Kathy Saltzman Romey is the conductor of the Women's Chorus (as well as the Grammy-nominated Minnesota Chorale) and her interpretation was unlike anything I think I've heard in a long time with regards to that piece. She stretched the tempi out and slowed the pace way down here and there and, in one case, eased into a faster tempo by way of a stringendo that reminded me of a locomotive slowly starting up. Of course none of this was in the score, but that didn't stop the choir from advocating her vision of the work at all. It's one of those rare moments where the conductor finds things to do with a piece that I didn't think were there. Usually ensembles call me in to shed light on what they’re working on. It almost never works in reverse. It was such a pleasure to "re-discover" that piece as I hadn't heard it live since 2002.
But, with regards to Dr. Romey's interpretation, I also think tempos have to be flexible. Experiences like this sometimes make me wonder if other composers are this non-proprietary about their pieces. Are there others out there who throw tantrums about their metronome markings or is that the exception to the proverbial rule?
For my part I think I have a pretty good understanding that a marking I've written isn't necessarily the last word on my piece as long as the choir sounds like they're making it work. I've always thought there's a weird balance that singers have to strike between tempos and the different articulations they have to use in order to make what they're singing sound good. That balance can come into play because of a variety of reasons (conductor preference, size of the ensemble or the reverb in the performance space are just a few that come to mind) but a piece sometimes lives or dies by it.
I faced an extreme example of this back in 2003 when the US Air Force Singing Sergeants gave the premiere of "Musica animam tangens" at the ACDA national convention in New York City. They took the main part of the piece in what felt like an incredibly fast 2 (compared to the relatively slow tempo I had written) simply because they're a smaller choir (20 at the most, I think) and the length of the phrases at the written tempo would have sounded anemic. At the time I was at a loss as to what to do until I just settled down a bit and actually started to hear what they were doing with it (which was awesome).
But what if a conductor isn't that smart or a choir isn't good enough to make the changeover? I have a friend whose piece was recorded by a professional choir (which shall remain nameless) and the conductor took the tempo faster than what she had written. However, he had the choir sing the piece as if it was 10-15 beats slower and the imbalance between the tempo and the articulations made it sound like it was the composer's fault that the piece was so uninteresting. How could she possibly have fixed that in the score?
And that just brings us back to indicating the tempo with a metronome marking and hoping for the best. Or maybe I should just put an asterisk next to it that says something like:
“This is sort of how fast I want you to perform it but you can go slower or faster if you need to. Just make it sound good so I don’t look like an idiot if I’m there and I have to stand up in front of an audience.”There’s nothing worse than having to be recognized as the composer of a piece immediately after it receives a horrible performance. I like to think that the audience is sympathetic towards me in those cases rather than caustic...but I’ve also sat in that audience and watched other composers stand up and face that exact situation and probably not been on my best behavior.
Yeah, so I guess it’s an endless cycle. But food for thought nonetheless and I suppose the end result is this:
“I love smart conductors”
And--just because this has been an incredibly wonky blog post--I give you Serious Cat
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