:38.119
like it's not just like beyond with ornaments
00:27:38.119 --> 00:27:42.279
like corelli maybe so the claim was corelli wouldn't
00:27:42.279 --> 00:27:45.460
have not played the same ornaments and i was
00:27:45.460 --> 00:27:48.579
thinking of like that one shostakovich five music
00:27:48.579 --> 00:27:51.019
video music video of leonard bernstein conducting
00:27:51.019 --> 00:27:53.559
it at like double the speed and shostakovich
00:27:53.559 --> 00:27:57.839
allegedly said he liked it so that yes i know
00:27:57.839 --> 00:27:59.480
what you're talking about yeah great great recording
00:28:00.039 --> 00:28:04.200
Right? And it also goes way beyond the performance,
00:28:04.519 --> 00:28:06.339
like, fine arts performance. I mean, you got,
00:28:06.420 --> 00:28:09.500
like, different pop bands and everything. They're
00:28:09.500 --> 00:28:12.039
not going to play the same thing twice, like,
00:28:12.119 --> 00:28:15.799
from studio to live version. It's like, it's
00:28:15.799 --> 00:28:19.819
all relative. It's all relative. It is. It is,
00:28:19.859 --> 00:28:22.480
for sure. And I have this theory, too, that I
00:28:22.480 --> 00:28:25.839
feel like a lot of these changes, or a lot of
00:28:25.839 --> 00:28:28.720
the... more stifling aspects of classical music
00:28:28.720 --> 00:28:32.259
started to actually come about in the 19 maybe
00:28:32.259 --> 00:28:35.480
starting in like the 30s 40s and definitely by
00:28:35.480 --> 00:28:38.660
the 50s we had this like image of the very like
00:28:38.660 --> 00:28:41.579
polished classical music uh genre and i think
00:28:41.579 --> 00:28:43.380
part of that is because at least in the united
00:28:43.380 --> 00:28:46.259
states we started to get jazz and rock and roll
00:28:46.259 --> 00:28:48.180
and all these kind of new genres that were very
00:28:48.180 --> 00:28:51.900
uh just rhythmically looser freer had a lot of
00:28:51.900 --> 00:28:54.900
improv improvisational and i I mean, I might
00:28:54.900 --> 00:28:57.039
be wrong and maybe it is kind of layered, but
00:28:57.039 --> 00:28:59.339
I think especially in the United States, classical
00:28:59.339 --> 00:29:03.579
music as a genre, as a people, I think all the
00:29:03.579 --> 00:29:06.339
individuals involved kind of wanted to distinguish
00:29:06.339 --> 00:29:08.480
themselves from things like jazz or rock and
00:29:08.480 --> 00:29:11.920
roll. So we got this more like what's written
00:29:11.920 --> 00:29:14.299
on the page is exactly how you play it and, you
00:29:14.299 --> 00:29:16.480
know, make sure that your rhythm is perfect and
00:29:16.480 --> 00:29:18.380
you're playing it exactly as the composer. So,
00:29:18.420 --> 00:29:20.900
yeah, but kind of getting rid of things like
00:29:20.900 --> 00:29:22.759
writing your own cadenzas, which we talked about
00:29:22.759 --> 00:29:26.400
in a previous episode. Um, and maybe being freer
00:29:26.400 --> 00:29:28.839
with your ornamentations and adding your own
00:29:28.839 --> 00:29:30.740
ornamentations, for example, and just things
00:29:30.740 --> 00:29:33.940
like that. That is kind of sad though. Like it
00:29:33.940 --> 00:29:37.740
is, it's like now then it's not even like, I'm
00:29:37.740 --> 00:29:41.420
trying to think, is it like, it's not even regression.
00:29:41.559 --> 00:29:45.220
It's like, I don't know. You're just locking
00:29:45.220 --> 00:29:50.619
yourself up. We haven't moved. Yeah. Cause now
00:29:50.619 --> 00:29:52.920
you're just telling people, Oh, do this, do that,
00:29:52.960 --> 00:29:57.460
do this, do that. And it's like, I guess that's
00:29:57.460 --> 00:30:01.140
why genres where artists feel like it doesn't
00:30:01.140 --> 00:30:04.640
belong in one category, it's totally fine, right?
00:30:04.700 --> 00:30:08.240
Because some of the best music could be new age
00:30:08.240 --> 00:30:12.420
and people claim it's folk. I was thinking of
00:30:12.420 --> 00:30:14.160
American pianist George Winston because he was
00:30:14.160 --> 00:30:15.759
more of a nature pianist. People didn't like
00:30:15.759 --> 00:30:19.359
it calling folk. He really didn't like that.
00:30:19.400 --> 00:30:22.059
And Debussy didn't like being called an impressionist.
00:30:22.899 --> 00:30:25.359
Yes. Yeah. What was he more like? I thought he
00:30:25.359 --> 00:30:28.140
said he, I thought he was kind of like more of
00:30:28.140 --> 00:30:31.700
like, he said kind of like realist, like kind
00:30:31.700 --> 00:30:35.539
of like vividly like vivid experiences within
00:30:35.539 --> 00:30:38.660
the, the, the cotton like piece and like his
00:30:38.660 --> 00:30:42.759
creations. I forgot the exact term, but no, for
00:30:42.759 --> 00:30:45.200
sure. Yeah. That's the thing with some of these
00:30:45.200 --> 00:30:47.900
artists, like they don't, they don't like being
00:30:47.900 --> 00:30:50.700
called like one kind of genre, but it's, it's
00:30:50.700 --> 00:30:53.000
totally fine. It's like, i i don't know where
00:30:53.000 --> 00:30:56.460
that lock lock like isolation isolation came
00:30:56.460 --> 00:30:59.980
from you know for me yeah i think maybe film
00:30:59.980 --> 00:31:02.799
music kind because okay cinema came out around
00:31:02.799 --> 00:31:05.519
the same time like 1920s 1930s and so you started
00:31:05.519 --> 00:31:07.859
to get film composers taking their classical
00:31:07.859 --> 00:31:09.859
music knowledge and writing these orchestral
00:31:09.859 --> 00:31:12.279
pieces for the stage or for the screen i should
00:31:12.279 --> 00:31:16.339
say um and i think maybe that posed another layer
00:31:16.339 --> 00:31:19.789
of don't want to use the word like threatening
00:31:19.789 --> 00:31:22.069
classical music because it's it's not like it's
00:31:22.069 --> 00:31:23.930
taking anything away it's just like a different
00:31:23.930 --> 00:31:26.609
it's a hybrid of it it's a interpretation of
00:31:26.609 --> 00:31:30.849
it and so I don't know and I don't also I'm not
00:31:30.849 --> 00:31:33.450
sure if this is just purely like a very American
00:31:33.450 --> 00:31:35.829
thing or if this also happened in Europe maybe
00:31:35.829 --> 00:31:39.549
a little bit of both um but yeah I'm not sure
00:31:39.549 --> 00:31:41.289
I'm not sure I also think the classical music
00:31:41.289 --> 00:31:44.250
unless you're brought up in a way where it's
00:31:44.250 --> 00:31:46.529
you're exposed to it quite a bit i think a lot
00:31:46.529 --> 00:31:48.369
of people get kind of intimidated by it because
00:31:48.369 --> 00:31:51.890
it is very difficult i mean if you play a classical
00:31:51.890 --> 00:31:53.670
instrument it's like you have to practice you
00:31:53.670 --> 00:31:56.230
have to do scales the repertoire itself can be
00:31:56.230 --> 00:31:58.829
very challenging um it's layered but i think
00:31:58.829 --> 00:32:02.349
people are less likely to to start that challenge
00:32:02.349 --> 00:32:05.789
partly because of the image where it's like it's
00:32:05.789 --> 00:32:08.430
it's really it's high class and it's for a certain
00:32:08.430 --> 00:32:11.900
type you know So I'm not sure if it's always
00:32:11.900 --> 00:32:15.099
been that way or it's it's been less because
00:32:15.099 --> 00:32:18.740
if you look at paintings of Sort of I mean it's
00:32:18.740 --> 00:32:20.440
always been maybe upper -class, but just the
00:32:20.440 --> 00:32:23.160
average family back in the day It's like everyone
00:32:23.160 --> 00:32:26.539
knew a little bit of piano or piano forte Maybe
00:32:26.539 --> 00:32:28.960
a string instrument somebody would play a lute
00:32:28.960 --> 00:32:30.740
or a flute or something like that So I'm not
00:32:30.740 --> 00:32:34.059
sure but that's kind of a lost art Culturally,
00:32:34.119 --> 00:32:36.440
I'm not really sure that's a great connection
00:32:38.960 --> 00:32:42.579
like all the upper maybe upper class maybe yeah
00:32:42.579 --> 00:32:45.119
upper class in general would have access to all
00:32:45.119 --> 00:32:47.779
those well they were they were interested first
00:32:47.779 --> 00:32:50.940
of all to like indulge themselves and that kind
00:32:50.940 --> 00:32:54.799
of like um field and you know music like even
00:32:54.799 --> 00:32:58.279
at an amateur level and then i i guess it's kind
00:32:58.279 --> 00:33:02.220
of like hallucinated now because some people
00:33:02.220 --> 00:33:05.130
don't some people do it's it's really up to like
00:33:05.130 --> 00:33:06.910
if you were actually interested in it have you
00:33:06.910 --> 00:33:09.869
played before a long time yeah or what do you
00:33:09.869 --> 00:33:11.890
even know it's like everybody knows what a violin
00:33:11.890 --> 00:33:14.690
is but if you were to ask somebody what a violin
00:33:14.690 --> 00:33:16.930
concerto is they probably wouldn't be able to
00:33:16.930 --> 00:33:20.890
tell you exactly what that means musically um
00:33:20.890 --> 00:33:23.609
but to be fair i gotta be honest i wasn't alive
00:33:23.609 --> 00:33:27.089
50 years ago so maybe maybe that's not true but
00:33:27.089 --> 00:33:33.019
i'm not sure that's crazy though i i i Hopefully,
00:33:33.039 --> 00:33:35.720
we live long lives and see what the heck happens
00:33:35.720 --> 00:33:37.779
in the future. No, exactly. Yeah, we'll see.
00:33:37.880 --> 00:33:43.000
We'll see. All right. Okay. There are many methods
00:33:43.000 --> 00:33:45.240
for learning to invent arbitrary alternatives.
00:33:45.519 --> 00:33:48.819
We can look at some recipe books where each interval
00:33:48.819 --> 00:33:51.200
is shown with a series of possible ornamentations
00:33:51.200 --> 00:33:54.900
or diminutions. We can also study examples of
00:33:54.900 --> 00:33:56.880
a simple melody and its ornamented version underneath,
00:33:57.039 --> 00:34:00.880
such as Telemann's Sonata Metodice, 1728 and
00:34:00.880 --> 00:34:04.000
1732. And there is a figure four. If you want
00:34:04.000 --> 00:34:05.859
to check out the score, it's on the right there.
00:34:06.359 --> 00:34:09.400
But this is, just to be specific, if you want
00:34:09.400 --> 00:34:13.039
to look this up on IMSLP, sorry, we cannot provide
00:34:13.039 --> 00:34:15.940
the image. I can't pull up anything. It's Telemann
00:34:15.940 --> 00:34:22.920
Adagio from Sonata Metodica 2 for violin or transverse
00:34:22.920 --> 00:34:29.860
flute and basso continuo. TWV 41 A3. 1728. Measures
00:34:29.860 --> 00:34:32.860
1 through 11, if you want to look at that. You
00:34:32.860 --> 00:34:35.420
can pause the podcast and go take a look. Exactly.
00:34:36.780 --> 00:34:39.619
Yeah, and this is something, actually, we didn't
00:34:39.619 --> 00:34:41.940
say that much, actually. I think we only went
00:34:41.940 --> 00:34:44.840
through, like, two or three of these, but now
00:34:44.840 --> 00:34:48.019
I think we kind of, like, learned to say that.
00:34:49.880 --> 00:34:55.630
That's the most thing. We certainly must realize
00:34:55.630 --> 00:34:57.750
that many elaborate passages and compositions
00:34:57.750 --> 00:35:00.190
are in fact only written down ornamentations
00:35:00.190 --> 00:35:02.969
and should therefore be performed as such. When
00:35:02.969 --> 00:35:05.289
these passages are no more than arbitrary alternatives,
00:35:05.690 --> 00:35:08.610
we may feel free to replace them by our own inventions.
00:35:08.949 --> 00:35:11.349
Indeed, there exist many sources of favorite
00:35:11.349 --> 00:35:14.309
opera arias where the composer's ornamentation
00:35:14.309 --> 00:35:17.130
has been changed or supplemented by a famous
00:35:17.130 --> 00:35:19.849
18th, 19th, and even early 20th century singer
00:35:19.849 --> 00:35:24.760
who was unhindered by any exaggerated respect
00:35:24.760 --> 00:35:27.519
for urtext versions. We can still hear some of
00:35:27.519 --> 00:35:29.900
this practice in the earliest opera aria recordings
00:35:29.900 --> 00:35:33.159
with sopranos such as Adelina Patti and Luisa
00:35:33.159 --> 00:35:36.179
Tetrazini. I suppose that this freedom of changing
00:35:36.179 --> 00:35:38.800
or adding ornamentation was considered the soloist
00:35:38.800 --> 00:35:41.920
prerogative, at least in the Italian tradition
00:35:41.920 --> 00:35:45.400
up to the beginning of the 20th century. Gluck's
00:35:45.400 --> 00:35:47.739
endeavor to have the singers perform what he
00:35:47.739 --> 00:35:50.039
had written in No More, as expressed in the preface
00:35:50.039 --> 00:35:56.889
to the 1769 edition of Alcesta. must have often
00:35:56.889 --> 00:36:00.570
remained wishful thinking. This important preface
00:36:00.570 --> 00:36:02.769
quite eloquently describes the then -current
00:36:02.769 --> 00:36:05.690
style of vocal composition and performance. The
00:36:05.690 --> 00:36:08.570
composer had to allow the singer ample opportunity
00:36:08.570 --> 00:36:11.730
to show off his or her virtuoso abilities with
00:36:11.730 --> 00:36:15.150
elaborate passaggi and free ornamentation. Gluck
00:36:15.150 --> 00:36:17.889
accuses composers of complicity because they
00:36:17.889 --> 00:36:20.269
are all too willingly catered to the singer's
00:36:20.269 --> 00:36:24.639
vanity. Gluck's reforms are aimed precisely at
00:36:24.639 --> 00:36:26.860
stopping this abuse, as he calls it. One year
00:36:26.860 --> 00:36:30.860
later, in the preface to Elina et Paride, Vienna
00:36:30.860 --> 00:36:34.679
1770, Gluck enumerates the bad practices once
00:36:34.679 --> 00:36:38.219
more, holding no longer or shorter than written
00:36:38.219 --> 00:36:40.980
arbitrary rubato, failing to observe an accelerando
00:36:40.980 --> 00:36:43.460
or crescendo. These would normally have been
00:36:43.460 --> 00:36:45.179
the singer's decision, but not the composer's.
00:36:45.179 --> 00:36:48.219
And ill -chosen arpeggiaturas, trills, and coloraturas,
00:36:48.400 --> 00:36:50.440
again introduced by the performer, not the composer.
00:36:51.500 --> 00:36:54.480
Luke states that whereas these effects would
00:36:54.480 --> 00:36:57.260
do no harm to other composers' works, or even
00:36:57.260 --> 00:36:59.980
improve them, they ruin his own compositions.
00:37:00.340 --> 00:37:05.920
Not exactly a modest stance. Dang! Luke has some
00:37:05.920 --> 00:37:08.159
beef here. He's got some beef with these singers!
00:37:08.400 --> 00:37:10.500
I don't know. I don't hear about him too much,
00:37:10.519 --> 00:37:15.480
but he was a significant figure in the movement
00:37:15.480 --> 00:37:19.880
and his field. I feel like there's a lot more
00:37:19.880 --> 00:37:22.079
sophisticated stuff about him than if you talk
00:37:22.079 --> 00:37:24.199
about Bach. Like, think about his, like, him
00:37:24.199 --> 00:37:28.940
accusing other composers that they cater too
00:37:28.940 --> 00:37:32.519
much to the singers too much. No, exactly. Yeah,
00:37:32.719 --> 00:37:35.340
and that's actually a huge debate, too, between
00:37:35.340 --> 00:37:38.760
maybe less so now, I'm not really sure, but between
00:37:38.760 --> 00:37:41.760
the composer versus the performer, especially
00:37:41.760 --> 00:37:44.719
when, because I feel like as performers, a lot
00:37:44.719 --> 00:37:46.960
of the... the interpretations that we have are
00:37:46.960 --> 00:37:48.739
kind of like what we think the composer would
00:37:48.739 --> 00:37:51.940
have liked but it gets kind of problematic when
00:37:51.940 --> 00:37:53.840
the composer is actually alive and is telling
00:37:53.840 --> 00:37:55.820
the performer it's like you gotta do it this
00:37:55.820 --> 00:37:57.420
way you gotta do it this way and then the performer
00:37:57.420 --> 00:37:59.579
is like well i'm performing it so i'm gonna do
00:37:59.579 --> 00:38:02.000
it my way it's like i don't know it's a different
00:38:02.000 --> 00:38:05.659
different interaction there i think yeah it's
00:38:05.659 --> 00:38:08.340
like you're literally walking you're like walking
00:38:08.340 --> 00:38:11.659
the tightrope uh tightrope like tug of war basically
00:38:11.659 --> 00:38:15.480
it's like they the singers don't feel like they
00:38:15.480 --> 00:38:18.000
get what they want and then like you know you
00:38:18.000 --> 00:38:21.639
have this man who wants like an over has an overarching
00:38:21.639 --> 00:38:25.519
like goal or claim right to deliver something
00:38:25.519 --> 00:38:31.380
like truly unique for sure yeah so yeah gluck
00:38:31.380 --> 00:38:34.840
is kind of sophisticated even like with his argument
00:38:34.840 --> 00:38:38.719
on like who gets who what um a practical example
00:38:38.719 --> 00:38:40.699
of what singers would add to the printed text
00:38:40.699 --> 00:38:44.820
can be found in domenico corey's a select Collection
00:38:44.820 --> 00:38:48.059
of the most admired songs, duets, etc. from operas
00:38:48.059 --> 00:38:50.340
in the highest esteem. Volumes 1 through 3 start
00:38:50.340 --> 00:38:53.739
at 1780. Volume 4 after 1794. Volume 5 is part
00:38:53.739 --> 00:38:56.500
2 of the Singing Treatise 1810. That's a long
00:38:56.500 --> 00:38:58.760
description. Also, I like that title name. It's
00:38:58.760 --> 00:39:01.139
very nice. I should probably find it in my local
00:39:01.139 --> 00:39:04.519
library or ask for the interlibrary loan and
00:39:04.519 --> 00:39:06.639
then ask, can you get me this book? It's probably
00:39:06.639 --> 00:39:10.260
pretty good. I need to find this book, a select
00:39:10.260 --> 00:39:12.659
collection of the most admired songs, duets,
00:39:12.679 --> 00:39:15.019
etc. from authors and the highest esteem, specifically
00:39:15.019 --> 00:39:18.960
volume 1 -3, circa 1780, volume 4 after 1794,
00:39:19.219 --> 00:39:24.559
volume 5 is part 2 of it. That's just like you
00:39:24.559 --> 00:39:26.320
want to look for the best recordings, right?
00:39:27.159 --> 00:39:29.440
Think of, like, Classics Today and Dave Hurwitz.
00:39:29.579 --> 00:39:34.039
Classics Today, Dave Hurwitz. Surprisingly, he
00:39:34.039 --> 00:39:36.139
doesn't disappoint, especially with the orchestra
00:39:36.139 --> 00:39:38.260
recordings. Like, I know there could be a lot
00:39:38.260 --> 00:39:41.599
of other different, like, you know, contrasting
00:39:41.599 --> 00:39:43.940
claims with different, like, recordings, but
00:39:43.940 --> 00:39:47.579
he does deliver generally pretty well with the
00:39:47.579 --> 00:39:50.659
recommendations. Because it's hard to start somewhere,
00:39:50.760 --> 00:39:52.679
even, like, especially for amateurs. I feel like
00:39:52.679 --> 00:39:54.380
I'm an amateur, even though, like, we're good
00:39:54.380 --> 00:39:57.340
players. But, like... At the same time, it's
00:39:57.340 --> 00:40:00.039
like, looking for a recording is like, oh, I
00:40:00.039 --> 00:40:01.840
have to look up for, like, there's thousands
00:40:01.840 --> 00:40:05.539
of them. There's so many! Well, and there's also
00:40:05.539 --> 00:40:07.460
that thing, too, where sometimes the reference
00:40:07.460 --> 00:40:09.699
recording that people say is like, this is the
00:40:09.699 --> 00:40:13.139
go -to for this symphony. If you are, like, okay,
00:40:13.300 --> 00:40:15.079
if you're somebody who's really interested in
00:40:15.079 --> 00:40:17.840
historical playing... The Bach reference recording
00:40:17.840 --> 00:40:19.760
might not actually be the Bach that you want
00:40:19.760 --> 00:40:21.840
to listen to if you're more interested in, like,
00:40:21.900 --> 00:40:24.159
historical performance. So that's a whole thing.
00:40:24.340 --> 00:40:25.800
Yeah, and even some of the period recordings
00:40:25.800 --> 00:40:28.320
are not going to be even that good, too. That's
00:40:28.320 --> 00:40:31.400
true, too, yeah. Like, technically it might be
00:40:31.400 --> 00:40:34.579
great, artistically not the best, and vice versa
00:40:34.579 --> 00:40:37.719
the other way around. There's no winning here.
00:40:38.519 --> 00:40:43.199
I don't want to get too personal, but especially
00:40:43.199 --> 00:40:47.179
I... I went to Ravinia yesterday, Ravinia Festival
00:40:47.179 --> 00:40:49.119
in Highland Park, Illinois, close to Chicago,
00:40:49.260 --> 00:40:51.579
and I saw Stephen Israelis perform. He's a British
00:40:51.579 --> 00:40:54.219
cellist. He was great. But he performed the Haydn
00:40:54.219 --> 00:40:58.559
Cello Concerto in C, and he has great style and
00:40:58.559 --> 00:41:03.400
kind of like this character as a musician. It's
00:41:03.400 --> 00:41:05.400
so distinct. Like, if you just listen without
00:41:05.400 --> 00:41:08.380
watching a video, you know it's Stephen Israelis.
00:41:08.440 --> 00:41:10.500
And he has such great character. He doesn't...
00:41:11.420 --> 00:41:13.460
I don't think he corrupts a lot of the music.
00:41:13.480 --> 00:41:16.559
He tries to stay truthful to it. He uses all
00:41:16.559 --> 00:41:19.460
gut strings for most of his concerto performances,
00:41:19.780 --> 00:41:22.000
maybe except like Kavalevsky or something like
00:41:22.000 --> 00:41:25.199
that. But it's like, yeah, I can notice that.
00:41:25.239 --> 00:41:27.380
But at the same time, even though he's trying
00:41:27.380 --> 00:41:31.199
to get too close to that goal, it's not necessarily
00:41:31.199 --> 00:41:36.099
all the way there. Correct, yeah. of your goal
00:41:36.099 --> 00:41:39.340
yeah and that again it's that fine line of i
00:41:39.340 --> 00:41:40.900
think what the author is talking about with the
00:41:40.900 --> 00:41:43.840
good taste where you if you're playing a historical
00:41:43.840 --> 00:41:46.260
piece you want it to be kind of in that the essence
00:41:46.260 --> 00:41:49.420
of the historical period but you also as a performer
00:41:49.420 --> 00:41:53.000
you you want to bring your own thing to it as
00:41:53.000 --> 00:41:55.619
well and i think like one of the early chapters
00:41:55.619 --> 00:41:58.880
in the book um Barthold Kuijken was basically saying
00:41:58.880 --> 00:42:00.460
that where he's like i've been to some historical
00:42:00.460 --> 00:42:02.739
concerts where they're very true but it's just
00:42:02.739 --> 00:42:05.539
an awful concert because there's nothing really
00:42:05.539 --> 00:42:09.440
artistic about it it's sort of that that one
00:42:09.440 --> 00:42:12.360
they're literally following verbatim of everything
00:42:12.360 --> 00:42:19.420
you know like yeah yeah exactly at 18 22 25 milliseconds
00:42:19.420 --> 00:42:23.900
right in 1871 or like this is what i'm they were
00:42:23.900 --> 00:42:27.630
doing like oh right right And in a sense, though,
00:42:27.650 --> 00:42:30.309
it loses its historical accuracy in that way
00:42:30.309 --> 00:42:33.110
because, as the author just stated here, these
00:42:33.110 --> 00:42:36.349
opera singers or these soloists or instrumentalists
00:42:36.349 --> 00:42:39.889
were not actually necessarily following everything
00:42:39.889 --> 00:42:42.309
the composer was saying. And so if you want to
00:42:42.309 --> 00:42:45.409
be accurate, I think you've got to do both. Yeah,
00:42:45.469 --> 00:42:50.389
you have to. Yeah. All right. Corey, so this
00:42:50.389 --> 00:42:53.510
was the author. Corey was a student of the famous
00:42:53.510 --> 00:42:57.179
Nicola Popora. and was himself an influential
00:42:57.179 --> 00:42:59.739
singing teacher in England. In this collection,
00:42:59.840 --> 00:43:02.539
he prints many favorite resuscitatives and arias,
00:43:02.539 --> 00:43:04.260
together with the way a number of great singers
00:43:04.260 --> 00:43:07.000
performed them. One of his examples is Gluck's
00:43:07.000 --> 00:43:10.880
famous Cefaro senza iuridis from Orfeo e di Iuridis
00:43:10.880 --> 00:43:17.420
in 1762, as sung by Gaetano Guadagni, who was
00:43:17.420 --> 00:43:20.199
Gluck's first Orfeo, with the singer's ornaments
00:43:20.199 --> 00:43:22.139
and the rhythmic adaptation we mentioned earlier.
00:43:22.840 --> 00:43:25.119
In the introduction to the first volume, Corey
00:43:25.119 --> 00:43:27.480
laments the insufficient notation of all the
00:43:27.480 --> 00:43:30.380
expressive devices, ornaments, rhythm, and pitches,
00:43:30.579 --> 00:43:33.920
and tries to remedy this by introducing new symbols.
00:43:34.579 --> 00:43:36.699
And here is his direct quotation. He writes,
00:43:36.940 --> 00:43:40.300
Experience has evinced that, for want of such
00:43:40.300 --> 00:43:42.559
signs, the music of half a century back is in
00:43:42.559 --> 00:43:44.719
great measure lost to the present time, even
00:43:44.719 --> 00:43:47.340
in the same country, and is at all times totally
00:43:47.340 --> 00:43:50.880
unintelligible to a foreign nation. There seems
00:43:50.880 --> 00:43:52.739
to be a little hope for us two centuries later.
00:43:53.280 --> 00:43:56.099
Some pieces are clearly written as an open and
00:43:56.099 --> 00:43:58.920
urgent invitation to the performer. Without ornamentation,
00:43:58.960 --> 00:44:01.820
they sound too simple and inexpressive. Where
00:44:01.820 --> 00:44:04.260
do we expect these free ornaments? In vocal music,
00:44:04.420 --> 00:44:06.840
they occur mostly on words with strong emotional
00:44:06.840 --> 00:44:10.260
meaning and on good vowels. In French Baroque
00:44:10.260 --> 00:44:12.599
opera, they are typically found on gloire and
00:44:12.599 --> 00:44:18.219
victoire. I actually, I thought I was going to
00:44:18.219 --> 00:44:21.039
get, I was going to get it right. It's close
00:44:21.039 --> 00:44:23.519
enough. That one's cool though. Like specific
00:44:23.519 --> 00:44:27.500
type of words have the sophisticated meaning
00:44:27.500 --> 00:44:31.699
that, so that they would actually like, what
00:44:31.699 --> 00:44:35.179
would they say? Like lengthen on that kind of
00:44:35.179 --> 00:44:40.010
like word. Yeah. We see them used more in slow
00:44:40.010 --> 00:44:42.230
rather than in fast instrumental movements. If
00:44:42.230 --> 00:44:44.969
used in fast movements, they often take the form
00:44:44.969 --> 00:44:47.750
of an even more virtuosic passage, whereas in
00:44:47.750 --> 00:44:49.690
slow movements the note values might be less
00:44:49.690 --> 00:44:53.130
regular or less defined. The Brussels Royal Conservatory
00:44:53.130 --> 00:44:55.750
Library houses a number of violin concertos by
00:44:55.750 --> 00:45:00.610
Franz Benda with his own variations, as he calls
00:45:00.610 --> 00:45:03.730
them, for both fast and slow movements. There
00:45:03.730 --> 00:45:06.070
are excellent examples of the extent to which
00:45:07.010 --> 00:45:09.449
ornamentation could be applied. Other typical
00:45:09.449 --> 00:45:11.989
situations are the da capo of an opera aria,
00:45:12.030 --> 00:45:14.630
where ornamentation was a must, and the repeat
00:45:14.630 --> 00:45:18.369
of an idea or section. In his Versuch, Quantz
00:45:18.369 --> 00:45:21.050
advises to perform the idea simply at first,
00:45:21.210 --> 00:45:23.710
then ornamented the subsequent items, so that
00:45:23.710 --> 00:45:25.769
the audience can hear that the ornamentation
00:45:25.769 --> 00:45:28.110
is the invention of the interpreter, not of the
00:45:28.110 --> 00:45:31.389
composer. Juan states also that in trio sonatas
00:45:31.389 --> 00:45:33.849
or duets, the ornamentation in one upper part
00:45:33.849 --> 00:45:36.869
must generally be imitated, not negated or exaggerated
00:45:36.869 --> 00:45:39.829
by the second melodic voice. This is illustrated
00:45:39.829 --> 00:45:45.750
in Telemann's Trieti Metodici in 1731. Doubles
00:45:45.750 --> 00:45:48.789
present a special case. They originate with the
00:45:48.789 --> 00:45:51.730
17th century French air de corps, where the second
00:45:51.730 --> 00:45:55.559
of the true text couplets, text couplets was
00:45:55.559 --> 00:45:58.699
even more highly ornamented in an often rhythmically
00:45:58.699 --> 00:46:01.940
very intricate way. We find the same style in
00:46:01.940 --> 00:46:03.960
some French instrumental pieces of the period.
00:46:04.119 --> 00:46:06.360
J .S. Bach occasionally wrote doubles in his
00:46:06.360 --> 00:46:11.079
instrumental works, sometimes even more in other
00:46:11.079 --> 00:46:14.719
places with very virtuoso, arbitrary alternatives.
00:46:15.360 --> 00:46:18.480
These doubles always come after the simple version
00:46:18.480 --> 00:46:21.460
as a quasi -independent piece. C .P .E. Bach
00:46:21.929 --> 00:46:25.130
writes a number of keyboard sonata mit veranderten
00:46:25.130 --> 00:46:28.750
reprisen, 1760, where the repeat sections are
00:46:28.750 --> 00:46:31.250
written out in a very freely ornamented way.
00:46:31.449 --> 00:46:33.550
It can be hard to recognize where the repeat
00:46:33.550 --> 00:46:36.530
actually starts, since even the left hand is
00:46:36.530 --> 00:46:38.889
often changed, though the basic harmony evidently
00:46:38.889 --> 00:46:52.460
remains the same. I think he's alluding to just
00:46:52.460 --> 00:46:57.619
anything with... I think double... No, I don't
00:46:57.619 --> 00:47:00.199
know if it's double instrumentation. Yes. Is
00:47:00.199 --> 00:47:03.000
it? I think. Yeah, I'm trying to figure this
00:47:03.000 --> 00:47:07.780
out too. Yeah, he is. He's saying that. So...
00:47:07.780 --> 00:47:16.539
I thought this was another interesting case because...
00:47:18.940 --> 00:47:21.699
I can't, I'll have to get back to you. Let's
00:47:21.699 --> 00:47:23.760
read one more, and then I'll actually say something.
00:47:24.059 --> 00:47:26.599
Treatises usually stress that in order to invent
00:47:26.599 --> 00:47:30.079
good arbitrary alternatives, one has to know
00:47:30.079 --> 00:47:32.139
the rules of composition. Free ornamentation
00:47:32.139 --> 00:47:34.300
must not only be interesting and expressive,
00:47:34.440 --> 00:47:37.139
but also harmonically correct and well integrated
00:47:37.139 --> 00:47:40.380
in the complete piece. As with the Vicent Neshamaniren,
00:47:40.539 --> 00:47:43.360
as a final requisite, good taste is often quoted.
00:47:45.079 --> 00:47:47.039
gives a very interesting definition of the concept
00:47:47.039 --> 00:47:49.219
of taste when he explains musical terminology
00:47:49.219 --> 00:47:52.699
in an appendix to his Music, Men, and Manners
00:47:52.699 --> 00:47:56.199
in France and Italy in 1770. Taste is the adding,
00:47:56.340 --> 00:47:58.519
diminishing, or changing a melody or passage
00:47:58.519 --> 00:48:01.480
with judgment and propriety, and in such a matter
00:48:01.480 --> 00:48:04.460
as to improve it, if this were rendered an invariable
00:48:04.460 --> 00:48:07.599
rule in what is commonly called gracing, the
00:48:07.599 --> 00:48:09.400
passages and compositions of the first class
00:48:09.400 --> 00:48:13.579
would seldom be changed. Wow, that's great. You
00:48:13.579 --> 00:48:15.260
know what I was thinking, too? Like, because
00:48:15.260 --> 00:48:17.260
in this sort of passage, I think actually it
00:48:17.260 --> 00:48:18.880
was sort of in the doubles passage. He's talking
00:48:18.880 --> 00:48:24.099
about just Bach as a composer and how he sort
00:48:24.099 --> 00:48:26.300
of had these free works. I think I'm trying to
00:48:26.300 --> 00:48:28.800
find the exact quote that he said. He was talking
00:48:28.800 --> 00:48:31.360
about like the repeat sections are written out
00:48:31.360 --> 00:48:33.559
in a very freely fermented way. And for me, it's
00:48:33.559 --> 00:48:36.800
like, OK, if you. picture an image of Bach as
00:48:36.800 --> 00:48:39.139
a composer and the pieces that he's written and
00:48:39.139 --> 00:48:41.199
even as like a student trying to play the pieces
00:48:41.199 --> 00:48:44.079
there's this idea where it has to be like very
00:48:44.079 --> 00:48:46.800
strict sort of where it's like okay make sure
00:48:46.800 --> 00:48:50.280
the rhythm is is perfect in this way um just
00:48:50.280 --> 00:48:51.579
like we were saying earlier is that you have
00:48:51.579 --> 00:48:53.840
to follow everything on the page super actively
00:48:53.840 --> 00:48:56.960
and verbatim right and it's like you you don't
00:48:56.960 --> 00:48:58.739
want to because if you change too many things
00:48:58.739 --> 00:49:00.900
and it's going to change the the I guess the
00:49:00.900 --> 00:49:04.070
DNA of the piece itself but There is that element
00:49:04.070 --> 00:49:07.489
where, you know, a creative person who wrote
00:49:07.489 --> 00:49:10.849
all of the pieces that Bach did had to have had
00:49:10.849 --> 00:49:14.849
an idea, I think, of being creative while performing,
00:49:15.010 --> 00:49:16.909
if that makes sense. Where there's sort of a
00:49:16.909 --> 00:49:19.710
connection between composing and performing versus
00:49:19.710 --> 00:49:22.690
composition being completely separate and segregated
00:49:22.690 --> 00:49:25.070
from the performance perspective, which I think
00:49:25.070 --> 00:49:29.639
is kind of a newer concept in general. That is
00:49:29.639 --> 00:49:33.380
a great sophisticated synthesis of all the, like,
00:49:33.380 --> 00:49:36.679
five paragraphs we read. That's my thesis. Well
00:49:36.679 --> 00:49:38.980
done. That's the thesis right there. I loved
00:49:38.980 --> 00:49:41.719
it. I loved it on this one. Big brain, big brain.
00:49:41.780 --> 00:49:44.360
I mean, because he's also just, like, going in
00:49:44.360 --> 00:49:48.300
all different directions each time. So it's generally
00:49:48.300 --> 00:49:53.219
a complicated stance. I mean, sure, you got,
00:49:53.260 --> 00:49:57.079
like, mad gluck. You got mad gluck. Luke, um,
00:49:57.239 --> 00:50:01.739
you have, uh, J .S. Bach doing stuff with doubles
00:50:01.739 --> 00:50:05.380
and, you know, he has apparently, quote -unquote,
00:50:05.519 --> 00:50:08.820
arbitrary, uh, alternatives to this and that
00:50:08.820 --> 00:50:12.360
with what he chooses for the instruments and
00:50:12.360 --> 00:50:17.500
all that, and now it ends to, um, the, like,
00:50:17.619 --> 00:50:20.780
the different, um, I guess, like, just, like,
00:50:20.800 --> 00:50:25.820
solely, um, the passage itself, lastly. If you
00:50:25.820 --> 00:50:28.539
get what I'm saying. Yeah, I know. For sure.
00:50:28.579 --> 00:50:31.420
Yeah. It's a whole thing. I don't know if maybe
00:50:31.420 --> 00:50:35.159
in terms of like if you were to view this as
00:50:35.159 --> 00:50:38.539
like a classical music conflict, the only the
00:50:38.539 --> 00:50:40.300
suggestion I would have, and I think the author
00:50:40.300 --> 00:50:42.960
makes this claim, too, is that just researching
00:50:42.960 --> 00:50:45.440
more about where the pieces came from and what
00:50:45.440 --> 00:50:47.559
the composers were thinking while writing them
00:50:47.559 --> 00:50:50.519
probably would influence the modern performer
00:50:50.519 --> 00:50:55.389
quite a bit because. everything in performance
00:50:55.389 --> 00:50:59.090
is very much like everyone practices to play
00:50:59.090 --> 00:51:00.969
all the notes perfectly which don't get me wrong
00:51:00.969 --> 00:51:03.349
like you definitely have to practice you have
00:51:03.349 --> 00:51:06.710
to to play the intended like yeah yeah it's kind
00:51:06.710 --> 00:51:09.250
of you know but there i think they're sort of
00:51:09.250 --> 00:51:13.409
like it's not exactly a one -dimensional thing
00:51:13.409 --> 00:51:17.210
i think they're if doing that plus learning how
00:51:17.210 --> 00:51:19.849
to improvise plus learning the history of it
00:51:19.849 --> 00:51:21.730
and kind of approaching the pieces with that
00:51:21.730 --> 00:51:24.730
history in mind, I think that would change classical
00:51:24.730 --> 00:51:29.010
music quite a bit in the modern era. Definitely.
00:51:29.570 --> 00:51:33.849
I mean, without the initiative to like, because
00:51:33.849 --> 00:51:36.369
we're in this generation, if we're not going
00:51:36.369 --> 00:51:39.289
to do anything, then nothing changes. Yeah, yeah.
00:51:39.409 --> 00:51:41.630
And I think we just go through phases, too. Like
00:51:41.630 --> 00:51:43.710
if the phase maybe in the last century was make
00:51:43.710 --> 00:51:46.070
classical music different than pop music, then
00:51:46.070 --> 00:51:47.590
who knows what's going to happen maybe in the
00:51:47.590 --> 00:51:50.190
next hundred years where pop music starts changing.
00:51:50.250 --> 00:51:52.429
Maybe pop music isn't so good anymore. So then
00:51:52.429 --> 00:51:56.130
classical music takes the stage again. Yeah,
00:51:56.969 --> 00:51:58.849
yeah, right. And there's a question like, was
00:51:58.849 --> 00:52:01.050
classical music ever supposed to be mainstream
00:52:01.050 --> 00:52:03.849
music? Was it ever mainstream music or was it
00:52:03.849 --> 00:52:06.929
sort of always been? academic not that that really
00:52:06.929 --> 00:52:08.550
changes anything but that's kind of the question
00:52:08.550 --> 00:52:11.710
of like where does it fall within the whole holistic
00:52:11.710 --> 00:52:15.070
view of of music in the arts we'll have to see
00:52:15.070 --> 00:52:19.429
yeah definitely i i don't know because like pop
00:52:19.429 --> 00:52:22.389
some of my even some of my own music teachers
00:52:22.389 --> 00:52:24.590
believe like pop's not gonna last very long i
00:52:24.590 --> 00:52:27.829
mean i'm sure you can say the same applies with
00:52:27.829 --> 00:52:31.250
literally almost every genre but some don't like
00:52:31.250 --> 00:52:35.079
some have more longing endurance than others
00:52:35.079 --> 00:52:38.460
and like yeah pop oh well some pop is just gonna
00:52:38.460 --> 00:52:40.260
be like completely dead you're gonna see like
00:52:40.260 --> 00:52:42.619
the youtube feed and the youtube comments section
00:52:42.619 --> 00:52:45.559
is just like oh there is a small like dedicated
00:52:45.559 --> 00:52:48.440
base but like look at where classical music has
00:52:48.440 --> 00:52:51.739
like taken people to and taken us for sure yeah
00:52:51.739 --> 00:52:55.579
that's the thing like it is now still even still
00:52:55.579 --> 00:52:58.199
and it's selling out uh concert venues i mean
00:52:58.199 --> 00:53:00.119
i know that's a whole that's a whole other issue
00:53:00.119 --> 00:53:02.380
with the whole like concert venue thing because
00:53:02.380 --> 00:53:04.260
i think that's a more of a marketing issue and
00:53:04.260 --> 00:53:07.860
less of the music itself but anyway that's my
00:53:07.860 --> 00:53:10.940
take that's a whole but um yeah a lot of pop
00:53:10.940 --> 00:53:12.840
music you're gonna get those comments on the
00:53:12.840 --> 00:53:15.739
youtube it's like anyone here in 2026 and it's
00:53:15.739 --> 00:53:18.900
like a song from last year that's like that's
00:53:18.900 --> 00:53:25.110
insane all right so after what uh Bernie states,
00:53:25.329 --> 00:53:28.210
though good taste must go further than faithfully
00:53:28.210 --> 00:53:30.289
sticking to the written notes, C .P .E. Bach
00:53:30.289 --> 00:53:33.250
also mentions in his Versuch that the free ornamentation
00:53:33.250 --> 00:53:35.349
of which a performer is so proud might have well
00:53:35.349 --> 00:53:38.130
been the idea that the composer had also considered
00:53:38.130 --> 00:53:41.070
but rejected. Obviously, there is a mutual relationship
00:53:41.070 --> 00:53:43.730
between the degree of ornamentation and the tempo
00:53:43.730 --> 00:53:47.170
of a movement. In the Berlin and Finnsammerstil
00:53:47.170 --> 00:53:49.690
of the second half of the 18th century, the inclusion
00:53:49.690 --> 00:53:52.210
of more and more free ornaments in the adagio
00:53:52.210 --> 00:53:54.369
must have resulted in the tempo slowing down.
00:53:55.210 --> 00:53:58.530
Conversely, the predilection for very slow adagios
00:53:58.530 --> 00:54:02.050
gave the performer room more for extensive ornamentation,
00:54:02.070 --> 00:54:04.489
as in the above -mentioned Benda violin concertos.
00:54:05.050 --> 00:54:07.570
The slow movements of infant psalm concertos
00:54:07.570 --> 00:54:10.469
are especially unconvincing in an unornamented
00:54:10.469 --> 00:54:13.329
form, and the practice of adding extensive ornamentation
00:54:13.329 --> 00:54:16.250
continued well into the classical era. An interesting
00:54:16.250 --> 00:54:18.929
ornamented version of the slow movement of Mozart's
00:54:18.929 --> 00:54:23.329
A major piano concerto KV 488 survives. Although
00:54:23.329 --> 00:54:26.050
not in his hand, it seems to come from Mozart's
00:54:26.050 --> 00:54:28.429
estate, suggesting that Mozart knew of it. He
00:54:28.429 --> 00:54:30.530
might have prepared it for a student, perhaps.
00:54:31.190 --> 00:54:35.039
The question of which... Three ornaments to add
00:54:35.039 --> 00:54:37.539
is often the first to be asked by a modern performer
00:54:37.539 --> 00:54:40.139
desiring to treat an early composition correctly.
00:54:40.539 --> 00:54:43.139
In my opinion, it should be the last question
00:54:43.139 --> 00:54:45.920
to be asked. First, all other aspects must be
00:54:45.920 --> 00:54:48.780
understood. Otherwise, ornaments are no more
00:54:48.780 --> 00:54:51.460
than a shiny but thin veneer applied to a fundamentally
00:54:51.460 --> 00:54:55.199
modern concept. A thin veneer. I'm going to start
00:54:55.199 --> 00:54:59.699
using that. Oh, the architecture, the Chinese
00:54:59.699 --> 00:55:03.500
videos on YouTube. apply thin wooden veneer to
00:55:03.500 --> 00:55:05.980
them yeah there's always like those two those
00:55:05.980 --> 00:55:07.860
two people that can make an entire house in an
00:55:07.860 --> 00:55:11.119
evening it's like okay i'm gonna do that i'm
00:55:11.119 --> 00:55:14.980
gonna violate osha rules right now i want to
00:55:14.980 --> 00:55:18.739
make my life as it is not in this not in a confined
00:55:18.739 --> 00:55:22.699
new york city uh five square meter apartment
00:55:22.699 --> 00:55:25.460
that's what i'm saying or if you've got a you've
00:55:25.460 --> 00:55:28.059
got a uh new york city apartment what if somehow
00:55:28.059 --> 00:55:31.219
you melded like a whole additional siding to
00:55:31.219 --> 00:55:33.539
it that kind of is over you know over the street
00:55:33.539 --> 00:55:39.199
look for the watch watch your back because they're
00:55:39.199 --> 00:55:44.260
gonna be coming for you the oh oh my gosh that's
00:55:44.260 --> 00:55:48.000
insane yeah this chapter is definitely filled
00:55:48.000 --> 00:55:50.690
with a lot of Really interesting aspects to it
00:55:50.690 --> 00:55:52.989
that I gotta be honest because when we got to
00:55:52.989 --> 00:55:55.050
the the ornamentation chapter I was kind of thinking
00:55:55.050 --> 00:55:57.449
he was gonna be very short like in the beginning
00:55:57.449 --> 00:55:59.809
They were saying or the author was saying yeah
00:55:59.809 --> 00:56:02.170
France did this Germany did this Italy did this
00:56:02.170 --> 00:56:04.469
this I was kind of just ready for that to be
00:56:04.469 --> 00:56:07.289
the final solution But then I mean he even though
00:56:07.289 --> 00:56:09.889
he does give several case studies They are very
00:56:09.889 --> 00:56:12.909
like they put you in deep thought they paralyze
00:56:12.909 --> 00:56:17.940
you in the sense of the mind Very big brain compared
00:56:17.940 --> 00:56:19.800
to like even some of the the other challenge
00:56:19.800 --> 00:56:22.619
the next one is on cadenza the one after that
00:56:22.619 --> 00:56:25.039
Improvisation and those are even shorter than
00:56:25.039 --> 00:56:26.780
this one, which I thought would be the shortest
00:56:26.780 --> 00:56:30.420
one that yeah, that's kind of insane, too so
00:56:30.420 --> 00:56:36.179
I guess I would have to like I Would I have some
00:56:36.179 --> 00:56:39.139
stuff written up and I'll definitely get back
00:56:39.139 --> 00:56:41.599
to it But I do want to get to condenses because
00:56:41.599 --> 00:56:44.519
it is actually kind of a fun one to talk about.
00:56:44.559 --> 00:56:46.539
If you want to just give it a read, it shouldn't
00:56:46.539 --> 00:56:50.679
be that long. I think you could do it all the
00:56:50.679 --> 00:56:52.780
way through the end or halfway and then we'll
00:56:52.780 --> 00:56:56.719
talk quickly and then finish it somehow. I think
00:56:56.719 --> 00:57:00.500
it's cool because that one proves a very interesting
00:57:00.500 --> 00:57:04.639
another argument with kind of like the element
00:57:04.639 --> 00:57:10.460
of jazz, right? a group letting you be by yourself
00:57:10.460 --> 00:57:15.219
on the stage with those lights on, just all on
00:57:15.219 --> 00:57:18.960
you, right? And then all back together. It's
00:57:18.960 --> 00:57:22.739
kind of like a theatrical effect, too. Yeah,
00:57:22.900 --> 00:57:25.320
there's an art to it, I think. So I'll just read
00:57:25.320 --> 00:57:27.119
it, and then if you have any comments, just let
00:57:27.119 --> 00:57:30.719
me know. Okay, so cadenzas. He writes, Related
00:57:30.719 --> 00:57:33.460
to freely improvised ornamentation are the cadenzas
00:57:33.460 --> 00:57:36.079
and fermatas, which occur in arias, sonatas,
00:57:36.139 --> 00:57:38.500
and concerti. Whereas fermatas are performed
00:57:38.500 --> 00:57:40.760
on a single chord, usually a dominant seventh,
00:57:41.000 --> 00:57:43.380
and are thus limited to one basic harmony, a
00:57:43.380 --> 00:57:46.099
cadenza occurs on the succession of a 6 -4 and
00:57:46.099 --> 00:57:48.659
a 5 -3 chord on the dominant, just before the
00:57:48.659 --> 00:57:51.119
end of the piece or a solo. Both should be invented
00:57:51.119 --> 00:57:53.179
on the spot, or at least sound as if they were
00:57:53.179 --> 00:57:55.320
improvised, even if the performer prepared them
00:57:55.320 --> 00:57:57.820
and wrote them down. Cadenzas became fashionable
00:57:57.820 --> 00:58:01.679
with singers, first in Italy around 1715, later
00:58:01.679 --> 00:58:03.880
in Germany and England too, and were quickly
00:58:03.880 --> 00:58:05.940
adopted by instrumentalists, who were imitating
00:58:05.940 --> 00:58:08.639
singers as they were supposed to do. According
00:58:08.639 --> 00:58:11.800
to Quant's Pursuit from 1752, cadenzas should
00:58:11.800 --> 00:58:14.380
be short, fresh, performed without regular tempo
00:58:14.380 --> 00:58:18.360
or meter, and surprisingly, a last quote. in
00:58:18.360 --> 00:58:22.599
a speech. Generally, cadenzas for singers and
00:58:22.599 --> 00:58:24.079
wind instrumentalists should be performed in
00:58:24.079 --> 00:58:26.500
one breath, which is crazy. Those for strings
00:58:26.500 --> 00:58:28.599
can be somewhat longer, and those for keyboard,
00:58:28.699 --> 00:58:30.519
offering the most possibilities for modulation
00:58:30.519 --> 00:58:33.800
and imitation, can be the longest. Cadenzas for
00:58:33.800 --> 00:58:35.800
more than one soloist are usually longer, too,
00:58:35.920 --> 00:58:38.960
and are naturally seldom improvised. In his...
00:58:48.339 --> 00:58:51.400
See I thought there was a tea before the s like
00:58:51.400 --> 00:58:53.980
in the last I don't know if it definitely wasn't
00:58:53.980 --> 00:58:56.780
typo This is like I don't know. I feel like I
00:58:56.780 --> 00:59:00.559
want to leave the tea out Yeah, it's like come
00:59:00.559 --> 00:59:03.119
on. Okay tip the audience just take my word for
00:59:03.119 --> 00:59:10.960
it. It's a real word try to dig Okay, anyway,
00:59:11.119 --> 00:59:14.920
so written before, probably written before 1756,
00:59:15.280 --> 00:59:17.719
Tartini expressed the view that the cadenza is
00:59:17.719 --> 00:59:19.820
not the most interesting part of a piece, but
00:59:19.820 --> 00:59:21.920
since the audience wants it, the performer must
00:59:21.920 --> 00:59:24.800
be able to invent it. Tartini's cadenza's examples
00:59:24.800 --> 00:59:28.119
are, not unexpectedly, rather discreet. A good
00:59:28.119 --> 00:59:30.119
flautist could often still perform them in one
00:59:30.119 --> 00:59:32.619
breath. Historical examples confirm this image.
00:59:32.840 --> 00:59:35.559
They also show that vocal, wind, and string cadenzas
00:59:35.559 --> 00:59:37.619
are seldom thematically linked to the piece itself.
00:59:38.239 --> 00:59:40.920
If they are, they are usually not the most successful.
00:59:41.579 --> 00:59:43.699
The short duration allows little more than a
00:59:43.699 --> 00:59:46.280
literal quotation of a motif, or motive, plus
00:59:46.280 --> 00:59:52.760
some leading in and out, and the final trill.
00:59:52.780 --> 00:59:54.340
I guess the final trill has been a thing for
00:59:54.340 --> 00:59:57.619
a long time. The final, yeah, definitely. He
00:59:57.619 --> 01:00:01.000
says, because the usual, you kind of need it,
01:00:01.079 --> 01:00:03.539
because I remember, because we just did the Mozart
01:00:03.539 --> 01:00:05.300
piano concerto for my senior son. Yeah, that
01:00:05.300 --> 01:00:08.110
was fun. The conductor. After the audience, the
01:00:08.110 --> 01:00:09.550
conductor was Derek, who was just on the last
01:00:09.550 --> 01:00:11.849
episode. There were a couple times where he's
01:00:11.849 --> 01:00:13.329
like, you gotta play the last trill so I know
01:00:13.329 --> 01:00:15.889
when to conduct the last downbeat. And I'd forget
01:00:15.889 --> 01:00:17.929
about the trill and I'd be like, what the heck?
01:00:18.329 --> 01:00:20.989
And I was like, do something to kind of imitate
01:00:20.989 --> 01:00:25.670
that. So it's a universal thing. He says, besides
01:00:25.670 --> 01:00:27.829
the usual short ones, we do find some extraordinarily
01:00:27.829 --> 01:00:31.570
long violin cadenzas, rather caprice than cadenza,
01:00:31.670 --> 01:00:34.730
by Vivaldi and Tartini himself. The fast movements
01:00:34.730 --> 01:00:37.889
of... Locatelli's Violin Concertos, Opus 3, circa
01:00:37.889 --> 01:00:40.949
1733, comprise an elaborate and often extremely
01:00:40.949 --> 01:00:45.170
difficult capriccio, which curiously ends with
01:00:45.170 --> 01:00:49.050
the word cadenza. After a long breakneck display
01:00:49.050 --> 01:00:51.630
of virtuosity, the performer is supposed to improvise
01:00:51.630 --> 01:00:57.250
his or her own cadenza, probably shorter and
01:00:57.250 --> 01:00:58.750
maybe more melodical than the capriccio itself.
01:00:59.480 --> 01:01:01.320
Bach's harpsichord cadenza for the 5th Brandenburg
01:01:01.320 --> 01:01:03.679
Concerto is an example of an unusually long cadenza,
01:01:03.739 --> 01:01:07.179
even among keyboard cadenzas and resembles these
01:01:07.179 --> 01:01:10.679
Caprice cadenzas. A collection of original keyboard
01:01:10.679 --> 01:01:13.420
cadenzas by C .P .E. Bach shows that while the
01:01:13.420 --> 01:01:15.300
longer cadenzas can be linked to the piece itself,
01:01:15.519 --> 01:01:18.320
they do not need to be so. The shorter cadenzas
01:01:18.320 --> 01:01:21.280
are, at most, based upon a little motive, which
01:01:21.280 --> 01:01:24.300
is even then usually not literally quoted. Some
01:01:24.300 --> 01:01:26.320
of C .P .E. Bach's shorter cadenzas are restricted
01:01:26.320 --> 01:01:29.789
to the right hand alone. Mozart's keyboard cadenzas
01:01:29.789 --> 01:01:32.210
are often thematically highly inventive and rather
01:01:32.210 --> 01:01:34.289
long. According to his wife, they were written
01:01:34.289 --> 01:01:36.329
for his students. He himself would presumably
01:01:36.329 --> 01:01:38.769
have improvised one, and each time another one.
01:01:39.329 --> 01:01:41.929
When composer -performers write cadenzas, they
01:01:41.929 --> 01:01:44.070
obviously want to introduce more facets of their
01:01:44.070 --> 01:01:46.230
themes and have invention enough to combine and
01:01:46.230 --> 01:01:49.110
stage them. In that sense, it's a pity we do
01:01:49.110 --> 01:01:52.050
not have Mozart's cadenzas for his violin, oboe,
01:01:52.070 --> 01:01:54.389
or flute concerti. Would they have also been
01:01:54.389 --> 01:01:57.099
longer than the average two lines? We find only
01:01:57.099 --> 01:01:59.300
one cadenza for a single melody instrument written
01:01:59.300 --> 01:02:03.840
out by Mozart in the slow movement of Ein musikalischer
01:02:03.840 --> 01:02:11.079
Spaß. Ein musikalischer Spaß. Ein musikalischer
01:02:11.079 --> 01:02:18.500
Spaß. KV 522, and this is from 1787. It is not
01:02:18.500 --> 01:02:20.519
excessively long, but was certainly meant as
01:02:20.519 --> 01:02:23.860
a caricature. We can learn what to avoid. A short
01:02:23.860 --> 01:02:26.119
vocal cadenza stands at or stands at the end
01:02:26.119 --> 01:02:31.159
of Mozart's solfeggio KV 393 -5, this is probably
01:02:31.159 --> 01:02:34.139
1782, he writes, though it's not been recognized
01:02:34.139 --> 01:02:36.719
as much by the composer of the bass part that
01:02:36.719 --> 01:02:38.920
was absent in Mozart's manuscript, it clearly
01:02:38.920 --> 01:02:41.340
is a splendid example of an almost instrumental
01:02:41.340 --> 01:02:45.719
6 -4 -5 -3 cadenza. It could easily be taken
01:02:45.719 --> 01:02:49.059
as a model for melodic instrument cadenzas. Caprice
01:02:49.059 --> 01:02:51.860
cadenzas for winds are extremely rare. Charles
01:02:51.860 --> 01:02:54.679
Deleuze published 12 of them in his L 'Errante
01:02:54.679 --> 01:02:58.440
de la Flute Clavissière. That's my French pronunciation.
01:02:58.440 --> 01:03:01.659
This is from 1761. This whole flute method is
01:03:01.659 --> 01:03:05.280
strongly dependent on the Geminiani violin method
01:03:05.280 --> 01:03:08.579
of 1751, which had appeared in a French translation
01:03:08.579 --> 01:03:12.420
in Paris in 1752. Possibly, Deleuze imitated
01:03:12.420 --> 01:03:14.940
the Italian violin idiom also in his caprices,
01:03:14.940 --> 01:03:18.239
even in acclaimed virtuoso flutists, such as
01:03:18.239 --> 01:03:22.679
F. Dev... De Vienne, he lived from 1759 to 1803,
01:03:22.960 --> 01:03:25.159
kept his cadenzas within a one -breath length,
01:03:25.320 --> 01:03:27.019
as far as we can judge from his written -out
01:03:27.019 --> 01:03:30.639
examples. It is interesting to see how fast style
01:03:30.639 --> 01:03:33.300
can change. Beethoven's cadenzas for Mozart's
01:03:33.300 --> 01:03:38.320
D minor piano concerto, KB 466, is as typical
01:03:38.320 --> 01:03:41.309
for Beethoven as it is atypical for Mozart. Later
01:03:41.309 --> 01:03:43.530
in the 19th and 20th centuries, we see many of
01:03:43.530 --> 01:03:46.170
these collage cadenzas where the styles of the
01:03:46.170 --> 01:03:48.489
cadenza and concerto do not match anymore and
01:03:48.489 --> 01:03:50.409
where string and wind cadenzas are as long and
01:03:50.409 --> 01:03:53.409
ambitious as piano cadenzas. Also today, even
01:03:53.409 --> 01:03:55.750
early music wind and string performers are very
01:03:55.750 --> 01:03:57.969
much tempted by this romantic image of the instrumental
01:03:57.969 --> 01:04:02.309
hero. We only rarely hear cadenzas in 18th century
01:04:02.309 --> 01:04:04.710
repertoire whose style corresponds to documented
01:04:04.710 --> 01:04:07.289
18th century practice. Might these performers
01:04:07.289 --> 01:04:09.489
be afraid to disappoint the listeners, who are,
01:04:09.550 --> 01:04:11.510
of course, also more accustomed to the elaborate
01:04:11.510 --> 01:04:15.250
romantic virtuoso cadenzas? Just as for the...
01:04:15.250 --> 01:04:27.289
There are two facets to cadenza playing. They
01:04:27.289 --> 01:04:29.750
can be correctly composed... But it is the actual
01:04:29.750 --> 01:04:31.750
playing which will make them good or bad. We
01:04:31.750 --> 01:04:34.750
must thus decode the notated cadenzas. According
01:04:34.750 --> 01:04:37.449
to Quance, their true performance cannot be notated.
01:04:38.070 --> 01:04:43.630
Dang. That's a word full. That's crazy. I thought
01:04:43.630 --> 01:04:46.710
last time it was going to mention Brandenburg
01:04:46.710 --> 01:04:50.030
Frye, but that was like, remember the Fifth Brandenburg
01:04:50.030 --> 01:04:53.929
Concerto, which was basically like this long,
01:04:53.929 --> 01:04:58.230
long passage just for the harpsichord is like.
01:04:58.519 --> 01:05:00.940
for him all in the show like i'm i'm thinking
01:05:00.940 --> 01:05:04.780
like that was a big um like pinnacle of like
01:05:04.780 --> 01:05:08.960
the cadenzas but that is the craziest thing i'm
01:05:08.960 --> 01:05:11.199
just gonna say this i was looking at the music
01:05:11.199 --> 01:05:13.960
and i'm like okay the cadenza starts here and
01:05:13.960 --> 01:05:15.820
then i keep going through all the pages and i'm
01:05:15.820 --> 01:05:19.719
like what the that's insane right i think like
01:05:19.719 --> 01:05:24.000
the cadenza is like five pages long it's crazy
01:05:24.920 --> 01:05:27.019
I mean, weren't you also kind of, like, worried,
01:05:27.059 --> 01:05:28.820
like, when you were, like, doing your, like,
01:05:28.860 --> 01:05:33.599
C major, Mozart, cadenza, that was, like, you
01:05:33.599 --> 01:05:35.159
were, like, you were, like, I don't know, maybe
01:05:35.159 --> 01:05:37.380
holding yourself in a little bit before, like,
01:05:37.420 --> 01:05:40.179
everyone just comes back. No, exactly. I remember
01:05:40.179 --> 01:05:42.119
because I was really debating for that part.
01:05:42.179 --> 01:05:44.309
I was, like. trying to learn all the music, and
01:05:44.309 --> 01:05:46.230
I kept forgetting about the cadenza. But then
01:05:46.230 --> 01:05:48.769
I told myself, it's okay, it's Mozart, so just
01:05:48.769 --> 01:05:51.250
improvise it on the spot. So long story short,
01:05:51.429 --> 01:05:53.389
I've never really done that before. So the first
01:05:53.389 --> 01:05:55.969
time I did that was like during the rehearsal
01:05:55.969 --> 01:05:58.010
and then the concert. And that was kind of the
01:05:58.010 --> 01:06:00.949
example of like, okay, we got to lock in here.
01:06:01.110 --> 01:06:03.389
And it was definitely a very, very short cadenza,
01:06:03.469 --> 01:06:07.590
which I guess is more historically Mozartian,
01:06:07.710 --> 01:06:11.179
I guess, classical era. But yeah, that was...
01:06:11.179 --> 01:06:15.139
Yeah, that's cool, too. And also, I thought also
01:06:15.139 --> 01:06:18.099
the... I know we're taking it a little longer
01:06:18.099 --> 01:06:21.260
than it is, but I noticed, like, especially with...
01:06:21.260 --> 01:06:23.360
Have you noticed, like, even with, like, Baroque
01:06:23.360 --> 01:06:26.840
or generally classical cadenzas, there's a wide
01:06:26.840 --> 01:06:29.820
range of, like, people, like, making long and
01:06:29.820 --> 01:06:32.380
short stuff. Like, I was talking about that a
01:06:32.380 --> 01:06:35.739
little bit with especially C .P. Bach. cadenzas
01:06:35.739 --> 01:06:38.280
and all such. But I remember, especially with
01:06:38.280 --> 01:06:40.719
Haydn, like, when I played the cello concerto,
01:06:40.760 --> 01:06:43.139
some people would just play so long, like, some
01:06:43.139 --> 01:06:45.679
cellos would play so long, it'd be like a song
01:06:45.679 --> 01:06:47.360
of its own, right? You don't, like, want to get
01:06:47.360 --> 01:06:50.659
too hallucinated. You want to go off into your
01:06:50.659 --> 01:06:53.199
own world. I thought, like, the general principle
01:06:53.199 --> 01:06:54.980
and even, like, even though it didn't really
01:06:54.980 --> 01:06:58.219
say that much throughout this chapter was, like,
01:06:58.280 --> 01:07:00.440
it should be kind of, like, generally simple
01:07:00.440 --> 01:07:02.860
and short. Like, you kind of, like, veer off
01:07:02.860 --> 01:07:05.119
a little bit of the path. But then you come back,
01:07:05.139 --> 01:07:08.480
kind of like in this unison sense. I don't know
01:07:08.480 --> 01:07:11.460
if you thought about that, too. No, I agree,
01:07:11.559 --> 01:07:13.239
too, because sometimes, especially if you're
01:07:13.239 --> 01:07:15.320
not familiar with the piece, you're hearing it
01:07:15.320 --> 01:07:17.460
for the first time, if you forget what the main
01:07:17.460 --> 01:07:19.920
melody is because the cadenza's taking so long
01:07:19.920 --> 01:07:22.320
that the reprise isn't coming in, and then when
01:07:22.320 --> 01:07:25.500
it does, you're like, oh, yeah! Then it's like,
01:07:25.579 --> 01:07:28.539
ooh, jeez. That's a long cadenza. That's insane.
01:07:29.260 --> 01:07:32.119
That's crazy. It's a long... And also, like...
01:07:32.269 --> 01:07:35.050
would you like to hear a two -minute like like
01:07:35.050 --> 01:07:37.909
because you're kind of like that's its own piece
01:07:37.909 --> 01:07:40.710
it's itself right it's it's an own piece it's
01:07:40.710 --> 01:07:43.829
not part of the entire thing it's not it is not
01:07:43.829 --> 01:07:47.710
like mozart piano concerto and c major 15 minutes
01:07:47.710 --> 01:07:50.469
instead of like average 12 minutes right yeah
01:07:50.469 --> 01:07:54.489
that makes a huge difference i think um and then
01:07:54.489 --> 01:07:57.809
there's that i feel like a lot of performance
01:07:57.809 --> 01:08:01.239
is kind of musicians trying to almost one -up
01:08:01.239 --> 01:08:05.219
each other. So if you have a famous violinist
01:08:05.219 --> 01:08:08.139
who plays one cadenza, then maybe it's a really
01:08:08.139 --> 01:08:10.719
long cadenza and it's virtuosic, that means all
01:08:10.719 --> 01:08:12.260
the other violinists are going to do that too.
01:08:12.599 --> 01:08:14.940
And so you kind of take away from the actual
01:08:14.940 --> 01:08:18.399
purity of the piece itself, and it kind of goes
01:08:18.399 --> 01:08:20.739
down this rabbit hole. So yeah, that's an example
01:08:20.739 --> 01:08:23.420
of that. I can't really see that. being put into
01:08:23.420 --> 01:08:26.159
context if especially it's very long i mean if
01:08:26.159 --> 01:08:28.279
if it's very beautiful maybe you might have a
01:08:28.279 --> 01:08:31.100
convincing point there like especially yeah regardless
01:08:31.100 --> 01:08:35.619
of the era um last lastly here though improvisation
01:08:35.619 --> 01:08:38.119
is per definition not notated it should often
01:08:38.119 --> 01:08:40.939
start from a written down theme in a thematic
01:08:40.939 --> 01:08:43.039
condenser or an improv improvised variations
01:08:43.039 --> 01:08:45.539
or it could be afterward be notated probably
01:08:45.539 --> 01:08:49.149
in a somewhat more organized and cleaned up form,
01:08:49.289 --> 01:08:51.850
as in the case of Bach's Musikalisches Opfer,
01:08:51.970 --> 01:08:54.550
or musical offering. The fact that many pieces
01:08:54.550 --> 01:08:56.989
might have originated as improvisations will
01:08:56.989 --> 01:08:59.590
inevitably influence their performance. Such
01:08:59.590 --> 01:09:02.930
beautifully said, too. I remember you, one more
01:09:02.930 --> 01:09:06.229
thing, I remember you said something, you were
01:09:06.229 --> 01:09:10.270
reading about the long instrumentalist should
01:09:10.270 --> 01:09:12.739
be performed in one breath. That quote right
01:09:12.739 --> 01:09:15.579
there in the beginning of chapter 11. I do have
01:09:15.579 --> 01:09:18.319
something. Maybe you might have remembered, but
01:09:18.319 --> 01:09:24.260
there is, I believe, an Italian mezzo -soprano.
01:09:24.340 --> 01:09:28.319
Yes, an Italian mezzo-soprano, right? I believe
01:09:28.319 --> 01:09:31.800
her name is Cecilia Bartoli. And she had, if
01:09:31.800 --> 01:09:34.260
you go on YouTube, everyone, you can go on YouTube
01:09:34.260 --> 01:09:37.000
and search up The Longest Breath. So, Cecilia
01:09:37.000 --> 01:09:40.699
Bartoli. It's like 30 seconds long. It's so long.
01:09:40.920 --> 01:09:43.140
It's like, now that's the kind of theatrical,
01:09:43.300 --> 01:09:47.159
like, suspense you want to take away as a cadenza.
01:09:47.159 --> 01:09:49.800
That is like, I love those kind of things. It's
01:09:49.800 --> 01:09:54.319
like, it should be getting more views. No, that's
01:09:54.319 --> 01:09:56.460
a crazy video. And that's an example, too, of
01:09:56.460 --> 01:09:59.340
like, when, if they're saying things like, okay,
01:09:59.380 --> 01:10:01.460
if you're a singer or a woodwind player and you
01:10:01.460 --> 01:10:03.859
have to do the whole cadenza in one breath, it's
01:10:03.859 --> 01:10:05.850
like, okay. What kind of breath support did they
01:10:05.850 --> 01:10:08.090
have, technically, back in the day? Like, what
01:10:08.090 --> 01:10:09.770
were the expectations for the performers at the
01:10:09.770 --> 01:10:12.270
time? Was it like that? Or was it, like, five
01:10:12.270 --> 01:10:15.609
seconds? Like, I'm not sure. That is, yeah, but
01:10:15.609 --> 01:10:18.069
it's kind of, like, insane to think. Everyone,
01:10:18.189 --> 01:10:21.069
you should, like, search it up. But it's just
01:10:21.069 --> 01:10:24.350
fascinating to think, too. And I generally, from,
01:10:24.430 --> 01:10:26.369
like, the soul, believe that would be a good
01:10:26.369 --> 01:10:29.090
cadenza. Like, regardless, I don't care if I
01:10:29.090 --> 01:10:30.829
find any more other research for that. That's,
01:10:30.829 --> 01:10:33.829
like, great. just the one note yeah exactly if
01:10:33.829 --> 01:10:34.829
it sounds good it's good