Guest Blogger: Jose Luis Hernandez-Estrada

Jose Luis Hernandez-Estrada is a member of the third class of The Sistema Fellows at New England Conservatory. An accomplished pianist and conductor, he studied at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, the Conservatori del Liceu in Barcelona, and the University of Texas Pan-American. A former conducting fellow at Bard College Conservatory of Music, he has directed numerous ensembles including El Sistema-inspired ensembles such as the Orquesta Sinfónica Juvenil Carlos Chavez (Mexico’s flagship youth orchestra) and the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Youth Orchestra LA (YOLA). In the presentation classes I teach for the Fellows Program at NEC, I have observed his passion for music and his eloquence in advocating for it. –Tony Woodcock

 

The language of the invisible

“What is it that the orchestra has planted in the souls of its members? A sense of harmony, a sense of order implicit in the rhythm, a sense of the aesthetic, the beautiful and the universal, and the language of the invisible, of the invisible transmitted unseen through music.” –Jose Antonio Abreu 

I remember, vividly, the day that I decided to study music.

Beethoven Eroica conducted by Leonard Bernstein

I wanted to be an artist.  As a child, I didn’t know what that meant, but I knew how it sounded. I would listen to Leonard Bernstein’s recordings of the Beethoven symphonies for hours on end. At six years old, the Eroica was my favorite musical work of all time. The sheer power of the sound was captivating; the music, grand and elegant.

Somewhere, I heard that if you studied piano, you could play the sounds of an orchestra. So I decided to take lessons. I remember having to sign a contract at the local community arts school—literally. This simple and yet daunting document stipulated that I would commit to attending lessons, practicing at home, and dedicating the effort into producing “results of artistic value.”

Fair enough, I agreed.

I quickly realized that music was not easy. And that it would take a while to reproduce the sounds that were so endearing to me. Nonetheless, a meaningful journey in music began, right then.

My first piano teacher wasn’t a world renowned artist or pedagogue, but he instilled in me a sense of purpose—the idea that any student, even at the initial stages of learning, should feel that his life in music and the arts, is important.  I had my concerto debut, at age ten.

Yo Yo Ma

Growing up, I treasured listening to Yo-Yo Ma’s interpretation of Haydn’s Cello Concerti. Ma’s playing sounded as if he were sharing his own life-story. His music-making conveyed a sense of order, of utmost immediacy and relevance. The music, composed over two hundred years ago, made sense, even in our times. With such universal works, we can develop new connections and experiences— a set of personal views, unique perspectives that allow us to realize their timeless beauty.

A few months ago, I was preparing to conduct a performance of La Mer. In learning the score, I decided to try something new. I spent some time just looking at the sea. In contemplating its stillness, I began to see Debussy’s opening bars in a new light. Everything came into focus—its colors and textures became more relevant, its message spoke more clearly to me. Impressionism became a more familiar language.

Recently, I heard Alan Gilbert lead the New York Philharmonic in a series of closed rehearsals at Lincoln Center. As they worked through Gustav Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, you could feel the musicians becoming enraptured by the composer’s world of sound, playing with an Olympian strength that was so striking and yet so accessible. What made their interpretation so unique?

Gustav Mahler

Over the years, the Philharmonic has gotten to know Mahler very well. In playing the composer’s works, the orchestra is expanding on and enhancing a performance tradition and legacy that have evolved since the time when Mahler himself was its principal conductor.

To remain relevant, music must be understood, perfected, and embraced as part of a larger cross-cultural and personal narrative context. In this manner, a work’s meaning evolves. As Mahler himself explains, ”it should be one’s sole endeavor to see everything afresh and create it anew.” When we adopt this premise, we can feel music as a living entity; flexible and malleable to the spirit of our times.

Indeed, the times are changing. We are entering into an era of artistic re-imagination. My generation is seeing the role of the arts evolve and thrive anew. Performers are continually raising the bar of musical mastery. Musicians are aspiring to look beyond the notes, and re-imagine the universality of music as a catalyst for social transformation, in and through communities.

Austrian Culture Minister Claudia Schmied in presenting Abreu with Austrian Cross of Honor for Arts and Sciences

Jose Antonio Abreu, the founder of El Sistema in Venezuela, the celebrated national network of youth and professional orchestras, believes that music can have a transcendent effect on the development of society. His work in education and the arts, considered one of the “world’s cultural treasures,” (in the words of Austrian Culture Minister Claudia Schmied) is a model for the role of classical music in our times. Abreu’s El Sistema is a powerful artistic philosophy, a window into the art of possibility, a space where musicians can envision their profession as an instrument of transformative purpose.

Recognizing the orchestra as its primary learning domain, El Sistema’s fundamental goal is not to produce young instrumental virtuosos, but rather, citizens of virtue. Of course, this does not mean there isn’t room for the highest artistic achievement. On the contrary, the Venezuelans believe that in embracing excellence, the whole person thrives. Indeed, research has shown that participating in music develops creative capacities for lifelong success.

“An orchestra is a community that comes together with the fundamental objective of agreeing with itself, therefore, those who play a part in the orchestra, begin to live the experience of agreement,” Abreu explains.

What does the experience of agreement mean?

Gustavo Dudamel and the Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra

When I heard Gustavo Dudamel and the Símon Bolívar Youth Orchestra of Venezuela (the flagship El Sistema orchestra)perform, I was immediately captivated by their sound. Their astonishing display of virtuosity reminded me that working together in the pursuit of common goals is a beautiful idea. As they tackled the dazzling mixed-meters and syncopations in Silvestre Revueltas’ Sensemaya you could feel their commitment to the score: their entire souls were present in the music.

Inspired by this experience and following Abreu’s guiding philosophy, I took on the task of building an orchestral program from the ground up. An orchestra of 100 children was born in Reynosa, Mexico, the city of my childhood, where I first heard the Eroica, just across the border with the United States. In a short time, we saw the youngsters’ level of playing increase dramatically; we saw a culture of collective achievement blossom through music. I learned that music could serve manifold purposes and that it could influence the lives of people in powerful ways.

In an orchestra, participants blossom through teamwork, understanding music as an endeavor that propels them to new spheres of achievement. Great professional and youth orchestras recognize that their work is never finished, but just begun, all of the time. They ask questions, they hone their message, and live up to the highest standards of excellence.

El Sistema orchestras are communities of practice. When musicians come together to learn from each other, they explode the narrow perception of art as an entity of exclusivity. They re-imagine music, fitting it to their own broader social construct, that of a new reality stemming from both an aesthetic purpose and social need. This duality of artistic motivation creates the kind of musical accomplishments that have captivated audiences all over the world.

That an orchestra and its members should recognize themselves as interdependent— is an interesting notion. The term, embraced by Abreu, stems from the field of economics. The orchestra becomes, “a whole of which the parts are connected and react on each other,” borrowing from the words of the 19th century mathematician Antoine Augustin Cournot, who wrote about economic interdependence.  Beauty is realized in communion with others.

This is what the El Sistema movement in the United States and around the world can strive for—to energize artists and teachers to create new frameworks of teaching and learning that connect people and ideas. In doing so, educators can also borrow from other fields and collaborate with thinkers across disciplines. Harvard’s Project Zero’s Studio Thinking Framework, is an exceptional tool that can help us understand artistic endeavors in the context of human growth.

I was recently invited to lead a conducting seminar for young maestros at the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s Orchkids, an El Sistema-inspired program. The children and I talked about what it means to be a part of an orchestra. We listened to Beethoven’s Pastorale Symphony and discussed the composer’s idea of wanting to convey a “feeling of the expression of nature.” A world of beauty opened up, children were eager to feel for the sounds of nature in the score, to enter into a dialogue with the composer, and consequently, among themselves.

I’ve often heard that El Sistema’s artistic outcomes stem from a pedagogy of “passion preceding precision.” We must be careful not to romanticize this notion and to remember that musical achievement, which includes a strong command of instrumental technique, is fundamental to achieving any other extra musical benefits. Abreu believes that first and foremost, “art implies a sense of perfection.”

At Symphony Hall, shortly after his rehearsal of the Dvorak Cello Concerto with the Boston Symphony, Yo-Yo Ma met with young musicians from the Boston Arts Academy. He asked them, “What do we still need to work on?” Clearly, a world class artist is always on a path to excellence.

NEC Youth Philharmonic Orchestra

It is always a thrill to hear a youth orchestra play Beethoven. The Youth Philharmonic Orchestra at the New England Conservatory, for example, is one of the country’s most accomplished youth orchestras. They are working on the Fifth Symphony, a work of epic proportions, one that we all know, almost too well. The musicians bring a sophisticated interpretation to the score, a unique personality and meticulous precision. It feels as if Beethoven had written the piece for them.

In the symphony, the composer presents us with a narrative of perseverance. The score itself represents a pedagogy of passion; of striving for gold. In daring to realize a score to its fullest potential, a musician must always feel as if the piece were composed for him. All emotions must be reconciled with past and present ideas—converging and creating new meaning for contemporary audiences. Sir Simon Rattle also believes that “music is always about something.” Part of the reason we feel any profound emotions from musicians is that clearly, the music, at its core means the world to them, hence “the message becomes loud and clear.”

In playing Beethoven, young people living in Boston, west Philadelphia, or in the barrios of Caracas can come to embrace and embody these same ideals. This is the language of the invisible at work, the kind of music-making that Abreu has envisioned through his orchestras.

Encompassing a duality of dimensions–artistic excellence and social participation, music can be seen as a vehicle to achieve civility, an enhanced notion of citizenry, and a “new school of social life.” The experience of agreement is also about knowing how to listen in pursuit of common goals. The orchestra teaches us lessons that extend well beyond music: we can learn how to work together.

Recently, the Sistema Fellows presented a lecture on the efficacy and potential of the arts as an instrument for social transformation for a study group at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. We were asked to enact El Sistema’s guiding principles.

We decided to engage our audience (graduate students in the fields of economics, education, and political science) musically. We followed Orff’s formula—our students were to “experience first and intellectualize later.”

Recognizing the unique skills of that community, we formed an orchestra—of voices. In less than forty-five minutes, we rehearsed and presented a finished musical performance. We assigned them parts from a collection of folk songs, perfected them, and embraced them as our own creations. We assimilated various pedagogical perspectives. Dalcroze (eurhythmics) was part of the equation.  The group was mesmerized with the results of that experience, energized, and ready to further explore music education and the arts as a part of a public service agenda.

In being one with music and community, artistry thrives and evolves. These are exciting times. We’ve now seen the El Sistema movement blossom into more than fifty communities around the country. The Sistema Fellows are an important voice in guiding this progress. Along with countless educators, administrators, and other visionary leaders, we are seeking to re-imagine the role of classical music in the 21st century.

To be a musician in our times, one must feel that through our profession, we can truly light-up the world. In realizing  a unique and personal interpretation of the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto; developing a new pedagogy for teaching music in the context of the needs of at-risk youth; or conducting a performance of Dvorak’s New World Symphony, we can communicate our own perspectives of beauty and purpose. This in itself is a transcendental contribution to the world.

Every now and then, I listen to my old recording of the Eroica, to find inspiration, to connect with my beginnings—a reminder that the journey is never finished, but just begun.

In Beethoven’s time, the opening E-flat major chords signaled a profound change in the direction of music. The work conveyed a wealth of new ideas—an identification with the challenges of humanity and with the heroism of bravery. In our times, musicians must be ready to embrace the true meaning of our craft: to produce artistic value, again and again.

After all these years, I’ve now come to realize that the greatest musicians are those who enter into our lives to share their talents in ways that inspire us to dream and thrive anew. Music can bring strength and purpose to our lives.  The language of the invisible, that which is transmitted unseen through music, is possible—when we strive to reveal its beauty—together.

---

 [e1]I love this quote!

George: A tribute

George

Just about one year ago, I wrote an entry to this blog in which I praised the continuing acuteness, love of life, intellectual curiosity, and wonderful humor of my friend George—aged 99. To me, he was a real-life hero. My wife and I had visited him at his home in Florida and enjoyed ourselves hugely. Sadly, I recently received word that he had died—not having reached his 100th birthday. You can read his obituary here to get some background on his genuinely swash-buckling life.  And, in appreciation for his example on how to live one’s life, I’m re-running the blog post.

George: A study in living in the moment

The other day my wife and I went to visit our friend George. George is the oldest person I have ever known. He is now 99 years old and is my role model for any age. No, I’ll correct that. “Hero,” conveys a much stronger image of courage and humanity. Nearly all my other heroes are fictional, Pierre and Prince André from War and Peace, Prince Hal from Henry IV, Jacques from As You Like It – you get the picture. But George is the real living embodiment of the heroic. He is an exemplar of being human and keeping a mind so alert and so acute that intellectually he can do the 100 meters every day. He amazed me yet again by remembering our previous conversations, referring to them, and not repeating himself. I can’t even do that at my age.

Anthony Hopkins as Pierre Bezhukov in War and Peace

George was a journalist and covered the European theatre in WWII, actually finding himself in Milan in 1944 when Benito Mussolini was shot and hung face down in the market place, next to his mistress. He tells how initially the mistress was left hanging with her dress around her face until an old Italian man took off his belt and tied her skirts around her feet for decency’s sake. This is the photo you always see of this harrowing scene.

Mussolini

He also covered China during the epochal struggle between Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong in the late 1940’s. George’s apartment has the most wonderful Chinese works of art. He speaks of reading the first issues of the New Yorker magazine, the Atlantic Monthly and Time magazine, and his daily reads still include these three publications plus the New York Times. National and international events and the dramatis personae are at his fingertips be they the new British government, cuts to the BBC’s World Service, Al Jazeera, or the tumult in Egypt. On his living room table is the just-released autobiography of Mark Twain (ed. Harriet Elinor Smith) in which he is deeply immersed. In fact, words, books, and literature are what I believe have made him, as his doctors describe it, a living phenomenon. He cuts his intellectual teeth on ideas and facts every day. His style of speaking is akin to Alistair Cooke in his precise, clear, articulate, colorful, and well-structured reportage. He is achingly vivid when describing his own situation—which I’ll get to shortly.
I have made it policy over the years to send George books that I have discovered. He consumes them avidly and then gives his opinion. Salman Rushdie’s Shalimar the Clown (he found this book hard to appreciate because he had known most of the historical persons described); Némirovsky’s Suite Française and Roberto Bolaño’s Monsieur Pain. He wrote to me about Bolaño, an author he didn’t know, and I’ll just quote a section of his observations: “What will always, and I mean always, remain in my mind, were those two and a half pages of an inserted vignette which is a total gem of writing. It is dropped in those pages with no connection to the plot. I’m sure Bolaño just had to include it. It’s magnificently tense, keenly aimed at the reader’s heart. You will find it starting at paragraph 2 between pages 54 and 56.” I had missed this section during my reading and had to go back and rediscover it – and yes, of course, he was right.

Opera has always been a big feature in George’s life (all music I think, too) and he attended his first Metropolitan Opera performance at age ten with his mother (at the old New York Met). That experience ignited his lifelong love affair. Today he has the greatest joy going to the Met – through the live telecasts broadcast at a theatre near his home. He praises these with all his strength.

Just a few years ago, George came to our home for dinner with two of his closest lady friends. The idea was to have a great dinner and then attend a concert. The average age of our guests was around 93. They all arrived on time and dressed to the nines. The conversation was about politics. The preferred beverage was gin martinis with olives. I half expected them to light cigarettes. They were all feisty. The ladies had the serene beauty and toughness of Katherine Hepburn in On Golden Pond. Afterwards, we reflected that this was the type of blazing American character who could win a World War and still quote Keats. (By comparison, contemporary generations seem far more marshmallow-like in character.)

Katherine Hepburn

Even before he speaks, George’s eyes tell you everything you need to know about his character. They radiate life and curiosity. When he speaks about his current situation, he is unflinchingly direct. “Everything above my neck is working fine,” he says. “Below the neck, all the telephone lines have been cut.” Still, he accepts physical diminution. “If you can’t do it anymore then cut it out. Get on with what remains.” And he says this with whoops of laughter. For him every day is unique. There are no yesterdays. Tomorrow is a distant island. Only today, only the moment exists. George says that his life is as exciting today as it’s always been.
When I grow up and reach 99, I intend to visit George and compare notes.

The Cuckoo Clock

Years ago there was an interview with the great British film director Alfred Hitchcock about a movie that he always wanted to make but never quite did. The movie is set at La Scala Milan, the great opera house of Italy.

Callas as Medea

Maria Callas (whom Hitchcock always wanted to cast) is on stage singing one of those death scene arias which she is delivering with every ounce of her passionate being.  She looks out into the audience and for a brief moment spies, through the glare of the lights, a commotion in one of the VIP boxes. A hand is raised. It contains a dagger. It falls with awful speed and force towards its victim. Callas sees this just as she is approaching a high C and the high C becomes a scream of such dramatic force that the audience immediately gives her a standing ovation. She, of course, is left looking towards that box and the murder she thinks she witnessed. Great idea. And what a start to a movie. Hitchcock was probably joking in the interview but in a way he was also revealing how he might take a creative germ and develop it into movies such as Psycho, Notorious, Strangers on a Train, and Suspicion. He was letting the reader in on some of his creative process, but the flow and narrative detail of the drama were inexorably locked in his imagination, and only he would tell the tale.

In a way that helps to define one of the characteristics of the “film noir,” that astonishing genre that fascinated audiences from the 1940’s to the late 1960’s with its dark sets, darker stories, chiaroscuro lighting effects, nefarious crimes, femme fatales,  trenchcoats, rakishly tilted fedoras, and atmospheric haze of cigarette smoke.

Robert Mitchum

Never has a raincoat looked more elegant and chic than when worn by Jean Gabin, Humphrey Bogart or Robert Mitchum.  Never has a cigarette appeared more compelling and sexy than when Alain Delon would light up a Gitanes and blow blue smoke over some irresistible blonde. And I only imagine that the smoke was blue because “film noir” had to be in black and white, that greatest of cinematic media which allowed directors and actors to emphasize the corruption of their world and the evil in their hearts. Colour would have blown it completely.

The “noir” genre came into existence probably in the 16^th century with the prototypical plays of Shakespeare. Just think of Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, Julius Caesar. They all have the quintessential qualities of classic “film noir” and have been filmed or staged as such.

Consider Orson Welles’s Julius Caesar Broadway production from 1937, or Laurence Olivier’s 1948 Hamlet with the “To be or not to be” soliloquy balanced between spoken dialogue and voiceover, just like a Philip Marlowe narrative.   That Hamlet has a film score by William Walton that is straight out of Laura from 1944.

Now try putting some classic “film noir” actors in Shakespearean roles. Who wouldn’t have paid top dollar to see Bette Davis as the First Witch in Macbeth, or Joan Crawford as Lady Macbeth, or  even better, Barbara Stanwyck with her ineffable quality of vulnerability (think Double Indemnity)? Or how about Edward G. Robinson as Lear (Orson Welles played the part on television in a scaled down production by Peter Brooks) or Robert Mitchum as Iago or even Edmund in Lear with Rita Hayworth as Cordelia? But I am getting carried away.

Les Diaboliques

Anyway . . . the genre has been around a long time and probably achieved its pinnacle of success in movies like Les Diaboliques, whose final bathroom scene I still find frightening; or The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon, Five Fingers and Sunset Boulevard. And it still inspires. What are Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction or even Beckett’s Krapp’s Last Tape (surely the final piece of introspection from Philip Marlowe?) but later examples of the genre.

Of all the outstanding “noir” examples, the one I keep coming back to because of its sheer power and storytelling originality is Carol Reed’s The Third Man. Filmed on location in war-torn Vienna in 1948, the movie is based on a novella by Graham Greene that he wrote in contemplation of the film treatment. It is a rare example of a film or theatre adaptation being so much better than the book. (The other of course being My Fair Lady, which adapted Shaw’s boringly self-reverential play Pygmalion.)

The film for me is the “ugly twin” of another movie classic, Casablanca from 1942, which famously starred Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman. Casablanca is a movie of heroes, of optimism in the face of tragedy, of the positive future that war could produce. It even has a happy ending. By contrast, The Third Manis a story about the dreadful after-effects of war.  It is about doubt, menace, gloom, conscience, fear, hatred, and evil. And most of all it is about a hunted soul, Harry Lime himself. His lover, Miss Schmidt, played by Alida Valli, is a Bergman lookalike. The hat, the coat, some of those intensely sad looks. But there is no redemption for her. The last scene of the movie is an invitation to a happy ending. A long shot in a Viennese cemetery. It is day, a rarity in this movie. The sky is clear. There is no rain. Miss Schmidt is in her Bergman hat and coat walking briskly between a colonnade of trees that are not just devoid of leaves, but resemble the skeletons of a First World War battle scene. She walks towards a man waiting for her, who is patiently smoking a cigarette. A man who has the power to change her life and who is in love with her. And she walks straight past him . . . it is so exactly brilliant and right in its courage.

Scene from The Third Man

Earlier, she has a scene with this man, Holly Martin, an American who makes a living writing Westerns, played with all the right naive credulity by Joseph Cotton. The scene exactly models the famous rendezvous of Bergman and Bogart in the Arab market place. In Casablanca, we understand perfectly that the lovers are soul mates, yet the scene ends with Bogart crushed by Bergman, his face averted from the camera, in the weakest shot any actor can be made to play. Cotton and Valli play out the analogous incident in a rail station waiting room but without any sign of closeness, and with the dissonance of her train leaving without her. It ends with that same weak shot of Cotton’s face turned from the camera, defeated. The same is true of humor. In Casablanca it’s the pickpocket and the fat blond waiter playing out a set piece comedy routine. In The Third Man the humor is embodied in a poor emaciated man with a fixated stare walking slowly and inexorably towards the British forces trying to sell a mass of balloons. What could be more incongruous?

The major protagonist of The Third Manis Vienna. It is ravaged by war. There are bomb sites, rationing, a pervasive gray ambiance, the black market, the look of hunger in people’s faces. The city is divided into four zones occupied and controlled by the Americans, the British, the Russians and the French, and you feel that political vise tightening around its people.  The streets are wet with some relentless seeping moisture, the damp cobblestones giving off a phosphorescent gleam under the street lights. Pavement and buildings are crumbling. The avenues and passageways appear as dark mazes or caves.

"Papa!"

The play of shadows turns a small three-year-old boy with an oversized newsboy’s cap, very short pants, skinny legs, and a long coat, into a giant of scary proportions. He runs, shouting “Papa, Papa,” his voice echoing down the streets. I can hear it now.

I have seldom come across such mastery of light as Reed demonstrates here. But then, having created magical effects above ground, he takes us into the depths of the city . . . its sewers which he illuminates as if they were a vast subterranean cathedral. This is the setting for the denouement which I will mention in a moment.

The film’s second major protagonist is Harry Lime, played by a young Orson Welles. You have to wait 67 minutes for him to make his appearance but when he does it is one of those unforgettable moments in cinema history. A slightly drunk Holly Martin (who has been trying, despite ominous warnings, to unravel the mystery of his friend Harry’s suspicious death) thinks he is being followed in the dark streets. At the same time, a cat has escaped from Miss Schmidt, to whom Holly has declared his love. Suddenly, the camera discovers the cat which is seen purring in obvious delight, wrapping itself around the feet of a man hidden in the shadows of a doorway. Holly shouts so loudly that he wakes a neighbor in a top floor who opens her window to complain. It is the shaft of light from the windows that plays on the face of Orson Welles, revealing him like the most brilliant spotlight in the theatre.

Orson Welles

The very much alive Harry Lime stands,  smiles, is unafraid. And at this moment we become aware of how important the music has been throughout the movie. Indeed it is like a third protagonist, for it is so characterful. Carol Reed, who initially didn’t know what to do with the music, went out to dinner one night in Vienna and heard for the first time a zither played by Anton Karas. He was so taken with this sound that he recorded Karas for hours and then inserted the music into the film, including the famous Harry Lime theme.

The music is essentially commercial, the sort of ersatz folk idiom you hear in cafes and street corners when on vacation in various European capitals. But when used in the context of this drama and story it paints the states of minds, of emotions, of tragedy. The use of music at the moment of Harry Lime’s lighted entrance is nothing short of genius.

I mentioned the denouement. This happens in the Viennese sewers. The police and British forces have discovered that this is how Harry travels the city without detection and they are giving chase. Suddenly all those closed entrances are clangorously opened. Men and dogs and shouting fill the space of the submerged cathedral.

Vienna Sewers

And Harry runs. His body, his soul, they’re both running to be free of the calamity he has set in motion with his life and crimes. There is one shot that touches me with its simplicity and profundity. Harry has found a set of spiral stairs leading finally to the opening of a Viennese street. Escape is literally close at hand, but he doesn’t have the strength to open the grate. Instead you are left with the image of just his fingers stretching through the grillwork in the night air, the sound of wind blowing, as though his quivering fingers are small flowers that will never bloom in the sun. The moment lasts maybe fifteen seconds but it was made by a master.

Ran Blake

All of this has come to mind recently because of Ran Blake, one of our great faculty members, musician extraordinaire, founder of “Third Stream” with Gunther Schuller, and one of the great lovers of “film noir.” His “film noir” nights at NEC, recently featuring the work of Chabrol and Hitchcock, have reminded me personally of the wealth of images and originality of this genre.  It sent me back to look at The Third Man and I was overcome by just how great this movie is. So . . . I am not just commending it to you. I think I am saying it is essential watching for anyone who is fascinated by the human mind and creativity, and compelling storytelling. (Incidentally, if you’d like to hear music from The Third Man, you might consider attending our Viennese-themed Feast of Music, Feb. 25. More information here.)

P.S. Oh yes . . . the title of this blog. It is taken from the conversation between Holly Martin and Harry Lime as they ride the Ferris wheel in the heart of Vienna (the huge amusement park ride at the Prater is still a Viennese icon).  The words come at the climactic moment of one of the most nihilistic and cynical observations on humanity ever uttered. The words are Harry Lime’s… pronounced in the most off-hand, almost humorous way as he crunches on pills for his indigestion. The speech, undoubtedly the best in the movie and one of the best in any movie, lasts about three minutes and was written not by Graham Greene but by Welles himself who felt that the drama needed such a lift. And if you compare this with the Greene original, he is totally right. Take a look . . .

Deep Song by Tony Woodcock

---

Deep Song

Amy Winehouse’s death just a few months ago was a great tragedy and has deprived us of a unique voice and creative spirit. Her career was brief, meteoric, self-destructive and full of moments of amazing achievement.

Amy Winehouse

The response that she was able to command from her fans was at once affirming and provocative and in many ways enabled her worst excesses. Her followers seemed to will her down a path towards an inexorable conclusion. But in a way she was living out the covenant that any extraordinary artist has with their public. The public demands more and more of its heroes; it has expectations of performance that are excessive and rapturous, but with only one way for the artist to meet that need–with a self-sacrificial outpouring of gifts and soul.

We love the romantic notion of artists who have given everything, whose talent is extinguished too early, whose covenant with us is ruptured by an untimely ending. Just think of our relationships with Mozart, Schubert, Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, Jimi Hendrix, Jacqueline du Pré, Kurt Cobain, Maria Callas: we are suffused by an inner yearning still for more but with an acknowledgement of what was given and sacrificed. Some of the artists I have selected for this article certainly fall within this category, but others do not and are alive and well, playing wonderfully, and enjoying happy family lives. But they all share a characteristic for deep song, the ability to sing or play through the ground from the soles of their feet, and into their voices and fingers and, by doing so, to change the world.

My first is a young violinist whose career never really happened. Only glimpses of performance have been captured, and we are left with just a handful of recordings. These were made by the legendary impresario Walter Legge, who discovered in 1940 a boy of sixteen studying with the great teacher Carl Flesch and took him into the recording studio to perform a few salon pieces.

Josef Hassid (1923-1950)

His name was Josef Hassid (1923-1950), and there were many extravagant claims made about his playing and artistry. Fritz Kreisler heard him and was quoted as saying, “A Heifetz violinist comes around every 100 years, a Hassid every 1000.” When you listen to his rendition of Sarasate’s Playera, you can recognize what he means. It is as though he has stood on a New York bridge with Sonny Rollins [i]focusing upon producing just one note, and he allows its sound to transmute into every dark colour imaginable.

The work is not a virtuoso showpiece; instead, it is a song expressing profound emotions of pain and knowing.

Art Pepper

As a result of his very candid autobiography Straight Life, Art Pepper (1925-1982) provoked all sorts of “voyeurism” when he came to London to perform at Ronnie Scott’s Club in 1980 with Milcho Leviev. In his past life he had turned to drugs, to criminal behavior, had served time in St. Quentin, but had emerged from this cauldron of desperation and experience with so much to tell us. And in the album “Blues for the Fisherman,” written by him and Leviev , he lays out his soul. His Make a List, Make a Wish is for me the supreme example of his artistry as a performer and composer. Bassist Tony Dumas has a really strong riff that is repeated and repeated, and every repetition is different—subtly and transformationally. Above it there are two long solos, first from Pepper and then, after a climax that has burnt and smoldered, Leviev takes us structurally to almost the same place but in a different way.

Jacqueline du Pré (1945-1987)

Jacqueline du Pré (1945-1987) enjoyed a meteoric solo career of little more than ten years during which time she consumed music and communicated her love and passion. In 1973, I heard her play the Elgar Concerto in London, a work forever associated with her. This was during the period of her very brief return to the concert platform after a two year break before her illness overcame her. Sir Neville Cardus, who wrote with equal passion about cricket and music, and who was knighted by the Queen for his services to both, wrote this astonishing description of her Elgar, “She went to the heart of the matter with a devotion remarkable in so young an artist so that we did not appear so much to be hearing as overhearing music which has the sunset touch on it, telling the end of an epoch in our island story and also telling of the composer’s acceptance of the end. The bright day is done, and he is for the dark. And she got the wounding juice out of this self-revealing work.” The Saint-Saens First Concerto from 1971 which I have selected is not musically on the same page as the Elgar but in terms of performance and sound, Du Pré will stop you in your tracks.

Lionel Hampton

Now this one is a total must. Lionel Hampton (1908-2002) with his All Stars playing “Stardust” from the Civic Auditorium, Pasadena, in 1947. Something was happening that night. The band took the standard and never looked back. Each solo builds on the next and is in itself unique. Willie Smith on alto sax is downright dirty. Corky Corcoran’s tenor is floating, sensuous, seductive. Charlie Shavers’ trumpet is virtuosically humorous. Slam Stewart, bass, does that astonishing improvisational trick of playing and singing what he is playing at the same time, at the distance of an octave. I adore this sound. Every one of them is sensational. The best ever. Then . . . in comes Lionel Hampton on vibes with an extended break which leaves everyone else at home. This is music making shaking with energy and discovery. And Hampton knows it. He knows how good it is and that this is a new place. It becomes more and more fluent, finding inspiration in every phrase of the standard. I played this once to my good friend and colleague the conductor Andrew Litton in his car just before an important dinner. He couldn’t leave and just sat there, transfixed.

Sarah Vaughan (1924-1990)

Sarah Vaughan (1924-1990) recorded a live album in 1957 at Mister Kelly’s in New York City with her trio—Jimmy Jones, Richard Davis, and Roy Haynes. It contains a track called “Be anything but darling be mine,” in which she demonstrated not just her voice and total command but her ability to sing as though she was an instrument rather than a voice—particularly the saxophone. Her muted, covered voice in certain passages takes us to new colours and feelings.

Eddie South (1904-1962)

Eddie South (1904-1962) was an African-American jazz violinist, classically trained, who, because of the savage racism of the time, could not pursue a career in a symphony orchestra. Instead, he developed into perhaps the greatest jazz violinist of all time and, in the 1930’s, became the mentor of Stéphane Grappelli when he visited Paris. His sound and imagination are extraordinary. Listen to his “Eddie’s Blues” (with Django Reinhardt accompanying him with a variety of rhythms and harmonic punctuations) for a great example of his originality as a performer and composer. What he produces in this recording dating from 1937 (and just think of the great violinists dominating the string world at that time) is a new sound and method of playing the violin. It is fluently virtuosic but only to expressive purposes. The sound is overall very sweet, but he can turn a note as well as a slide with a variety of different vibratos and colours. And then there is the percussive use of the bow adding punctuation to his phrasing. The first time I heard this track I could not believe what he was achieving, and each time I listen to it, I find new points of originality which amaze.

South’s accompanist, Django Reinhardt (1910-1953), is most associated with the Quintet of the Hot Club of France and Stéphane Grappelli. Reinhardt, Grappelli, and South collaborated many times, including some experimental crossovers with a jazz version of the Bach Double and this was many years before Jacques Loussier or Ward Swingle. Reinhardt was a gypsy born in Belgium to the Manouche gypsy family. At the age of eighteen, he was severely burnt in a caravan fire and suffered major damage to the third and fourth fingers of his left hand. His doctors stated that he would never play again. They were wrong. How he plays with basically two operational fingers defies belief. This is acoustic guitar playing in a totally different world from anything before or after. Only Jimi Hendrix in the 1960s created something as original. Reinhardt makes a unique sound. It had unspeakable character and colour and a sensuous quality which strokes the air. His virtuosity is given sometimes to amaze, always within character, but held in reserve as something that he has facile dominance over. He recorded a few purely solo works of his own composition. “Parfum” is full of simplicity and gentle, exotic chord sequences. The melodic line is sung with an accompaniment as delicate and soft as though from another instrument.

Last summer my wife and I traveled to Lisbon, Portugal, for a first visit. One of the main attractions for us was to experience the musical form, Fado, a sort of mixture of the blues and Flamenco. We went to many Fado clubs and heard some amazing singers. The format was always the same. Four different singers, performing for not longer than fifteen to twenty minutes each. No amplification. A small instrumental group of two guitars and a mandolin playing melodic lines and melismas and the voice hauntingly telling its story in thunderous declamatory form.

Amalia Rodriques (1920-1999)

All the performances we saw were given in cellars using the natural excellent acoustic provided by arches, the sound filling a room usually seating 100-200 people. It is a sound of the greatest complexity speaking to our humanity. The Queen of Fado was Amalia Rodrigues (1920-1999), whose recorded legacy shows how it can be done.

I first came across British Baroque violinist Rachel Podger about eight years ago when someone played for me her recording of the Bach Solo Sonatas and Partitas. It was a revelation in terms of blowing new life, energy, and insight into these masterworks. Consider this excerpt, the Gavotte and Rondo from the E-Major Partita. Podger works as a soloist, but in reality she is a confirmed collaborator. Her Bach Violin Concerti, in particular the last movement of the A minor, is a case in point. Instead of the old-fashioned virtuoso playing with a large orchestra accompanying rather like a herd of wildebeest with the contrapuntal lines so lost and muddy, we hear everything with the solo line merely part of the musical counterpoint and argument rather than the only line. It is like a chilled glass of San Pellegrino with lime, full of familiar and unfamiliar tastes. It is Bach reinvented. If you can get hold of it, I highly recommend it. (We at NEC were delighted to host Podger in a public masterclass in September 2010 where she worked with several of our string players in works of Bach.)

Jascha Heifetz (1901-1987)

So I will end with the last public performance given by Jascha Heifetz (1901-1987), the doyen of violinists and one of the greatest virtuosos of the 20^th century. In his last recital at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in 1972, he amazed as always with his showpieces, but with his final works he toned the brilliance down and instead elected to play short melodic pieces, often with mute. The Manuel de Falla “Nana” is for me the best example of simple melodic playing coloured by the articulation and ornamentation of Flamenco. It is as though he had walked away from the power Ferrari of his virtuosity and sat quietly in the melting sun allowing his soul to sing.

[ii]

---

[i] Rollins famously reinvented his playing by practicing his sax on the Williamsburg Bridge in NYC during a two-year musical sabbatical beginning in 1959. Returning to performing, he named his comeback album The Bridge.

Guest Blogger: Joseph Swensen

Joseph Swensen. Photo by: Ugo Ponte

“Violinist/conductor Joseph Swensen is the Founder and Artistic Director of U-HAC International; Principal Guest Conductor and Artistic Advisor of Ensemble Orchestral de Paris; and Conductor Emeritus, Scottish Chamber Orchestra. As a violinist he has recorded the Beethoven Violin Concerto with Andre Previn and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Bach Sonatas with NEC’s very own keyboardist John Gibbons, and the Sibelius Violin Concerto. As conductor and violinist, he has recorded concertos and orchestral works by Mendelssohn, Prokofiev and Brahms with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra.  My first encounter with him was while I was running the Bournemouth Symphony and Joey came to play the Beethoven Concerto. His was a performance of great musical integrity and originality. After that occasion, I gave him some of his first conducting opportunities. I’m delighted to have him write a guest blog on a subject that I know is of passionate concern to him.” –Tony Woodcock

UNIFORMITY, ENTITLEMENT AND SOMETHING CALLED U-HAC

When I was a child, Stravinsky, Copland and Shostakovich were the living legends, the heroes, the artistic giants clearly at the top of the classical music hierarchy. The gradual “flattening out” of that hierarchy during the decades since, has had a profound effect on the world of classical music. Don’t get me wrong, I am no advocate of the return of the old hierarchy, but our community needs to become more idealistic from the bottom up. Specifically by way of the education of future generations of classical artists.

Pragmatic goals now dominate the minds of many an artist, and a valid and earnest concern for the survival of the massive artistic institutions our forefathers built is justifiable, if self-serving. These institutions span the globe and require thousands of professional musicians to fill the positions they have created. Competition for these positions is fierce and salaries are usually very good. This competition, although seemingly necessary and certainly practical, has lead inevitably to an unprecedented uniformity and orthodoxy, even among many composers. This orthodoxy has ironically and tragically resulted in what seems to me to be the near renunciation of a previously shared conviction: that the most important factor in all artistic creation is the expression of what could be called the unique, mystical center within every artist, namely the soul. Of the soul, Johannes Brahms in the year 1896 allegedly said: “the soul of man is not conscious of its powers…to evolve and grow, man must learn how to use and develop his own soul forces (sic).”(1)

Dorothy Delay

In classical music training, separating the art from the craft is widely considered an essential part of the education. My violin teacher, Dorothy DeLay, was a pioneer and a revolutionary in taking this idea to the extreme. She and others like her taught us to systematically separate all technical aspects of playing an instrument from the integrated organic whole for the sake of perfecting the craft of music making, assuming the art (and soul) would take care of itself. She explained to me when I was fourteen years old that the reason she never mentioned the intangible or mystical aspects of music in her teaching was that she simply didn’t know how to speak about things she could not quantify. I remember being relieved however when she admitted to me that she nevertheless accepted these aspects of art as essential. But I complained to her nevertheless that, by choosing not to speak of the mysterious and intangible, she was giving the world the mistaken impression that she herself didn’t believe that they were important or that they even existed at all!

Igor Stravinsky

The musical values of our time were also deeply influenced by Igor Stravinsky. Famous for his disrespect for and dislike of performing artists, (especially orchestral musicians whom he often referred to as “nitwits”), Stravinsky demanded an unprecedented level of objective literalism in the performance of his works. In 1947 he wrote: “Interpretation is at the root of all the errors, all the sins, all the misunderstandings that interpose themselves between the musical work and the listener and prevent a faithful transmission of its message”(2) Perhaps this and other similar outbursts on the subject by Mr. Stravinsky are understandable overreactions to the irresponsible and arbitrary freedoms some mediocre early 20th century players exerted over composers’ apparent intentions.

It is clear to me that it is the misunderstanding and misuse of DeLay’s and Stravinsky’s philosophies, which have become the conventional wisdom in classical music today. Consequently, a new ideal has emerged: the ideal of uniformity. For example, a good string quartet is considered to be one in which the members’ sound, phrasing and intonation is indistinguishable one from the other. Decisions concerning uniform bowings in string chamber groups are often the first and sometimes the only discussion in rehearsals. As long as we all uniformly follow Stravinsky’s admonitions, we needn’t do anything as musicians other than robotically reproduce literally what the composer wrote on the page. Almost all “good” symphony orchestras are on ”uniform and blended” mode, (and many of the most prestigious ones are by far the most uniform). Conductors have little long-term influence. Even the great Carlos Kleiber, who famously referred to the Berlin Philharmonic as “wall to wall carpeting” in the 1980′s was, in my opinion, no match at the end of the day for the power of that orchestra’s uniformity ideal.

Beethoven : Coriolan – op.62, Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Carlos Kleiber
Live Recording from 28 June , 1994 ;

All this uniformity and conformity obviously leave little room for anything Brahms might have called “soul work”, or in other words, art.

I don’t know about you, but this reminds me more of a military paradigm than an artistic one. Could this mentality be the legacy of classical music’s most influential conductors? From well before Toscanini to Solti and von Karajan these conductors taught us to be exacting, uncompromising soldiers. Even now, years after the last of them has gone, we continue their work by tyrannizing each other and ourselves. Georg Solti once said, when predicting the bright future of a promising assistant: “good sergeants make good generals!” It is ironic that since the Second World War, the world has become more free and diverse, while classical music has become more regimented and uniform. This ideal of uniformity is being passed on by way of most of our educational institutions for a very good reason, the job market requires it, and we believe that we are powerless to change the values of that market. I protest. We must change those values and it is the educational institutions themselves that need to lead the way to a more inspiring and interesting future for classical music. We educators need to implore young artists to have the courage to be true to their unique souls and see themselves as part of a force for positive change, from the bottom, up. This is imperative, not only for the sake of our finding joy in music once again, but for our very survival.

I dream of a more colorful, creative and relevant classical music world and I am not alone in pursuing this dream. Great work on behalf of these ideals is being done by extraordinary people all over the world and along with my partner Victoria Eisen, I am pleased to join their ranks with the creation of a new kind of arts education and arts aid organization: Unity Hills Arts Centers International (otherwise known as U-HAC International).

U-HAC’s home-base, a historic, inspiring 15-room, circa 1776 farmhouse in Townshend, Vermont, USA, is a meeting, learning, working and living space for artists, both professional and amateur.

U-HAC home base. Townshend, VT

Here we will continue to bring together artists of all mediums and from all cultural traditions for workshops, regularly occurring seminars, and residencies. We at U-HAC want to teach, learn, work and live with the arts in a completely different way: where inspired improvisation is the absolute ideal, the starting and ending point of all great art and all real living, where the “beginners mind” of the amateur and young student is at least as highly valued as the convictions and sophistication of the professional (the term “beginners mind”, used by the Buddhists, describes the state of mind in which one feels that everything is possible), and where teaching and learning are two sides of the same process shared by all involved.

We in the classical music world need to start to think differently, we need to set out to break the mold of uniformity. (Uniformity being obviously the absolute antithesis of “beginners mind”). It is that mold of uniformity itself, which is preventing innovation, individualism, artistic freedom and for some, real joy from becoming once again a part of the professional classical musician’s daily life. Although we may be created equal, we are not meant to become uniform. This is symbolized at the U-HAC home base by the power and infinite variety of the natural surroundings.

Music making should be a personally, uniquely transformative experience for MUSICIANS, not just for the music-loving, paying public. I was therefore pleased when, after our recent August 2011 seminar, ”Total Immersion in Brahms and Bach”, which brought together instrumentalists, conductors, composers, scholars, writers, visual and culinary artists of all ages, levels and cultures, many participants called it ”a completely life-changing experience.” Our sincere hope is that everyone who spends time at U-HAC will, each in his own way, take what he experienced back into the world, sharing these fresh values with colleagues and demanding them from leaders.

Complementing our work at the home base are the U-HAC Satellites. These mobile buildings, which will be constructed from recycled materials, will be sent to underprivileged and underserved rural communities worldwide. Village life across the world is fast disappearing as more and more young people from villages seek a more prosperous life in the cities. The social, cultural, economic and ecological results of this are disastrous and U-HAC wants to play a positive role by helping to enhance the cultural life and therefore the quality of life in the world’s villages. Each of these U-HAC Satellites will offer a varied curriculum of workshops in the arts of all cultures and each will present its own world-class concert series. They will be staffed in part by a kind of ”peace corps” of dedicated artist volunteers who believe that the arts can be a powerful means for social and economic revitalization. Most importantly, all U-HAC endeavors will be carried out with the utmost care for the earth’s natural environment.

U-HAC musicians rehearse

Other projects in various stages of development are the U-HAC Mentor/Apprentice Orchestral Institute, a program where orchestras will be created with one half retired professional orchestral musicians and the other half young students, sitting alongside each other for intensive workshops in orchestral playing. These workshops will take place in rural villages worldwide providing orchestral concerts for those communities in addition to providing profound benefits for the participants. The U-HAC Chamber Players, the resident ensemble at the home base and at all the U-HAC Satellites, is an ever-evolving group of about a dozen musicians which provides an invaluable, educational stepping stone in the form of performance and touring opportunities for the most accomplished and promising young artists at the very beginning of their professional careers.

Combining the vertical climb towards the highest imaginable artistic ideals with the corresponding horizontal outreach to humanity at large is the greatest challenge of the artist of today. We classical musicians have been indoctrinated with the belief that, solely due to the high art we create, we are indispensable to humanity. Like the monks of old, many among us presume that other people should finance our quest. This culture of entitlement contributed to the disappearance of most of the world’s monasteries and we classical musicians must avoid the same fate. If UNICEF provides food, and Doctors Without Borders provides medicine, we artists must create more aid organizations that provide the arts to the needy. No man should live by bread (or meds) alone and the arts are an essential nutrient for the survival of the human race.

In the USA, where the vast majority of public schools no longer even offer music in their curriculum, U-HAC International is one small organization, still in its infancy, yet full of hope, enthusiasm and energy. We are attempting to fill a void, and eager to play a role in the coming rebirth of a new and rejuvenated arts world.

(1) Arthur M. Abell, “Talks with Great Composers” (New York, N.Y.: Citadel Press, 1994) 6-7

(2) Igor Stravinsky, “Poetics of Music in the Form of Six Lessons” (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1947), 122-3

Unleashed

I am sure we’ve all had evenings when we arrive home from work exhausted and brain-dead, not having the energy or concentration to do anything more than switch on the TV and go semi-conscious.  And of course, sleep comes pretty quickly, and that then consumes the entire evening.  Well I was having that sort of evening some years ago and eventually awoke with a start and stared at the action on the TV.  And…I was completely disoriented. I felt like I was inside an episode from the Twilight Zone. There on the screen was a film that I knew really well and admired enormously. Same dialogue. Same scenes.  Same direction. Same camera shots. But it was not the same movie.  For one thing, the original was in black and white and this was in glorious colour. All the actors had changed. Janet Leigh had suddenly become Anne Heche for instance.  I had stumbled across Gus Van Sant’s frame-by-infinite-frame remake of the great Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. It was immensely unnerving.

Well I had pretty much the same experience last week when I sat in on rehearsals for the first modern performance of the original version (premiered in 1889 in Budapest’s Vigadó Theater) of Mahler’s First Symphony performed by our Philharmonia Orchestra and Hugh Wolff.

Vigado Theater, Budapest

There was the Symphony’s last movement developing in all the ways we know and love building to that incredible moment when the entire viola section plays as though the Himalayan mountain range is exploding with that fortissimo three-note run.  And there it wasn’t.  Instead here was Mahler in some impossibly distant key, a box he had gotten himself into and the only way out was to bring back the huge dissonant storm that had started the movement.  That was pretty unnerving too.  But the insight that this moment and many others in this original version gave about the compositional process was astounding.  Listening to the September 26performance, we were hearing a masterpiece in process played with the passion and commitment that only outstanding young musicians can bring to such a project.

NEC Philharmonia

We had been given the rights to recreate this version by Marina Mahler, the composer’s granddaughter. Kristo Kondacki, a third- year Composition student and Mahler devotee had spent his summer producing a performing edition.  The results were a revelation.

Stanford and Norma Jean Calderwood Director of Orchestras Hugh Wolff

The concert inaugurated a semester-long celebration at NEC on the Centennial of Mahler’s death which I believe I can confidently say, no other performing organization could even approximate. Mahler Unleashed brings together the vast diversity of all NEC’s programmes from Jazz and Contemporary Improvisation, to piano, song, chamber music, and, of course, our extraordinary orchestra programne.  We will present more than 20 events, including symposia and film, between September and December.  Concerts include our conductorless Chamber Orchestra performing some of Mahler’s arrangements of Schubert and Bach  (did you know he conducted Bach with the NY Philharmonic?!) and showcasing music of his contemporaries, Fuchs, Schreker, Suk and Webern.  Mahler’s reworking of Beethoven’s Fifthis included.

His Fourth Symphony will be juxtaposed with Messiaen’s l’Ascension on a program with the theme Different Paths to Heaven. We will hear the fragment of his early Piano Quartetwhich the composer Alfred Schinittke took as a germ for his own fascinating mashup of gestures and ideas.

Ken Schaphorst

We will hear songs by Mahler and  his contemporaries and… Alma.   There are two quite experimental concerts: Mahler Remixed, which is a student project.  The participants have been invited to program, perform, compose, arrange, and market their own tribute to Mahler as part of our Entrepreneurial Musicianship program. From what I have seen of their plans so far they have come up with something totally original.  And there is Mahler in Chinatown  a title inspired not just by the composer’s choice of Chinese texts for Das lied von der Erdebut also by the story (perhaps apocryphal except I like it too much ) of his conducting the NY

Sarah Jarosz

Philharmonic, an experience he did not relish, and then eating comfort food in Chinatown. Anyway… besides the Schönberg arrangement of Das lied there will be a performance by our Chamber Orchestra of the famous Adagietto from the Fifth Symphony. But this time the orchestra will be joined by Jason Moran, a distinguished faculty member and one of the most original jazz pianists in the world today, who will weave improvised tropes on the music .  Who knows what Mahler would have made of this but it will be a fascinating meeting of styles and creativity.

Jason Moran performs “Fire Waltz”

All of these ideas took wing just a few months ago when Katarina Markovic, Chair of our History Department, mentioned the idea of oneconcert to celebrate the centennial.  This one concert became the inspiration amongst faculty chairs for the massive celebration we are now enjoying, and which I hope you will experience as well.

Katarina Markovic

Katarina has been a star throughout our planning, but the planning has been very unusual.  Instead of appointing an Artistic Director who would have imposed some sort of “Vision” on us all, I opted instead to empower all faculty chairs to discuss their ideas and come up with their own programmes reflecting their individual passions.  A case study in removing leadership and allowing the collective creativity of amazing minds to do the work.  Maybe there is something there for Government to think about!!

Before our opening concert on September 26, I had invited Gilbert Kaplan, the very well known Maher authority, to set the scene for our celebrations with his presentation, Mahler’s legacy.  Before a packed audience he gave a deeply felt and passionate account of Mahler’s life, illustrated by more than 200 slides and various musical examples.  As he reached his conclusion and literally faded from our view with only music in our ears, I felt deeply grateful for the emotional place of this sound world in my life.  Mahler has reached us all.

Guest Blogger: Paul Judy

For over 70 years, since a boy, I have been an engaged and passionate listener of classical music.  For over 40 years I have had an affiliation with a major symphony orchestra organization, and for the last half of that period, have been a student of the organizational behavior patterns and decision-making processes within orchestral institutions.  During 1995-2003, I published Harmony, the journal of the Symphony Orchestra Institute.  Harmony presented the thoughtful inquiry and critique of North American symphony orchestra organizations by over 60 authors closely familiar with the field.  Over 1,200 pages were published. During this period, the Institute also sponsored or reported on six concerted and facilitated organizational change efforts.

The content of Harmony and these various interventions had the goal of bringing about positive change in how symphony orchestra organizations functioned — toward greater effectiveness, greater constituency satisfaction, greater community value — to be achieved particularly through greater involvement, stake, and responsibility by musicians in the decision-making and longer term development of their organizations.

In 2003, the work of the Institute was brought to a close and the residual funds were contributed to the Eastman School of Music for the development of the Orchestra Musician Forum and the website www.polyphonic.org. Here the goal was to advance the personal and professional outlook of symphony orchestra musicians in North America.

As I look back, particularly over the past fifteen years, it is disappointing to see that despite these efforts, and those of others, like the Mellon and Knight Foundations, there has been little change or innovation in the way orchestra  organizations operate.  While the need for greater community engagement and social value has mounted, it is discouraging to see how little has changed. Orchestra organizations have done little to redefine the community services they should be providing and, thus, there has been little modification of the job descriptions of all employees, but especially those of musicians.  With a few exceptions, no significantly modified or truly innovative models of organizational structure and decision-making processes have emerged.  At the same time, there have been recurring examples of serious organizational dysfunction entailed by adhering to the “isomorphic institutional” [1] model employed in the orchestral world now for some 50 years.

As reiterated frequently in Harmony, the structure of the larger conventional symphony organization is implicitly unsound and ineffective, and leads to organizational dysfunction. Through natural bonding heightened by unionization, the ensemble of musicians— which is the very reason for the organization’s existence — is separated from and pitted economically and psychologically against governance — the management and board — and through them, against the organization’s audiences and contributors –and the local community at large. These fraught relationships, buttressed by traditional industrial management and board attitudes about governing and managing unionized enterprises, along with the intransigence of national and local union leadership, assures a fundamentally adversarial relationship and sows the seeds of permanent distrust. The “we and they” of the orchestral structure essentially undermines the development of a common vision and operations designed to achieve it. Collective bargaining agreements have become complex organizational straitjackets that preclude flexibility and responsiveness.

There are various stages in the lives of traditionally structured and operated symphony organizations.  For some, despite steady and relatively high cost inflation—even when coupled with a lower breadth of community service and value—managements and boards are able annually to coax higher ticket fees out of audiences and larger gifts from contributors.  Boosterism and generosity prevail, with perhaps subtle, growing concern and mounting resistance. This situation exists in the organizations in a number of major cities. These prestigious orchestras will likely move forward but with growing stress.  They already gobble up a major portion of the philanthropic dollars devoted to musical organizations in their communities, and thus have little chance for increasing “market share.”  Over time, audience and contributor fatigue will set in.  Poor general economic conditions and dips in or the lack of growth of endowment capital will accelerate this stress.  It is just a matter of time before this pattern of existence becomes broadly unsustainable.

In many smaller cities, these trends are accelerating, or are already at hand. The next season’s revenues are used to fund the last season’s deficit.  Reserves are drawn on and then exhausted. Angels may offer relief but only defer the inevitable.

In due course, there is or will be a relatively abrupt cessation of business, accompanied by conflict and accusations within the now defunct organization, and around the community.

Sometimes, a successor organization emerges. But deep scars exist all around.  Even so, in a triumph of hope over experience, the new entity will quite typically take on the same conventional organizational format as its predecessor, in part because there is no other model. These traditional structures are doomed to failure—the cycle will be repeated. Such a waste—such a terrible waste.

Certainly, there may be some organizations which, despite their traditional structure, have so far avoided serious conflict and dysfunction, and whose leaders are looking constructively forward.  These leaders may well wish authentically and fundamentally to change their institution’s dynamics, and have the will and courage to undertake the effort.  Unfortunately, these situations are rare and the odds of a successful intervention leading to a radically different organizational structure are poor.  For example, check out the favorable trends and positive outlook of the Philadelphia Orchestra as of early 2002, based on organizational development efforts in 2000-2001, as very accurately reported in Harmony #14. Compare this optimistic 2002 status with the organization’s more recent status.

Changing the culture within traditionally structured orchestral institutions on a sustainable basis is almost impossible. We need to devote our thinking and ingenuity to creating some larger scale musical organizations using fresh, new ideas and forms.

*************************

So now, let’s step away from all this history and pathology, take a pencil and a clean sheet of paper, and sketch out a new organizational model for the field.

Firstly, the notion of a “symphony orchestra organization” needs to be tossed out and replaced by the concept of a “musical arts and services organization.”  Such an entity would have a larger musician membership than a symphony orchestra, and its musicians would perform a wide range of classical and high-standard popular music. Among the activities would be symphony concerts performed in a central venue or venues. But more broadly and extensively, the organization would present a wide range of music in many smaller venues and settings throughout the community.  It would serve broad and diverse audiences, and such performances would be coupled and integrated with music education.  The reader will recognize this as the “community of musicians” concept put forth in 1987 by Ernest Fleischmann[2]

Ernest Fleischmann

and more recently endorsed and expanded by Bruce Coppock.

Secondly, in another major departure from past practice, these new organizations must be musician-governed and musician-driven.  By this, I mean the legal beneficial control of the organization through its organizing documents needs to rest with the musician membership. What’s more, the central board/executive committee functions, and particularly the artistic decision making (personnel and programming), need particularly to be led by musicians. [3]

These organizational concepts should be the foundational principles for those filling the voids created by unsuccessful traditional symphony orchestras.  There are a number of cities today that are ripe for such a new approach, and there will be more in coming months and years. But these cities will need a core group of musicians, supported and advised by a cadre of non-musician civic leaders, who together possess the imagination, will and courage to build a new flexible “network” organization valued by the community, gratifying to all constituencies, and capable of fulfilling the economic needs of musicians and staff.

In many large metropolitan areas, there may even be room for such an organization to develop and prosper as an alternative and supplement to the dominant symphony orchestra association.  Here again, a core group of musicians supported and advised by a group of community leaders will need to take the lead in galvanizing free lance musicians to participate in such an organization.

Symbolically, and practically, these organizations should be “musical arts societies”, as

Conductor Robert Shaw

Robert Shaw suggested — collaboratives in which all musicians and non-musicians, performers and audiences, join together in a covenant to provide and sustain high standard classical and popular musical and music educational services throughout the community.

In terms of legal format, these new organizations, under state law, should be either not-for-profit corporations or limited liability corporations. In either case, the organizing documents would provide for more than one class of members, with the musician member class having voting control. And in either case, the entity would obtain a 501 (c) (3) exemption in order to receive contributions which are tax deductible to donors.

The management and staff of such a new organization would have a structure and duties generally similar to that of any not-for-profit musical arts organization. However, given the breadth of musical performance activity envisioned, and the greater dynamism, flexibility and creativity needed, managers of these musician-driven musical arts organizations will need to develop high level skills in planning, logistics, and communications.

Although many musician members of such organizations might well be members of the AFM, there would be no need for collective bargaining agreements because the musicians will control the governance of these new organizations.   The musician members will have agreed in writing in by-laws or an operating agreement, and supplemental documents, how the enterprise is to be governed, managed, and operated, including compensation and work policies and conditions for all employees.  Any changes in such agreements would be voted on by the musicians and/or their elected representatives.  It is of questionable applicability and legality to propose to have a collective bargaining agreement cover a group of employees who together legally control and are responsible for “governing and managing” a corporation.

Some musical arts communities might consider and adopt multiple tiers of musician membership, following the experience and success of the London Symphony Orchestra.  In this arrangement, the level and nature of participation by each musician member would vary based on individual preference. There would be the flexibility to alter preferences and choices through annual personal employment contracts. Along with flexibility in work participation, there would be flexibility in compensation, depending on the nature and value of the work and the talents and experience of different employees.  Also, in such new organizations, sensible patterns of incentive compensation could be established.  All compensation policies would be developed in ways that flexibly serve the organization’s needs, as determined principally by the musicians themselves.

These new organizations will need to invest in personal and professional development of their members. On the musical front, the quality of individual and group musical performance will be primarily in the hands of musician colleagues; training in fair and compassionate evaluation processes will be needed. Musicians being periodically elected by their colleagues to fill overall governance and artistic decision-making roles — and their successors — will benefit from regular professional training in team building and team decision-making processes.

It would not be surprising that some new organizations develop primarily under the leadership and through the active participation of “younger-to-middle age” vs. “older” musicians.  Indeed, music school/conservatory leaders have recognized that members of the younger generation are highly tuned-in to societal change and community diversity. Trained in entrepreneurial skills and prepared to make musical careers outside traditional orchestra organizations, the students of today will most likely favor less hierarchical governing structures, and will exploit the enormous potential in electronic media.  Their achievements in developing smaller scale musical arts societies could be carried forward into large scale musician collaboratives.

A Far Cry

Some emerging musician-governed organizations, such as The Knights in New York, and A Far Cry in Boston, exhibit these potentials.  The philanthropic community will hopefully support these enterprising groups, as we are likely to see more and more of them come into existence.

To support and accelerate the development of new models of musician-governed arts organizations, it would be valuable to have a central advisory association. Such an association—which might be called The Association of Musician-Governed Musical Arts Organizations—could provide an exchange of “early best practices,” “experience-based insights,”or “lessons learned.” It could pair new groups with some of the existing symphonic organizations that already operate with some degree of musician governance

Memphis Symphony

(New Orleans, Colorado, Toledo, Memphis, and St. Paul come to mind.[4]) It could facilitate collaboration between fledgling groups and professional entrepreneurs. It might also research the experience of the many small chamber groups and chamber orchestras that are “self-governed,” to understand how their business models might be adapted to larger scale organizations.

In summary, we need to develop a new model for larger scale, musician-governed, diverse, and flexible musical arts and services societies. These entities would galvanize and liberate the creative potential of musician members, management and staff, and community participants.  They would better serve audiences, donors, and the community at large. And they would provide economic sustenance for the musicians, who would have the primary and controlling stake in the success of the organization.

###

---

[1] This is a phrase coined thirty years ago by DiMaggio and Powell to describe cultural organizations which adopt business practices not because they are efficient and effective, and suit the needs of the applicable constituencies and of tasks to be performed, but because they furnish legitimacy in the eyes of outside stakeholders and help to maintain the confidence of poorly-informed outside parties, despite being uncreative, non-innovative, and unresponsive to their environment.

[2] It might be noted that Fleischmann’s 1987 call for a “community” or “golden pond” of musicians was preceded as early as 1969 by Pierre Boulez who said that musical institutions suffered from a “sterile standardization” and should be reorganized or replaced by “polymorphous groups” in a “consortium of players” or a “cooperative of performers that could be drawn on for ad hoc purposes.”.   Further, in 1977, Robert Shaw put forth his ideas, held for many years, that orchestra organizations should be replaced by a “Society of Musical Arts” which “would embrace all musical activities and all areas of performances” and might have two hundred or more musician members. (http://www.polyphonic.org/harmony.php?id=2).

[3] In a recent article in Symphony (Summer 2001), Robert Levine states that a great deal of time and money has been spent discussing the “the formal role of musicians in governance” but that none of that discussion “has changed, can change, or will change the basic structure of American orchestras (as) “non-profit entities governed by volunteer community trustees” and this is a “reality” which must be faced.  As can be seen, I totally disagree with that assumption.  There is absolutely no reason why musical arts organizations can’t be musician governed.

[4] Further study might also be made of the Berlin and London Symphony organizations as reported in Harmony #9 and #13, or of the Louisiana Philharmonic, also reported in Harmony #9.