Archives for September 29, 2003

“Nothing is so poor and melancholy as an art that is interested in itself and not in its subject.”

George Santayana, The Life of Reason

Apropos of my most recent posting on Zankel Hall and its critics, I got this e-mail last week from Alex Ross, music critic of The New Yorker. I couldn’t post it until now because of the black smoke coming out of the hard drive of my iBook:

A friendly riposte re: Zankel. Is it fair to judge the acoustics on the basis of the preview concert alone? I’d be especially wary of measuring the hall’s suitability for amplified music solely on the basis of the Kenny Barron Quintet’s brief performance. Yes, their full show that weekend was noisy and unfocused. But Omar Sosa was another matter–cool, crisp sound. Perhaps Mr. Barron simply didn’t have an adequate setup.

I’ve Zankled nine times so far, and my perceptions keep changing. The subway noise, which annoyed me last week, is bothering me less. The acoustics are still weird, but I’m discovering that the aisle seats in the orchestra, where the critics are clumped, are among the worst. Best are the middle
seats of the orchestra and the side seats in the balcony. The problem is that the stage lacks a good reflective shell behind it–“revenge of Merkin Hall,” I heard one composer say–so the sound seems to gel only in certain places. A couple of butt-ugly buffers on the side might help. However, to judge from comments overheard, casual listeners are totally unperturbed by
all these issues. They like the place. So do I.

As for the multi-culti programming, I think you’re overlooking the hall’s usefulness as a filter for those who are baffled by the sheer superfluity of choices out there. BAM has long functioned in the same way–as a taste agent that people have grown to trust. The opening weekend worked because we trusted John Adams, the man responsible for the programming, and he put on a briliant tour of the musical horizon. The reliance on Nonesuch in the opening season is another canny use of the filter function. The crucial question is whether Zankel can maintain this level of interest, or whether it will devolve toward classical Dullsville.

Looking back over my original postings, I don’t think I was quite so categorical in my comments on the acoustics as Alex implies, but beyond that I think he is talking a good deal of sense. I have no doubt that everybody’s perceptions of Zankel Hall will change over time and with further exposure–or, to put it another way, we’ll all get used to the place, and come to see at least some of its characteristic features not as unpleasant surprises but as…well, characteristic features. This is even true of a phenomenon so seemingly “objective” as acoustics, and it’ll be even truer as more artists perform with amplification, thereby creating a sonic track record for the managers to draw on.

For what it’s worth (though I can’t name names), I recently had a chat with a jazz musician slated to perform in the hall later this season who came away from Brad Mehldau’s concert feeling considerable anxiety about the acoustics–especially as they affect drummers. Time will tell, and it will also tell whether Zankel is able to establish itself as a center for consistently imaginative programming or will deteriorate into “classical Dullsville.” I like Alex’s point about halls serving as filters and trustworthy “taste agents” for the public–though of course that doesn’t happen very often.

In retrospect, I fear that I was writing too much as the jaded insider who’s Heard It All. It’s true that the people who book concert-hall performances in New York rarely surprise me anymore, but then it’s my business to know what’s going on. In any case, I’m obliged to Alex for reminding me of some things that seem to have slipped my mind in the usual rush to judgment. Blogging has a way of doing that to you, but it also makes it possible for you to think twice, and three and four times, in public. I hope I’ll have thought a lot more times than that about Zankel Hall before I’m finally done.