One of my students emailed a link to something I loved, loved, loved.
It was a performance of Scheherezade, conducted by the ineffable, absolutely unqiue and wonderful Leif Segerstam. At the climax of which — and I hope you’re ready for this! — Segerstam and the orchestra start shouting.
About Segerstam…
- Segerstam facts, on Wikipedia.
- Piece on him from the Guardian, showing how unique — ineffable — he is (the composer of 319 symphonies, as of the day I’m posting this; only 251 when the Guardian piece came out).
- And here he is giving a TED talk, as only he could give one, impelling the audience to help perform a piece he creates on the spot.
Of course some people will think the shouting is out of bounds, forbidden, something you should never, never, never, never do in a classical music performance. It’s not artistic! Not refined! It isn’t in the score! Rimsky-Korsakov didn’t intend it! Probably wouldn’t have liked it!
But, you know…
Rimsky-Korsakov’s not with us anymore. And for me, the shouting took an already exhilarating performance clear over the top. I loved it. And found it completely appropriate.
Because Scheherezade, after all is a storytelling piece. And the story of the final movement, according to its title, is “Festival at Baghdad. The Sea. The Ship Breaks against a Cliff Surmounted by a Bronze Horseman.”
Now, Rimsky-Korsakov didn’t like the titles we give to the Scheherezade movements (which he didn’t choose), but they’ve stayed in use, because they so clearly seem to describe what the music is saying. And the moment when everyone shouts (well, not the winds or brass, since their mouths are otherwise engaged) — that’s the shipwreck.
So of course shouting! Wouldn’t the sailors have shouted, when their ship crashed into a cliff?
But let’s not discuss the theory of this. Just watch the performance — the video link starts shortly before the shouting begins — and see for yourself. I think the shouting even is structurally correct, since it underlines the climax of the piece. Do you agree?
One suggestion
Stay with the music right up to the end, which isn’t far off. Do this just to see the beatific joy on Segerstam’s face, after he’s brought the piece home.
Even without the shouting, this is a radiant performance, worth watching from the beginning. The orchestra — the Sinfónica de Galicia — is top-quality, both the principal players and the various sections (shining brass, glowing cellos and horns, firm, strong basses, evocative winds). The concertmaster plays the solos like a master storyteller, with great feeling, great love.
And, under Segerstam, there’s joy throughout. Or maybe the Sinfónia always plays with joy! I’d love to think so.
Excellent subject Greg! The yelling in Scheherazade is a great method for humanizing the experience. We create and inspire many such methods at CutTime. If “on the nose”, they can be these “Purple Cow Moments” people brag about. Maya Angelou’s Law (“People will remember how you made them FEEL”). It’s more intimate to hear actual voices, since even instrumental music is ultimately about singing (and dancing).
As the stern director of my small groups, I get to YELL in rehearsals. So why not a bit in concerts? Treat the concert hall like a dear friend’s living room. (OK, a very BIG living room!) Let’s try bold and effective. We’ve got only the rest of our lives to play it “the right way” again and again. Erich Kunzel would always start concerts shouting a sharp 1… 2… and set a light tone. for pops concerts.
I loved touring Europe with Detroit SO and Segerstam, when Neeme Jarvi took sick just before 9/11. Segerstam’s beat was steady as a rock like in this video. Yet he NEVER got ahead of the orchestra. He could hear EVERYTHING and brought out great characters int he music. Naturally, lots of stories, and experimental ideas, like a composer feels authorized to try (at least with HIS stature)..
I took to having CutTime Simfonica shout “I. Love. Po’k ‘n beans!” at the end my Pork ‘n Beans. If cheap tricks drive it home, all the better for what I’m doin’! I sing 8 bars in my arrangement of Beethoven 6 opening. I had left out an important line and just sang it. The audience cracks up and listens with anticipation, perhaps imagining people singing.. We can try a thousand more ideas to draw and welcome new audiences.
Consider what BODY LANGUAGE, or a little SKIT, might do for a new orchestra series (or even regular ones). Berlin Phil, YES! But isn’t there a next step… such as Tafelmusik and some smaller ensembles embrace? Principals, at least, could play “dramatically”, to DIRECT their role as a form of co-re-creating.
Beautiful, Rick! I agree with every word. And how wonderful that you toured with this unique, amazing conductor.
What about an “orchestra” formed ONLY of principals who can ALL move, play tight, and otherwise “sell it” like a band?
What’s the point of 80 people on stage in today’s world anyway?
I get it if you’re in the pre-amplified world of the 1890s… To properly “rock out” back then you had only one option… More players.
But it isn’t 1890 anymore and one amped violinist can EASILY be louder than an entire acoustic orchestra of 80+!
And with the delay dialed in, she can deliver a lush stereo chorus spread all by herself too.
Volume and texture no longer require numbers.
And OUR century craves individuality and expressive tightness that smaller ensembles can easily deliver (and funders can easily fund).
So how about some “amped classical”?
We used to drive innovation with respect to volume… For hundreds of years we kept redesigning and rebuilding our instruments until today’s violins achieved 4x greater volume vs Baroque originals.
And then what?
We just ceded that territory to rock and roll, buried our heads in the sand, and gave up our centuries long “volume quest”, that’s what!
Rick, do you think you could pull together a one player per part “amped classical” orchestra to rock Beethoven 5 and 6 as a touring show?
It is already too late to re-arrange the Titanic’s deck chairs one last time… The era of big orchestras is coming to a close…
And so what?
Nobody misses sackbutt ensembles anymore either even though THEY were all the rage for a couple hundred years too.
Classytroll says bring on the truly bold changes!
It is time for OUR generation to decide what an orchestra is TODAY!
Beethoven, Berlioz, Wagner… All would be SHOCKED and dismayed that the orchestra stopped evolving in 1890!
When they were writing, it was a fast moving target full of experimental instruments and different in every city…
Rick, ever seen a Wagner double double bass? The one so big a guy on a ladder handles the fingering while another person at ground level bows?
How can anyone doubt that Wagner would have LOVED a big amped subwoofer when you see the lengths he went to for more rumble down low?
Why are we so concerned with preserving this outdated relic from the past exactly as we inherited it when the very composers we claim to honor would have found it absurd to freeze it in time?
Show me some REAL innovation!
Who will step up and give us that desperately needed modern amped orchestra that can compete with modern live sound, excite a modern audience, and live within its means (costing only as much as it can bring in via ticket sales)?
Until we have THAT…
Well…
I fear it is all over but the shouting.
Kurt Munckasi — sound designer for Philip Glass — had this idea, too. Just one violinist, amplified and chorused to replace a violin section in an orchestra. Would be interesting to hear. With, of course, appropriate sound design so the winds, brass, and percussion lived in the same sound world.
We should understand that this sound world would make at least the string music flow in a really different way. Part of the power of the orchestras we have — when they play with any power — comes from the sweep of many string players all doing the same thing, with verve and unanimity.
Thst can be exciting! I remember hearing Carlos Kleiber conduct the Chicago Symphony in the 1980s, and he mesmerized the players, so it sounded like all the members of the string sections — the entire orchestra, in fact — had levitated, playing as if they’d all spontaneously thought of the same thing at the same time. Magical!
Or sometimes you get something magical from the string players not all doing the same thing. As when Stokowski famously got the Philadelphia strings to sound seamless by asking them to all use their own bowing, without coordinating with the otherss in their section. So you never heard any bow changes.
I’m sure we could multiply examples of whole-section magic. But there’s also a practical problem with multiplying a single player. What do you do with divisi passages, where a string section is divided into groups, all playing different things.
Rick Robinson, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. You know much more about orchestral string playing than I do!
Greg, is Kurt (Glass’ sound designer) still active?
I should meet him if so!
And I agree that the inevitable amped classical revolution will involve tradeoffs (and won’t please many symphonic purists).
But who REALLY prefers to play and hear a harpsichord vs a Steinway?
And while we are at it, show me an accountant who prefers the abacus!
Music is humanities greatest embodiment of evolutionary aspiration… A pointless thing not required for survival that has nevertheless obsessed our genius types for millenia.
If we try to STOP that evolutionary impulse, or wall it off from modern culture, we’ve destroyed all that makes it special, right?
Nostalgia addicts will always have thousands of great recordings to choose from…
But orchestras that can’t pay for themselves and want MY money to enable their trust fund baby antics DESERVE to fail if they refuse to evolve.
And evolution need not be painful…
But is it not the “sine qua non” of our true tradition to always move forward?
Well, the abacus is an inferior version of a calculator or computer. So to speak. But a harpsichord isn’t an inferior version of a piano. It’s a different instrument. So for me, and I think this would be the standard answer these days, there’s no point in asking which we’d rather hear. Depends on the player and the music.
It’s true that the piano evolved from previous keyboard instruments (of which the harpsichord is only one of several). And also true that for keyboard instrument makers what the piano does was at one time a kind of holy grail — to make an instrument where each key could play at different volumes. I know someone who’s writing a novel about a famous piano maker of the early 19th century, in which the origins of the piano come up. It’s amazing, and kind of crazy to read about the many instruments that were invented, and didn’t work out.
But that doesn’t mean the harpsichord is nothing but history now. As I said, it’s its own instrument, and can do at least one thing a piano can’t, which is to have contrasting sounds coming from different manuals. Allowing dramatic sound contrasts that you can’t precisely duplicate on the piano.
But way beyond that, it’s a wonderful instrument, and of course perfect for music that was written to be played on it.
And this is hardly an unfamiliar concept, I could add — that something new evolves, but doesn’t wipe out what came before. We have cars, but we also still have bicycles. They serve a different purpose — fun and exercise, for a start. Computers have replaced typewriters, but they haven’t replaced pen or pencil and paper. So many people still love writing in the old way (just ask the Moleskine company how its notebooks are selling).
Progress, evolution — complicated things. I remember a moment in Mary McCarthy’s novel The Group, where in the 1930s two progress-minded people talk about canned soup, then new. And say how nobody will make soup at home anymore, because it’s just not necessary.
But of course that didn’t happen! I hardly have to say that there’s been an explosion of serious home cookings for decades now. Just ask the All-Clad company how sales of their cookware are going! Or come to dinner at Anne’s and my house sometime. (You’d be welcome.)
Kurt Munckasi said that thing to me back in, wow, the 1980s, when I was hanging out with him and Philip and the Philip Glass Ensemble. I don’t know what he’s doing now. And I don’t think he ever seriously pursued that idea.
Classical music of course needs to evolve, and HAS evolved, but that doesn’t mean it stops doing its traditional stuff. Fashion design has evolved, as have fabrics, but we still see exquisite clothes made from cotton and wool. Or, something close to my heart — I’d much rather drive a shift car than an automatic. There were many factors that made us choose our new car, and I don’t regret the choice, but it mildly broke my heart that we couldn’t get it with a standard shift. So when I drive our old car, and get to shift the gears, it just feels comfortable and right to me, like coming home. To still love the sound of a symphony orchestra doesn’t at all mean that I don’t also love classical music’s much-needed expansion into digital territory (as for instance in Michael Gordon’s album Light is Calling, the only example I know — though surely there are others! — of an established classical composer creating music in a recording studio.)
Fascinatingly insightful and provocative comment from CT!
The idea that symphony orchestras should follow the lead of rock bands by reducing their sheer numbers drastically, essentially becoming one player on each instrument while taking advantage of electrical amplification.
But, perhaps, a larger perspective holds sway, The elements that made European classical music “classic” were largely intellectual, spiritual, technical, and expressive dominance. These are the qualities that persist in music which gains such aesthetic high ground. Thus, American jazz prevailed in these pertinent areas, followed by British and American rock and pop with some overlapping, of course. And, towards those ends, new instruments appeared, including the saxophone and the electric guitar.
Now, as British musicologist and composer, Nick Collins, states: “Where the 19th century saw a rush of composer-pianists, now the 21st brings the era of the composer-programmer…”
Personally, I believe that the computer as a musical instrument is what has coalesced with the musical zeitgeist of our time, but only when it is allowed to perform without interference from more traditional musicians because that joining pulls the music back into past conventions.
Well, essentially, that’s exactly what I’ve done with Beethoven 5 & 6 to build CutTime® two signature ensembles (cuttime.com) . They are both mini-orchestras (or “bands” if you prefer) that feature lively, hit and even abridged standard rep to introduce the fun, concepts and personal appetite for classical and esp. symphonic. CutTime Players is the mixed octet based on The Soldier’s Tale instrumentation, whereas CutTime Simfonica is a mini-string orchestra with drums to add values the rest of the world needs to relate. Plenty of samples at the website.
Once I learned of the Classical Revolution movement of SF, I saw my string group fitting in bars and clubs quite naturally, esp. since I already had an amplification system so we can work in noisy places and still be mostly heard and I could work (host) the audience like any good entertainer. With my arranger hat I’ve adapted famous works for us to bring into these settings with fun, surprises and key information for those really listening. I rarely play whole movements; but use clever cuts to keep the drama short and modulations original.
Complications arise when we try to crank up the volume of acoustic instruments with even hypercardioid (semi-direction) mics: the feedback threshold is still too low. I’m hoping to buy some “guns” (ultra-directional) mics someday. But the real dilemma is this: acoustic instruments are essentially multi-directional amplifiers; their sound spreads out like a warm blanket of sound. And by forcing that sound into two-channels, a lot of quality information is lost. I’m still willing to compromise, because I love turning on new audiences. But given the room size, I’d stick with acoustic mode. Btw, solid-body string instruments (“electric violins”) lose the above-mentioned surround qualities.
Now, that said, the difference between a single amplified violinist and a section of violinists is profound and obvious for the most part. The former can’t sound like a orchestra section, rather like chamber music. The effect of a whole string section is the impression of multitudes working together. And yet since I studied in Cleveland with a Szell-era member of TCO, the idea of an orchestra playing like a chamber ensemble led directly to me thinking of the orchestra as literally that. CutTime is a grand-son idea of George Szell. The compromise naturally becomes that richness is diminished since I had to leave out doublings, interesting voices, parallel thirds, some distinctive non-harmonic tones in the horns, and a host of textural contrasts. Nonetheless, some pieces work out surprisingly well as chamber transcriptions. Here’s my Till Eulenspiegel: https://soundcloud.com/mrcuttime/richard-strauss-till-eulenspiegels-merry-pranks
If we want to adapt symphonic music presentation so new audiences get a taste of what they’re missing, we need to use ALL ways and quite regularly. Full orchestra concerts could have a special easy-repeat marketed for newcomers. Rather than a “dumbing down”, this can be the smartening up the rest of the country has been waiting for. It’s all a matter of choice. We musicians need to personally convince our other friends why we’re addicted to classical music and without the academic language. Taking symphonic music to intimate spaces, amplified or not, is one complementary step in a whole marathon of doing what needs to be done.
Thanks, Rick! This is eloquent, thoughtful, and informative.
Thanks Rick! Great practical real world insight that should be TAUGHT at every conservatory!
Sounds like you’ve discovered the same challenges (and rewards) that I’ve encountered over the years implementing the “amped classical” concept.
Regarding feedback… I eventually hired a local recording studio to let me shadow their projects for several months and pick the brains of their lead engineers…
Turns out most of my feedback woes were due to bad mic placement!
Great studio engineers get the sound they want with mic selection and placement…
Amateurish hacks (like me before the studio schooled me) try to “fix it in the mix” with FX and extreem EQ.
For live violin, the DPA 4099 is hard to beat! The pickup pattern easily rejects almost everything “off axis” so if you just make sure your stage monitors reach the player’s ears “off axis” with respect to the mic, then you can crank them WAAAAY louder than any classical player can stand before feedback crashes the party.
And I’ve proven that with some especially resonant old instruments too…
For many years I worked with the family that owns the Mendelssohn “Red Violin” as well as several “cheaper” Amatis, etc. Spent a LOT of time experimenting with all kinds of mics on a particularly dark (and CRAZY LOUD) 400 year old Amati.
We ran that thing through a Big Muff (Hendrix’ preferred creamy fuzz tone) with TONS of gain!
Now to get an acoustic violin SCREAMING muff style will probably also require some secondary feedback controls… Like a noise gate set to “open” only when the player’s volume exceeds a set threshhold (so the self noise of the fuzz pedal doesn’t explode into feedback).
But one of the greatest sound world expansions of THIS century is of course riding the feedback waves as they build and crash like any great lead guitarist!
Violinists try that at their peril… But I’ve seen at least two master it.
Now on amping…
I agree stereo amps don’t typically deliver omnidirectional sound like an acoustic instrument… But the same physics that govern mic placement apply (just in reverse).
So clever amp placement can recruit nearby walls to bounce you into a quad stereo omni spread, for instance. Or you can just use four amps per player for quad stereo omni like we do.
Now the mic placement will be tricky though… More amps means more angles of sound potentially impacting your mic “on axis” creating feedback.
So you’ve got to visualize all the sound waves (and their wall bouncing) in 3D and teach yourself to “see” them in the room and arrange mics and amps accordingly.
I was dreadfully unaware of ALL this when I started my “amped classical” quest decades ago… But good sound engineers have solved all of these problems.
If we’d just embrace THEIR amping craft standard instead of trying to impose our own acoustic sensibilities upon a century that long ago rejected them, we’d all be having a LOT more fun.
And of course there are some “nuclear options” for feedback control that I try to avoid… Like active feedback squashing FX boxes that constantly scan for any frequency that is acting up and carve it out in real time…
But that can REALLY mess with a player’s head because now their “tone” is a moving target!
I’ve found that a DPA 4099, well positioned, and with careful amp placement, typically yields WAY MORE volume than any player actually wants.
But it is no simple thing to achieve that.
However, if every conservatory taught mic and amping technique alongside bow technique our craft standard would be permanently elevated within a generation.
It isn’t THAT hard to get right!
Just have to be willing to look outside our narrow (and shrinking) field for expertise.
Almost forgot to ask!!! When are you doing your LVB 5/6 show again?
Let us all know here, ok? I will probably fly out to see that!
I’ve long fantasized about a full immersion amped classical dome show built around those two masterworks.
We can’t be afraid to do to Beethoven what the Romantics did to revive the long dead Bach. They brought JSB back into style by playing it on much louder instruments and with radical doses of self expression.
If we aren’t “allowed” to do the same in our time to the nearly dead LVB, how are we honoring our tradition at all?
Keep it up Rick!
Wow! Fascinating advice CT! Thanks. I think I can get my hands on some DPA 4099s to try. IF we used monitors, they be “in-ear.”
As for the Beethoven, we only play my 3-minute reductions (cut time, get it?) of them in most all of our CutTime Simfonica concerts… to give a TASTE of the “full monty.”
On the note, however (C#), I hope you’ve both seen the videos of the Beethoven Moonlight finale played on electric guitars. They went viral about a year ago.
https://www.arcopdx.com/info
This is a group I’ve covered often that’s using amplification and stage lighting effects learned from rock shows to bring new audiences to classical music.
They’re terrific, Brett. Thanks so much for linking them here! I’d never heard of them. Now I’m a fan. Such joyful, exuberant playing! Anyone curious could start with this, a movement from the Bach A minor violin concerto — https://youtu.be/PMa0wH7tj0c Especially the cadenza! Amazing.
Also the first movement of the Bach Double Concerto, live in a club. Messier than the A minor, but the wildness in itself is pretty great. With counterpoint that really sounds contrapuntal, two real voices going individually, and not just an ensemble from which two voices can be discerned. With the soloists visually as well as audibly distinct. Live in a club, and the people there whoop and shout at the end.
And to ice the musical cake, there is exceptionally sensitive and very thoughtful, clear camera work here. Just beautiful. Thanks!
Yes! I noticed that, too. Goes way beyond what we usually see. Really illuminates the orchestration, among other things.
It’s really clear that the director knew the music and valued its power and that of and the musicians. It was a real treat to see something that aimed to illuminate the orchestral subjects rather than call attention to the camera work for its own sake.