The first time I heard that joke was from Kurt Sanderling, in German, no less, and he was around 80 at the time. Now bear with me: there was a story in Scandinavia about a young conductor, who famously would be invited, but never re-invited, due to lack of talent. In a rehearsal he tried to lighten the move by asking this question, and some musician gave the answer “you can only use them once!”
As you note, almost all of a good conductor's work is done in rehearsal and by performance time, the die largely has been cast. However, I've also heard and read a number of long experienced orchestral musicians note that the conductor's eye contact and gestures during a performance can serve to reinforce to the players particular aspects of the interpretation. In the process of creating a performance through hours of rehearsal and preparation, conductors most assuredly make a difference in the final product. It's the main reason why the same music performed by the same orchestra sounds different under different conductors. It's also the reason why many listeners, myself included, may wish to know who is conducting before shelling out the bucks to attend a concert.
One question I have is: "What if the orchestra isn't world class?" I've lived mostly in semi-rural areas and I'm familiar with more than one semi-pro community orchestra that has enjoyed the services of a long-term professional conductor. In each case, the conductor gradually raised the standard of the ensemble to the point where the orchestra was a pleasure to listen to. One such community orchestra, which I first encountered forty years ago, could at that time barely play together, or in tune. I remember one occasion where the orchestra screwed up the opening of the Schumann piano concerto and the piece had to be started over. Gradually, the standard was raised, and within a dozen years or so, the orchestra was playing works like Shostakovich's 10th Symphony with aplomb. With a community orchestra, a long-term conductor who is committed to the group can really elevate and transform an orchestra's performance standards. I've seen it happen more than once. And we have cases like Maurice Abravenal, who took a community orchestra in Utah and raised it to a level where they could effectively perform and record the complete Mahler symphonies. It's these orchestra-building conductors who really interest me. So here's a question for you for a future chat: Which conductors in the history of recording were the greatest orchestra builders?
@@DavesClassicalGuide I'm glad you like the question, and I'm sure many viewers would love to hear your insights on the subject. Szell /Cleveland? Abravanel /Utah? Paray /Detroit? Dorati /Minneapolis? Steinberg /Pittsburgh? Slatkin /St. Louis? Dutoit /Montreal? Rattle /Birmingham? Monteux /SF? Etc, etc. Did at least some of these conductors make something happen, or did they just happen to be in the right place at the right time?
One role you've left out is that conductors can be a visual anchor for the audience, "telling" them wat to expect and in some extreme cases, what to feel. This is probably the main ingredient of the "star conductor" phenomenon and has led some (Dudamel being probably the most hilarious example) to resort to quite excessive emoting while in front of an orchestra.
I much prefer the conductors who attend to business and conduct for the orchestra and not the audience. Toscanini, Monteux, Reiner, or Kubelik, to name a few. They never treated a work as a concerto for conductor and orchestra.
@@bbailey7818 And the extreme case, Mravinsky. They're in the minority, though, particularly since students are trained to "express" in front of the orchestra. Perhaps this is why I like someone like Oramo or Saraste so much as a stage presence. Or even Orozco, who is a tad more expressive but mostly, it feels, in service of the music.
For an orchestral musician, one of the most interesting situations you encounter is the one where the conductor is inept. Then the question becomes to what extent will the orchestra ignore him or her and just do their own thing. Then, if the conductor is both inept and insecure, he or she will try to reassert control of the proceedings, and it is game on to see who will win out. Usually the loser is the piece.
Isaac Stern tells a story in his memoirs of a concert in Minneapolis during the Mitropoulos era. During the second half Stern stood backstage and listened to the symphony. After a few moments, he became aware that Mitropoulos was standing next to him. Mitropoulos whispered to him that he just wanted to show the audience that the orchestra really only needed someone to start and stop the performance, if they were properly rehearsed. According to legend, Mravinsky canceled a performance of Bruckner 7 because he believed that the orchestra had given their all during rehearsal and that the concert would consequently be a disappointment. The BSO, NYPhil, and Met Opera all have wonderful databases on their websites. I wish my hometown orchestra had the resources to do that. Sometimes I want to check my concert going memories....
Members of the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra rotate standing before the ensemble during rehearsals to hear the Gestalt sound produced and provide feedback for any suggested adjustments.
A Bolero video exists where Eschenbach gives a cue for the drummer-at the front of the stage-to start and the orchestra follows the drummer`s beat for most of the piece until the climactic part when the conductor begins his conducting of the orchestra. And why not? He wants to be part of the fun! Conductors are also there to give cues, even for professionals. In Oliver Daniel`s incredible 900-page tome about Leopoldo Stokowski, the story is related that in a rehearsal Stokowski cues the timpanist to come in, but nothing happens. Stokowski stops the orchestra, walks back to the timpani player to see what happened, sees the newspaper draped across the drums, wads it all up, throws it on the floor, and tells the timpanist to the effect, “I guess you’ll come in next time on my cue, won’t you?”
I've enjoyed the live / youtube performances of the refreshing Kaleidoscope ensemble in Los Angeles which is conductorless and runs a lottery for every program for the first positions in every section, allowing all of the members to make decisions and manage their colleagues throughout a season... the first positions then collaborate and make group decisions if needed. They also play everything standing up, even mahler 😱 and commission new work for every concert ... I believe they even perform all of their programs at least once at homeless shelters in LA which is ... incredible.
@@alexjackson952That's really awesome, I'm definitely checking them out. By the way, you should be able to edit your comment rather than correcting yourself in a second one.
Last October I attended a Haydn concert with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment led by Matthew Truscott. It was a brilliant concert. Truscott mostly just sat at the leader's desk and did nothing, visually speaking, to lead the orchestra, other than give the initial beat for each movement; presumably he did the rest of the work in rehearsals, because there *was* a well-considered interpretation there. Once in a while, he'd get up for a second and give a brief gesture while playing, and then sit down again. I couldn't tell why he got up when he did, I didn't notice any distinguishing feature in those moments, but presumably his fellow-musicians knew, and that's all that's necessary.
thank you, it is true in our studio even when recording a 12 second jingle for a radio advert or music for these highly produced tv ads for medication.. some of them are like broadway musicals to sell a drug... good video and thanks for being so quick to respond to our question.. some of us have played in the pit and the key to getting hired for pit play and often on short notice was to be a "prima vista" which my teacher at age 11 refused to take students who did not want to learn to read music. good sight readers in the right cities, good $$$🥁🎵
One of the most exciting things I ever heard: Lorin Maazel was with Cleveland on tour. For an encore he comes out and gives the down beat to start the overture to Ruslan & Ludmilla at a breathtaking tempo. Then he stepped down and walked off stage leaving the orchestra to play it - spendidly - by itself. An orchestra of that caliber didn't need a conductor for that piece. Our local community orchestra couldn't get past the introduction without a conductor however poor he/she might be,
A very good take on this. I've thought about it a lot and tended to grumble about mine--Drop the stick One and get out of the way--maybe a little hostile lol. But I enjoyed this.
In my experience as a chorister most of the conductor's work was during the rehearsals. Once it came to the actual performance it was quite automatic, not meaning soulless, mind you, but automatic in the sense that all entries, pauses, dynamics, etc., were on time and as we had learnt during the rehearsals. I guess, the better, the more professional the orchestra, the less time has to be spent on rehearsals, but it's always there. There are stories about Mozart distributing just copied scores to orchestra members right before the actual concert! To perform in the circumstances must have called for unbelievable levels of proficiency and professionalism.
New topic for Ask Dave: Why do conductors use a score during the performance? They don't generally seem to be forgetful in the standard rep. In the standard standard rep, say Beethoven 7, what precisely are they learning about the third movement? Subtopic: What's happening when, during a performance, the conductor loses his place? I've seen them turning pages forward and back (some famous ones)!
If the listener wishes individuality and excellence in orchestral performance then the conductor is necessary. Could the superb BSO musicians of the 50’s and 60’s have created such miracles without Charles Munch?
I think Conductors are necessary, their egos are not! If they work on making the orchestra bring out the best of a work, they add value, and great value, otherwise, they sustract it and the music goes down the toilet . But it is difficult to deny that a good conductor can increase the level of a performance or a recording, if it wouldn't be so, a symphony would sound the same under any of them and we all know that's not the case. And I totally think their role is far more important during rehearsals than in the actual performance. Maybe in a recording it works different, I don't know. Very interesting video Dave, thanks.
I was surprised to hear your comments about conductors getting in the way of climaxes! I thought whipping up the orchestra into a frenzy with a ton of energetic movements would be one of the main benefits of a conductor in the first place! Back in musical school, i played the piano for conductors to practice conducting on me, and the good ones were always able to pump me up for big energetic passages way more than i would ever be able to do myself. Also, i found the arm movements helped subconsciously shape my melodic lines, so i assumed that also happened to orchestra players as well.
Well yes... your observations, especially those made while performing first-hand, are relatable - and there is plenty of proof, too! Conductor has all the tools and powers to boost any music, especially when wielding large orchestral forces. However it goes both ways with conductors, just as Dave said - some are too insecure or mannered to let the orchestra do what the music demands of them, at times "short-circuiting" the natural emotional impetus. I find that historically, acclaimed pedagogues (the so-called "orchestra builders") usually would also excel in getting great sound and seemingly intuitive flow to their performances - ultimately also not short on individuality, while the self-absorbed stars and "philosopher of the podium" types sometimes could go off the rails when they'd forget to serve the music, and try to "pull it around".
Let's talk about Schumann...incompetent, part of the reason FOR his later orchestration ending up - as you mention - so thick because of precautionary doubling; Glazunov...often drunk, probably the reason why Rachmaninov's 1st symphony failed; or even Beethoven...deaf... Talking about marked-up parts - as a violin player in pit orchestras, I always had to erase all marks on hired copies of the music.
There was a performance - so long ago that I've forgotten what it was - conducted by Sir Adrian Boult. Things went wrong: Boult tapped his music stand, turned to the audience, said "I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen, we've lost our way and will start again", or words to that effect. Wonder if that was under-rehearsing or over-rehearsing. I wish I could remember more about this, but ..... times pass.
Since, as you say, most orchestras are better than most conductors, there must be rehearsals that end up preparing the conductor more than the orchestra! I heard something interesting, if true, that Bernstein (or someone else) would only address certain parts of a piece during rehearsals, avoiding complete run-throughs until the performance itself, when a sense of spontaneity was more likely to emerge.
I think Nigel Kennedy was very explicit about it. There are probably many expendable conductors today, but a bad performance (of a great symphony, for instance) can convince us that a good conductor is always necessary.
A violinist rushes in late to the rehearsal for a concert.The violinist next to him asks him where he's been. 'I've been at a rehearsal down the road. 'Oh.. And who was the conductor?' 'I don't know. I wasn't looking.'
The volume problem - orchestras not playing loud - goes way back. I think it's a two-way trust issue. The conductor has to trust the orchestra, but the orchestra has to overcome their hesitance to sound vulgar. Klemperer was the best at getting orchestras comfortable playing loud. Because of this his performances have a dynamic range and heft that many others do not. It's amazing how consistently Klemperer achieved this across many orchestras, even in his later years when he appeared outwardly to do little or nothing. Put Klemperer on the podium and orchestras could roar.
Climaxes? Listen to the live recording of Beecham conducting the Sibelius 2nd. Hear him shouting and urging the orchestra on in the finale, and do they ever respond! One of my favorite Beecham quotes was, when asked his "secret" as a conductor, said, "I let them play." There was much more to it than that, but he never inhibited them, whether playing ppp or fff.
I always wondered why the Netherlands Wind Ensemble needed Edo de Waart to conduct them. They’re a small ensemble doing works like the Mozart Gran Partita and such. If the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra can go conductor-less, I can’t see why a crack wind ensemble can’t do likewise.
If conductors weren't needed, we wouldn't have them. The best orchestras need them less, lesser orchestras and groups need them more. Anyone who has played in a rhythm group of say four musicians knows the challenge of finding a groove even with a steady beat and harmonically simple music. Try that with 80 musicians spread all over the stage who don't even know the entire score. Impossible. Conductors are there because they bring something, although what they bring is not always helpful, least of all the destructive egos and overestimation of their own importance.
So as a corollary, how many hours per week do orchestras actually meet as an entire ensemble and practice together? I'm talking about full-time professional orchestras. Obviously the musicians have their own practice time, but as an entire body, how often do they meet?
When you talked about how conductors stifle and prevent their orchestras from playing well, I kept seeing Riccardo Muti's face in my head. I wonder why...
