Fergus Macleod

Something to be proud of

2010-08-16T03:24:00.000-07:00

With Mervyn King telling us all that choppy times are ahead, and news of arts council cuts and the scrapping of the film council along with the prospect of cutting funding to the bbc and the possibility of strikes affecting the bbc proms it is easy to be down hearted about the state of the arts in the UK, and more specifically ‘classical music’.

With the prospect of spending two years in Zurich, friends and relatives have been asking how much better is the music in Europe and for some reason why is Germany SO much better at it than we are and why has it produced so many more and better musicians? They aren’t in the music business and aren’t avid followers of the ups and downs and comings and goings of the classical music business, but my heart always sinks and then I get excited.

I get excited as I can tell them just how good we have it. Yes, this is largely down to the people in the business, in fact let’s rephrase that it is basically all down to the people that day to day strive to produce world beating performances and look to somehow scrape the funding together, rather than the powers that be that hide in the big buildings on the north banks of the Thames. Every time I have answered the question, my answer has been longer as I have thought of more and more which we do so well. I have little, if nothing to do with 99.99 % of what happens but I am still immensely proud of the fact that there is little that anywhere can do better. I thought it was about time someone sang the praises of it all. SO here we go!

I am sure I have left out most of what goes on and I am shouting only about the big names but feel free to have your own little plug / shout-out below!

Starting from the bottom up. Ok, so education. Well in schools we have problems, funding for the arts always plays second fiddle to sport (it’s good for you don’t you know), school dinners and literacy. Maybe it should and maybe it shouldn’t but the sad fact of the matter is we need to do more. However, outside of that, nationally it all starts with the National Children’s Orchestra. The amount of friends that have been touched by such a great organisation, founded by the immortal Vivienne Price, is countless. I think what is more important (in a way) is the amount of people I know who played in NCO who have chosen not to become a professional musician, but who will never loose there love of music mainly through the start the NCO gave them. Who can forget the murder mysteries and playing Peterloo! Then there are all the other organistaions – Pro Corda, Music House, National Children’s Choir, National Children’s Orchestra of Scotland, NYOS, NYCCO and NYWE and I could go on and on. I suppose on the ladder of progression in between NYO and NCO should go the National Youth Chamber Orchestra. It might have changed its name more times than hot dinners have been served at Queenswood School, however it is a real gem. An orchestra of about 50 young musicians working without a conductor and lead under the oh so watchful eye of Chris Hirons. It is an example of what our young musicians can achieve. The wonders that have been discovered there: from an appreciation of just how hard the string parts in the scherzo from Mendelssohn’s Midsummer Night’s Dream to the joys of Ravel’s Tombeau de Couperin and Respighi’s The Birds.

Then comes something that everyone should experience in some form or another. The rumours are true, it is sacred and never mind whatever Dan Brown says, it is where the Holy Grail resides (certainly of the UK music world anyway), and that is the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. Speaking personally it was and I am sure it will be, the most important part of my musical education. Not only was I able to play such varied and large repertoire, but also being able to work with some of the greatest conductors alive (and sadly no longer – Britten’s War Requiem with Richard Hicox comes to mind) as well as seriously gifted ‘Profs’ and all the contemporaries that experience it with you, who you continue bumping into whichever concert hall in the UK you go to. That is the obvious side of the NYO, which is so important, but there is also so much more it does. Working with musicians outside of traditional Classical Music such as Davod Azad. They taught me so much more about what music is really about. It’s fantastic to see that side of the NYO flourishing at the moment. Making our young musicians think outside of the box will only seriously improve what is already inside the box! To hear that the NYO has been getting young children to sit in amongst the orchestra was really fantastic. It is something that can be really life changing. It is something that other orchestras, such as the London Chamber Orchestra are having success with as part of their project in conjunction with Barnados. Sitting in my first full NYO rehearsal, reading Shostakovich’s 5^th Symphony conducted by Tadaaki Otaka was what made me want to become a conductor. All these activities define NYO as one of the great musical institutions of the UK. However, what makes it world beating is the quality of its concerts. When I don my objective hat, it is the best youth orchestra in the world – Simon Bolivar Youth Orchestra can eat their hats and multi coloured jackets!

I have already taken up too much space with the eulogy about out the ladder of UK youth orchestras that exist and I have not even mentioned things such as London Msuci Masters makers, Sistema Scotland all the county youth orchestras, bands and groups. One thing we can not forget is the part our professional orchestras play in education. It is crucial. I believe that we are world leaders and beaters in this respect. From, LSO Discovery to the BCMG’s zig zag ensemble and everything in between. So much more than a ‘children’s concert’. This is something to be proud of and trust me, those in Europe and America are jealous. I think this is a topic I might have to return to…(don’t groan!). I haven’t even mentioned the fact that London has 4 major conservatoires for music, of which at least two are world leaders.

So I have mentioned our professional groups, but let’s just think a little more about them. London : LSO, LPO, Philharmonia, BBC SO, RPO – five world class symphony orchestras in one city. ENO and Royal Opera House, Royal Ballet and English National Ballet, English Touring Opera, Sadlers Wells – and that doesn’t even scrape the surface of the one off productions, summer opera or touring productions that come out of the great metropolis. What about the smaller ensembles, period bands such as the OAE, modern groups such as the London Sinfonietta, or chamber orchestras such as the London Chamber Orchestra. That is just London and I know most of you will be able quickly reel off another 5 or 10 organisations which are on the tip of you tongue. Then, shock horror, if we dare to peak outside the M25 – the CBSO, Halle, RLPO, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, if we dare to inch outside of England and find the RSNO, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, National Orchestra of Wales, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Britten Sinfonia, the Ulster Orchestra and then the opera – Glyndebourne, WNO, Opera North, Scottish Opera. Oh and then I say to myself but I must say something about the best 2 international festivals in the world (BBC Proms and Edinburgh International Festival), and oh dear, I haven’t even mentioned any people – soloists, conductors, singers who call England home, or chamber music or concert halls or the other festivals and the community choirs and orchestras.

The list has gone on and on and I really could double all of that. However, we need to remember that these organisations aren’t just any old folk. They are among the best in the world. I don’t really care what lists made by organisations say, catch any of them and they will seriously impress.

It is so easy to fling superlatives around without any sense of proportion, however, it is so easy to take things for granted and that is when things suffer. To look abroad and wish that we had this, that, and something else is to really forget what is on our doorstep. We have the best, let’s not forget. People should know.

Experience is the biggest teacher

2010-03-18T02:36:00.000-07:00

I apologise for my normally over excited titles to these posts. I could go with Blog 1, 2, 3 etc. but that's just a cop out - so I am sticking with the slightly out there titles!

A week and a half ago I was down in London working with players from the London Chamber Orchestra and six composers as well as the two composer mentors, Diana Burrell and Steve Potter. We spent a day (as part of the East Festival) going through the works of James Luff, Chris Garrard, Solfa Carlile, David Futers, Anna Menzies and Tristan Rhys Williams. All of the works were inspired by architecture.

It reminded me yet again just how important experience is. The UK needs to give as many opportunities to its younger generations as its the best way to grow. Every time I come away from doing a concert or working with players I realise how much I still have to learn, how far (or not far!) I have come, and how much I have learned in those few hours I have been conducting, compared to the hours spent studying, watching, listening and reading.

It was of course fantastic for the composers and myself to work with such great musicians, and it had a big impact. However, I think it was just being able to hear their ideas being realised probably taught them more than anything - helped of course by the players realising them so well.

If you want to catch the LCO in concert - they are playing on March 24th (next Wednesday) at St John's Smith Square:

LCO Concert - Brahms, Glass, Chopin - March 24th

And come and hear the compositions in a mini concert on 26th May also at St John's Smith Square:

Six new works by young composers played by LCO musicians

New Music - a catching, cumulative disease?

2010-03-15T03:25:00.000-07:00

Recently there have been two internet articles that have taken my attention about New Music and the problems of it being 'understood'.

Telegraph

New Music Box

It centers around the recently published book by Philip Ball - 'The Music Instinct' . Ashamedly I have not read it (its on a quite long to-do list!) Philip Ball supposedly argues, or provides support to the idea that a brain will comprehend the music of Bach, Mozart or Beethoven more effectively than that of Webern, Schoenberg or a post-tonal composer. The aforementioned composers present logical patterns and progression within their music that are easier for our brains to decipher and follow. Thankfully, Ball does say 'it would be wrong to dismiss such music as a racket'. So the discussion arising from the book is one that revolves around readily perceptible patterns, cultural conditioning and what is 'natural'. The Telegraph says it shows why joe-blogs cant understand the 'subtleties of the chaotic sounding compositions', and on the 'natural' front David Huron, an expert on music cognition from Ohio State University, says that 'predicting what happens next has obvious survival value' and that post-tonal music has 'no pleasure from accurate prediction'. Dr Timothy Jones of the Royal Academy of Music says that with atonal music 'certain people can learn to appreciate it'.

So what do I think: well the snippets taken out of context do disservice to the Telegraph article, which is probably on a more middling ground than I give it credit for. One of the things people say to me at the end of a new music concert, or 'non new music' friends who are talking about new music - is that they just don't understand it. I think comprehension is an important factor in this. But there are two main areas.

Firstly, I don't 'understand' new music it certainly doesn't make sense to me, but I am not sure much music does. That isn't to say it doesn't culture within me every feeling under the sun. For me listening and appreciating music is not about understanding it, it is about what it makes me feel and the better a piece is the more it makes me feel. This then leads on to my second area.

Confusion seems to cloud some peoples perception of new music. This, I think might be not only to do with the atonal aspect of the work but also due to the approach we take to listening. I think as a race we can try to hard. We live in a world where we continuously work at full tilt and must apply ourselves to everything we do. In terms of cultural enjoyment, we need to understand a film or play's plot, see what a picture is and what it stands for and be able to hum the latest tune.

I didn't 'understand' Rothko's art at all until about four years ago when I did an improvised performance in the Rothko room at the Tate Modern with the National Youth Orchestra. During this improvisation (which I wasn't keen on at the time by the way), I felt a real power coming from the art on the walls (permission to vomit). I think the music helped, but I realised I was looking at the pictures and not really trying to understand them and they just seemed to draw me in. I didn't try, I just let it happen (so to speak). I found it a really difficult thing to do, but it is now something I try and do with all things that I know there is no way I will be able to 'understand' on first hearing or seeing.

New music should be played more than once - or played before and after and in the interval of a concert to help our little grey cells - I find atonal music is a catching, cumulative 'disease'. You have the initial feeling, and then on second, third, fourth hearing it gets better and better (if I like it...) as I suppose I can predict what is coming and take satisfaction in waiting and and then my desire to hear point X in a work is satiated!

So try an experiment - take some Xenakis and don't 'do' just listen and 'feel'!

Step 2: listen to it once each day for a week and see how you feel at the end of the week as opposed to the beginning. Answers on the back of a postcard.

P.S effects are much better in a concert.

The Ross is Noise - concert dress, applause and ranting

2010-03-11T02:11:00.000-08:00

This Monday Alex Ross gave the annual RPS lecture at the Wigmore Hall, entitled, 'Hold Your Applause: Inventing and Reinventing the Classical Concert'. The text to the talk is available here from the RPS website:

Hold Your Applaus e: Inventing and Reinventing the Classical Concert

Then on Tuesday Charlotte Higgins of the Guardian released a rumor about the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain allowing it's members to wear anything black for the concerts with the only restrictions being "no strapless, backless, leather or PVC":

"No strapless, backless, leather or PVC"

Ross seemed to concentrate mostly on the whole 'problem' of when to applaud and then more generally focus on broadly approaching the concert experience. For me, the best line is this:

'the radically different personalities of our composers, from Hildegard of Bingen to Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead, demand radically different approaches. The music is bigger than any kind of space we may design for it. '

What do I think of the concert experience? Well firstly it is a performance of a creation. Secondly, people normally have paid more than a cinema ticket to attend, sometimes much more. Thirdly the concert is presented for the audience. When I conduct, I have three major aims: 1. Honour the composer 2. Respect the audience and give them the best experience possible 3. Ensure the orchestra 'enjoy' the experience. I could and probably should add lots of sub-clauses to that statement but I am going to avoid the temptation. Anything that can be done to enhance those 3 points should be done.

Applause: In my perfect 'dream' performance of Tchaikovsky's 6th Symphony (Pathétique) the last movement would always erupt out out of raucous applause for the 3rd movement. It is as if Tchaikovsky wants all to seem perfect and ecstatic but then he surges from the grave, ripping open his shirt, baring his chest and saying 'NO - this is what I really feel'. The best experience is one that is natural - thus the no-clapping dictat enforces a sense of unnatural parameters on the given situation. People should clap when they want. Two really toe curling experiences in relation to audience behavior have happened while I have been at concerts at the Royal Festival Hall. The first was on the re-opening night, Jurowski had just started the Firebird Suite, and from the middle of the stalls came the electronic sounds of Mozart's Symphony No. 40. Jurowski turned around, scowled and restarted the piece. True, they should have turned it off, but it didn't warrant the response it got. He should have stopped and re-started with no glare. The second situation was recently when I was at Vanska's incredible LPO concert of 4th and 5th Sibelius symphonies. There was a lady two rows in front of me, who every time the man sitting in front of me turned the page of his program or moved the slightest inch she turned around in utter disgust. She made quite a lot of noise in the process, caused some amusement from my row and much worse by her actions distracted us all from the music, which is why we were there!

More focused lighting and a darker auditorium I think would help. However, the actual design of the auditorium is so important. I always feel I can relax at Symphony Hall in Birmingham, but not so at the Royal Festival Hall - non backbreaking chairs might help. I am not sold in bringing alcohol into the auditorium, but I do think that no programs are great - sometimes. I love the idea of the Night Shift, Club Karabits (at Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra) and Tonhalle Late:

Club Karabits Tonhalle Late Night Shift

However, the concert experience of overture, concerto and symphony really has its place as well. I am wary of using technology for the sake of being novel, but you don't know until you try. Its easy to add things on and say 'isn't this exciting' but the music must always be at the centre of everything you do - call me conventional, but isn't that the point? Talking is good, but sometimes how about playing it, talking, playing it again later on.

Now, concert dress. BBC Symphony Orchestra have their black suits, shirts and ties, which I think is pretty rubbish. There is your standard tails outfit and also all black open neck - the ladies have the 'luxury' of wearing smart all black. I love the last night of the proms dresses on the ladies in the orchestra but I wouldn't want it every day. Then there is the crazy dress used at one time by the new music ensemble bit20... (it is black but with rubber stamped patterns on!!)

The rumor of the NYO adopting a casual approach to concert dress, I find worrying on several levels. I am sure it is suppose to relax and open up the experience, allowing the music to be the main focus and get away from 'the old prim uniform'. Come on: black shirt, black trousers and the legendary NYO badge is not really prim - nor old - it was introduced about 4 years ago following on from the white shirt / red tie combo, that was pretty horrific and 'school-ified'. People have paid to come to a concert and they expect a level of professionalism. I hope most of the players go with a respectful approach. It could be interesting, but it could end up with a load of teenagers on stage looking scruffy, hair all over the place, and cheapen the whole effect. Also more importantly putting on your concert clothes puts you in a frame of mind, focuses your attitude and prepares you for what you are going to do. Also why black - is it moody? I love the NYO, not only because it gave me the best musical education/experience of my life but also because it performs great music really well. It gets on with the job and you can tell that what really matters is the music.

As a conductor I tend to wear black evening trousers and a chinese come arab shirt thing with no buttons and a collar, oh and red socks. However, when I conducted the Tokyo Phil in Japan I wished I had been wearing tails like them - some of the looks I received as I was coming out of the dressing room were quite telling!

Whatever happens to the concert approach there needs to be respect for what is being performed and who you are performing to and with. There is no quick fix and no right answer - each performance, piece, audience and event is different. What must never be forgotten is that the music you are performing is the most important thing.

Pushing things forward and helping along the way

2010-03-03T12:48:00.001-08:00

So this Saturday I am conducting players from the London Chamber Orchestra in a composition workshop. We have chosen six pieces and each will be work-shopped by the players, Diana Burrell, Steve Potter and myself - as well as recorded filmed and then reperformed on May 26th at St John's Smith Square.

Having done a similar thing with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra and try to encourage this sort of process with new pieces played by Cambridge University's New Music Ensemble, it is a real pleasure (and I am very excited - I have a list of the players, and trust me I felt like a boy who had been given a new toy!) to be working with the LCO.

The workshop is part of a larger process that started in November with a day of talks around the idea of architecture in music, giving the composers 'food for thought'. The composers then went away and composed a work based on the day and submitted them for selection - we chose six and that's the stage we are at now.

Waiting to hear what a work will actually sound like, I find really unnerving, but also really exciting (I know I have already used that word...). It challenges my ear. Does the piece really sound how I hear it from the paper? It's also as if you are brining something into the world. OK so that is a bit 'arty farty' but it is true. It is like going to see a new work of art you have been reading about in the paper for a few weeks or an opera you have read reviews of. It is about bringing the 'other' or 'removed' into reality.

One of the best things about these types of workshops is the players get feedback from really seasoned (and good!) professionals. It is fine for another composer, teacher or conductor to tell you this or that about your work but when it comes from a player it seems to have more of an effect. If a teacher tells you, 'such and such' is impossible to play then you can secretly tell yourself that they are talking rubbish. But, if the clarinetist of the LCO and London Sinfonietta tells you it can't be played... the likelihood is that unless you get Kari Kriikku to practice it for a year it can't be done. Secretly I love it because it is the closest I get to actually composing - maybe I can suggest one or two things that will make a difference!

So come and listen to the day in conjunction with the East Festival in London:

http://www.lco.co.uk/RVE4c131004979e4324ac5ba14fdc1e09f1,,.aspx

Amateur Music - love in a cold climate

2010-03-01T01:51:00.000-08:00

I have just returned from conducting an 'amateur wind band' - in ranks of musical snobbery, that must lay pretty low? There are the big symphony orchestras - the corner stone of the musical world, then there are the refined chamber orchestras who strive for a purer cause, then the period bands who like to do things differently and the contemporary ensembles are well, just, edgy. Way below that sit those ensembles who are amateur, and an amateur wind band - shock horror.

Just for those who might be slightly worried that I have gone insane, I don't believe in anyway what I have written above is true. However, a complete cynic, and moron, could interpret the musical hierarchy as such.

As a young conductor being able to work with such an ensemble is a complete gift. I tend to find that the more uncomfortable the situation is, the more I learn. That is not to say the group made me feel uncomfortable - quite the opposite. They are great. However, I am string player by training - and things you blow down to make a noise tend to unsettle me. Then there are all those instruments that you wouldn't see in a Beethoven symphony: baritone sax, euphonium, cornets and so on. Also where are the strings - my safety blanket! I am flanked on either side by flutes, oboes and clarinets!! Then there is the repertoire and compositional style, predominated by arrangements, homophonic writing and tonality. It is a completely different style to what I normally work with. It forces you to think differently, about how to make something work as an entity. But then you have the added factor of the players being amateurs.

Amateur - from the Latin amator - 'lover' via French and Italian. A person who engages in a pursuit as a pastime rather than a profession. However, it is the derogatory meaning that I believe does amateur music such harm: a person who does something unskillfully. I sometimes get the feeling it is OK to do it in your own home, but not in public thank you.

The 'factor' of the players being amateur is not a negative. However, one immediately thinks, can I be as critical and as demanding? The answer is of course yes. But, one has to remember that these players are here to enjoy what they are doing. But shouldn't that be what professional players are there for or putting it another way or - surely they love music as well? I think I was more concerned about the players enjoying themselves, however, as I write I think that that is probably untrue. I was just thinking how I could possibly achieve the best result in a different way.

Basically it has opened up a massive hornets nest for me. But I think actually nothing really is different. What is fantastic is that people love music, they are prepared to come out on a Sunday, rehearse and give a concert and that music is not about the professional world, but those who think about music everyday. From waking up to BBC Radio 2, to having a shower to Classic FM to singing some Mozart as you walk out of the tube, playing some quartets with friends and wine and going to bed thinking about the opening of Brahms 1 (symphony) - all that heat - it 'knackers' me out.

I had a fantastic time with the City of London Symphonic Winds and I learnt lots and the chance to think about masses. But things do make you wonder - which is good.

On a sunny morning like today, I think how lucky I am to be able to do something that I love.

Prokofiev - the precocious little ****

2010-02-15T02:12:00.000-08:00

I tend to have one music book on the 'go'. The last one to be finished was 'How equal temperament ruined harmony'. A great book you should read it.

For my next book I have returned to a book I lost in the bowels of the RCM halfway through reading it - Prokofiev's Diaries (1907-1914) translated by Anthony Phillips. I am always hooked by (good!) books about composers. Some suggestions:

Prokofiev Diaries - translated by Anthony Philips:

http://bit.ly/domZXp

Messiaen - Hill and Simeone

http://bit.ly/9JIvNF

Stravinsky - Walsh

http://bit.ly/cfNcpL

The diaries of Prokofiev have changed how I think about his music. I have to admit I have always sat on the Shostakovich side of the fence when it comes to 'Soviet' music. However, young Sergey is so witty, shallow, needy and outrageously flirtatious that I think I am now seeing a different side to his early compositions (especially his first two piano concerti). I think two things have really shone out in the first book, so far: His absolute need for a very close male companion (a complete display of platonic love) and also his infatuation at winding up the female race!

It's not just his character that is displayed but also the life of the conservatoire and more interestingly the internal wrangling of society and the musical world in Russia.

He has given me a great idea for a programme - directly lifted from one he went to in February 1913: Rachmaninov's Isle of the Dead and Second Piano Concerto, followed by Scriabin's Extase. Scriabin's Poem of Exstasy was played tonnes in St Petersburg!!

On hearing Stravinsky's Infernal Dance from the Firebird he remarks: 'simply excellent' and hearing Petroushka in Paris : the staging sent him into 'ecstasies as did the orchestration and the wit constantly displayed...so engaging it was...the music...there is certainy something not real about it'. Its interesting to think that the Ballet Russe put on Petroushka followed by Daphnis - again I think a really exciting programme highlighting the amazing colour in Stravinsky's work, although I think I would put the works the other way around.

One of my favourite stories he recounts is a message he sent to a girl, Ariadna, after hearing she didn't play particularly well in an exam, as she was 'suffering from anaemia (?!)' :

'But I was then struck but a brilliant notion, which we spent the rest of the day executing.

From the photograph of our group we cut out Radochka's impassioned physigonomy and stuck

it onto the body of another, fatter girl, then attached the whole thing to a silhouette of a grand

piano I cut out of cardboard. It worked splendidly, and resulted in a well-upholstered Radochka

sitting convincingly at a piano. Lavrov we cut out complete from the same group photo, and

Nikolayev (who had been Niolskaya's examiner) from another group we acquired Kaspari

especially for the purpose. The whole ensemble was then pasted on to dark green card, above

this was written: 'Professor (to examiner) - Oh, my dear colleague, please do have pity, give

her a 5! After all, she suffers from anaemia...See how thin she is...(whispering in his ear) and how

pretty! (Aloud) When her health permits she must walk along Morskaya and enjoy herself in all kinds

of distractions and tire herself out at the piano, the cause of her disgraceful performance!'

Below, written in Max's hand: 'But the incorruptible Examiner disdains to succumb either to these

honeyed words or to the feminine wiles, and with iron justice awards a mark not quite equivalent

to 5+'

I suggest you read it - WARNING - it makes you think Prokofiev is a precocious little **** ...

Sibelius – A poor mans Mahler?

2010-02-10T01:51:00.001-08:00

As I was walking the dog this frosty morning, I decided just how good the LPO sounded with Vanska the other week. The string intensity was incredible – the beginning of the 4^th Symphony was searing. You can see why the Vienna Phil gave up with it after initial rehearsals! But it got me thinking.

Sibelius 5 (1915) - based on the interval of the 5^th, swans flying etc. and then Bruckner 4 (1874) and Bruckner 3 (1873) both obsessed with intervallic dominance in its thematic material…

It’s a comparison I had never thought of before – probably due to my ignorance. I then thought about the string writing, use of the horns and I got this feeling that maybe I was thinking about Bruckner in the wrong way.

I have recently started to ‘get’ Bruckner, or so I thought. I have to admit that I use to always think of him as a poor man’s Mahler, like Nielsen a poor man’s Sibelius. I am now convinced that’s totally wrong. There are obviously similarities but it’s like saying Mahler is a poor man’s Strauss. Bruckner recently, I have been thinking is so academic (in a good way), but so rustic – thinking of the 2^nd subject in Bruckner 4 1^st movement – sing ‘on a walk in the country, on a walk in the country’ to the second subject and you will see what I mean. There is this amazing freedom, created out of an almost obsessive approach to construction. I suppose it is slightly how I feel about Dvorak 6 Symphony – possibly one of the most neglected masterworks of the symphonic repertoire.

I was so surprised when I first heard Bruckner’s slow movement from his 3^rd Symphony, it sounded like a premonition of Elgar. The string writing was clear of tremolo and there was this rounded nature and serious intensity. This tremolo business - it plagues string players in Bruckner, how to do it, how to survive it! I like David Halen’s (leader of St Louis Symphony approach) – many different speeds of tremolo create a powerful fuzziness! It reminded me of Sibelius’s approach in his symphonies (although not quite such an obsessive approach) and also the opening of his orchestral song Luonnotar.

What do all these random musings mean? No, Sibelius is by no means a poor man’s Mahler. However, it has made me think more romantically about Bruckner, less about the ‘tunes’ in Sibelius and more the orchestral atmosphere he is trying to create and thirdly that Mahler is so different to Bruckner.

Nielsen is still…yawn!

Rattle's Brahms, Prokofiev and Katherine Jenkins - a merry mix

2009-10-04T02:57:00.000-07:00

THIS WAS WRITTEN ON THE 30th OF DECEMBER 2010

I have found this blog title and thought it a good one to start the penultimate blog of 2009. At the moment people are busy shopping in the sales - have I been - no. Christmas is over, and yes I did remember to put the baby in the nativity on christmas day - must be a first. If I see another top ten list of 2009 or another ultimate review of the decade....that was the first decade of the 2000's don't you know, then yes I might just burn the Daily Mail.

I have had an amazing autumn, working with ETO and NMECU and planning in all the hours God sends. I have also been fortunate enough to realise just how good the Halle and CBSO are, and how lucky we are to have had the wisdom of Mark Elder and now the enthusiasm of Andris Nelsons. The Midlands are the new London for the next decade, you heard it first, or maybe I read it in Metro...

Rattle's Brahms - his first is the worst, second not the best but actually I prefer it to the Karajan and Berlin Phil or Barenboim and Chicago. It seems to shed a dead weight. That doesn't mean he takes things at rip-roaring speed. I think Rattle is seeing Brahms not as this heavy bearded, anti-Wagner staunch luddite, but someone searching for innovation. Brahms is a genius. He redefines the use of upbeats and meter and purifies and enhances what has been before. He was right when he said no one can better Beethoven but they can certainly join him. I think the 2010's are going to years of better Brahms, so there.

As for what else happens in the 2010's: Katherine Jenkins should sing her first opera. Yes I know she isn't a proper opera singer, but what is proper anyway, and she has made the mistake of going for lessons with Domingo, who himself has only just realised that he has been "cross-dressing" all his life and he is actually a baritone, not a tenor. However, I have faith.

P.S Yes my Christmas presents were nice, no you cant have any, and no I haven't written my thank you letters.

ETO HANDELfest – Part the first:

2009-09-28T14:31:00.000-07:00

OK - so - two weeks in I have photocopied a mass of music equal to the weight of a small village, rubbed out many markings, put in lots of bowings and met loads of fantastic singers. Handel holds a special place for me, not only as I studied it in detail at Cambridge, but also because the first opera I conducted was Handel’s Serse (Xerxes). He wastes nothing, everything is so clean and clear its almost a meditative experience (almost!!). Lucky that it is, as running back and forth from 3 Mills studios in Bromley by Bow (ETO rehearsal venue) to Clerkenwell (ETO offices) normally with music etc. is not! The offices are a small but perfectly formed powerhouse of activity. All the shows look and sound great. I think revivals are exceedingly difficult to pull off convincingly but with different singers in many cases and different conductors and directors, a real freshness is starting to be obtained. I really admire the conductors taking on tempi alien to their feelings and thoughts, I am not sure I would be able to do it with such discretion – but they certainly are creating a convincing product. The arrival of first orchestral rehearsals last week brought real excitement to the rehearsals and we launched ourselves into a headlong debate about what temperament to use: Young or Velotti!! We settled on Young as it was something different but brings a vitality to flat keys, although we have now decided that Velotti is a better path to go down as it is much more familiar and the G and D sharps were starting to cause a few winces among all concerned…

Zinman and Aspen reflection...

2009-09-13T03:59:00.000-07:00

Having now been back from Aspen for a month, the three months I spent there are starting to merge into a slightly more amorphous collection of memories, ideas and thoughts. One thing is for certain Aspen is a very special place. It certainly developed how I think about music and conducting and I might even go as far as saying that to a certain extent it changed how I think about music. While I have been in the NYO and read about orchestras such as Barenboim’s West Eastern Divan orchestra, I had never truly felt that the music experience could be truly unifying. I had hoped, but not felt, and this is not to say that I didn’t wholeheartedly believe that music is the greatest form of worldwide communication (not that I am biased at all of course). Partly as a sceptic of most things and also as someone who must ‘see’ to believe, in most cases, I had not experienced music bringing so many people together. I am not being specifically clear in what I am saying, maybe because I am still not completely sure what I experienced. It wasn’t just the musicians on stage, or the 700 musicians at the festival - it was also the conductors, managers, technicians, librarians and most importantly the audience and the local community. From the bus drivers to the shop owners, to the local residents and waiters, I felt not only that everyone was immensely proud of what a small (albeit exceptionally rich!) town was available to achieve, but also that it brought everyone closer together and all seemed to benefit from it. I am rambling but never mind. It was powerful and good.

Hearing Zinman at the proms when I came back with his own group, the Zurich Tonhalle, was really special. You don’t go to a Zinman concert to for bravado and swashbuckling fireworks. What is produced is perfection of a different kind, something that I think is rare in the musical world. Balance is perfect, and the sound is embracing. It does not make your heart beat heavily against the wall of your rib cage, but it really does make it race. You come away from the concert not high on adrenaline, but as if you have been given a great big hug. It is satisfying in a very different manner.

I think it is this type of satisfaction that needs to be thought about more in today’s age. As a musician, it is fantastic to see the likes of Dudamel and Petrenko firing up our orchestras. But while quick fix exhilaration may stay with you for a week or two, somehow I find the satisfaction that the Zinman prom, while not immediately as satisfying and enlivening stays with you for longer. There is definitely room for both and more, but it is a satisfaction that is not valued maybe as much as is it should be. Maybe I have this perspective as I find the fire easier to conjure than the wisdom!

Aspen over - now for 5 Handel Operas

2009-08-24T16:14:00.000-07:00

So its been just over a month since I last updated things on here. Well once again I am sitting in Denver airport waiting for a flight, this time to LHR - Denver hub B must be one of the longest uninterrupted corridors anywhere, it really goes on for ever. I would get some exercise and walk the entire thing if it wasn't for the fact that I am having to lug around both my violin in its tank like (but fantastic) Gorge case and my laptop bag which at the moment has the complete Tchaik and Beethoven 8 and Schubert 8 symphonies in it! Maybe something with wheels should be my next purchase.

The second half of Aspen was as amazing as the first, but slightly more tiring. I did a Handel opera scenes master class on Semele with the fantastic Nicholas Kraemer, conducted Elgar's Pomp 5 and much more. It amazed me to learn that in America they use Pomp and Circumstance March 1 for their Graduations. Oh how I would wish to be there and burst into Land of Hope and glory in the trio section. Not many knew that there were words to half of it and they were a little disheartened to find out that they were about the "Mother of the free"!

I am not sure if I will really realise just how much I have learnt from the whole experience until well into next year. However, already, the past two months have re-instilled in me the fact that one can do so much and yet appear to show so little. Both Zinman and Boulez are very different to the conductor I am trying and aspire to be, yet they are both masters of what they do. What is clear in both of their 'on podium' actions is that they have a real grounding, rhythm and control in everything they do, yet do it in the most concise and refined manner conceivable.

Zinman is very concerned with letting the orchestra play and creating an environment in which they can achieve this. The two months also made me realise that however good a musician one is if your beat is not clear then so much less is achieved while up there in front of the orchestra. It's an obvious statement to make but it's something that far too many conductors forget. When I think about the conductors who I have worked under and those who I place in the top rank (for me it only numbers a few...) what tends to separate the great from the truly masterful is whether or not you have to try to understand what they are doing. With Zinman one simply feels so safe in 'his hands', so to speak, that you really want to play and also feel that you can concentrate on making a great sound and he will sort everything else out.

Being at Aspen really made think hard about the state of modern music in programming and the role it plays in the USA. I heard a great Symphony by Harbison and an incredible arrangement of Schubert songs by Golijov (look out for them at the proms this Saturday). But I also heard a truly awful double violin concerto by Tsontakis, I think made much worse by those who were playing it (I must actually look into his music more), and a suite from Lieberson's Ashok's Dream which was such a sad advertisement for new music - nothing happened for 30 minutes. Maybe with words the music comes alive, or so I am told. But enough of the dour section of my post.

I find airports both fascinating and deadly boring. It's interesting to sit here opposite the phone-booth (where the power outlets are) wondering who people are phoning and where the various people on the travellator are heading. I am sitting next to a man who seems to work for Nasa - very impressive - and every one around here seems to own a BlackBerry, the first iphone free zone I have seen since I have been in the States, maybe its a sign I am coming home!

I now have 2 weeks off and then head into 5 weeks of rehearsals of 5 Handel Operas as the music associate for English Touring Opera's HandelFest. I am off to Zinman's Prom with the Tonhalle on Saturday which will be very exciting and interesting.

Earshot Readings with the Colorado Symphony

2009-07-18T07:49:00.000-07:00

I am waiting here in Denver international airport for my pick up back to Aspen. The last few days have really flown past in a whirlwind of excitement and incredible experiences.

The Earshot Readings, give four young composers the chance to work with a major symphony orchestra, conductor and mentor composers on a piece of theirs that has not received a public performance. In conjunction with American Composers Orchestra, the chosen symphony and other organisations, these composers receive a fantastic experience, something which really needs to happen in England. The Colorado Symphony could not have been better, the amount of effort they put into playing, feedback, and just making us welcome was inspiring. This all sounds very gushy but it was one of my best experiences with new music and the orchestral world. Many questions were raised, some problems were solved and great friends were made. I was lucky enough to be conducting one of the works, a piece by Tim Sullivan, and Delta David Gier conducted the other three (Yotam Haber, Angel Lam, Jeremy Podgursky). It is always interesting to see how composers react to suggestions but in this situation not only was the piece dissected by the orchestral musicians, but also three mentor composers, Rober, Derek Bermel, and Roberto Sierra, and the Vice President of the Colorado Symphony, Alberto Gutierrez as well as David and myself. I learnt a considerable amount, not only about the compositional process but about what the orchestra wants, needs and expects from new music. Hopefully this is a project that will continue to grow and develop over the coming years. It provides a real opportunity for major orchestras to converse with one another about up and coming composers and the needs of new American music in a really positive light.

One quick note about Colorado Symphony's Hall - Boettcher Concert Hall, part of the second largest arts complex in the US. Although the acoustics vary for seat to seat and there are problems with balance between orchestral sections, it is an amazingly intimate space where you feel so close to the stage and the musicians. It is one of the few large concert halls I have been in where modern music really works and where the space contributes to the experience.

Anyway I must catch my ride back to Aspen, and prepare Greensleeves. I'll say more about Aspen soon - I've got an opera scenes masterclass on Handel with Nicholas Kraemer coming up, so lots to look forward to.

Aspen Music Festival - Part the first

2009-07-14T13:12:00.000-07:00

Before I head off to Denver for Earshot readings (I leave tomorrow at 6.30 am...) with the Colorado Symphony, I thought I would say a little about the last month.

On Christmas Eve I got a phone call saying that I had been accepted as a fellow for the American Academy of Conducting at Aspen. This is part of the Aspen Music Festival and School, and is close to conducting heaven.

So far I have been coached by, worked with and met: David Zinman, Murray Sidlin, Nicholas Mcgegan, Christopher Seaman, Larry Foster, Andrey Boryeko as well as working with three fantastic concertmasters; David Halen, Andrew Wan and Gary Levinson. I have conducted works by Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Dvorak and Berlioz. Not only do we get to work with an amazing orchestra who are some of the very best musicians at the festival but we get free tickets to all the concerts, bar one or two special events. Yesterday, having had a day off, I had a video review session with Murray Sidlin and on my way back popped into a rehearsal for a concert of Brandenburgs with Nicholas Mcgegan. There are great support staff as well who ensure the program functions like complete clock work.

It is slightly surreal to say the least, but the amount I have learnt over the past month is staggering. I am not quite sure how long it will take for me to digest it all. Now I am off to conduct Berlioz's Corsaire Overture in concert and then learning a new piece by the young American composer Tim Sullivan for the Earshot readings before a very early start tomorrow! Then I am back for another month of heaven, before heading back to the real world and the rainy UK.

I'll say more from Denver,

Messiaen Part 2: his influence

2009-06-11T05:46:00.000-07:00

Finally part the second is here!

Following on from my initial investigation into the early orchestral works of Olivier Messiaen, I have recently completed a study on Messiaen's influence as a teacher and whether he produced a school of composition. It can be found at:

http://issuu.com/ensemblecb3/docs/theinfluenceofmessiaen

Shropshire Life Magazine Article

2009-05-26T07:17:00.000-07:00

There's a nice article about me in Shropshire Life this month, catch it on the shelves to see it in all its shiny glory - or catch it online here without all the photos:

http://www.shropshirelifemagazine.co.uk/people-and-places-lightning-conductor--153477

Let me know what you think.

It would be interesting to know if you think where you grew up influenced your musical interests or careers.

A bit of a mixture - linking the digital and real

2009-04-22T04:14:00.000-07:00

We are in the part of the year where orchestra’s and opera houses programmes for the next year are nearly all published and also in the midst of the various awards for classical music. Does it all make sense in this digital age? With blogs, twitter, spotify, the Berlin Phil’s digital concert hall and the likes, everything seems to becoming closer to the performer. But is this actually doing the opposite. By giving everything to the audience from within their own home and brining them so close to the performer, in such a personal fashion, does it negate the need to go to the concert hall. Or does it do the opposite? Does it create a yearning for the adrenaline of the concert hall, that tactile excitement it gives when sitting amongst a mass of people experiencing live music?

So many questions and I don’t think we will see real proof of either outcome for another five years, when people will have found more ways of creating ‘access’ to classical music. I certainly believe that the most important thing with increasing audience’s and bringing new generations to classical music is getting young people to a concert for the first time. This is where I think new music can really maximise on new audiences. Live, new music can be heart pumping and adrenaline creating. It is this excitement that is going to bring people in, in the initial stages of their appreciation of music.

What needs to happen is a bridge between the digital and the real: the computer and the concert hall. I don’t think that the Berlin Phil’s digital concert hall helps that problem. It does create a yearning for the real, but only once the real has been experienced.

Most things are now established they just need a bridge. The best way? Firstly, outreach which most orchestras in the UK seem to achieving impressively on the budgets they have. Secondly, filling empty concert halls with students and a real cooperation between orchestras and education, not just by outreach programmes, but by planning programmes with input from the education system. It’s being done in some places, but its success lies in making the concert hall and the orchestra’s friendly, by making them the friend of the community rather than dumming them down. The orchestra’s have to really become part of the fabric of the community. It’s harder to achieve in London but the Hallé seems to be leading the way. It’s getting the young to enthuse the younger. We’re getting there. Now let’s shout it from the roof tops and tell others rather than keep it to ourselves.

I haven’t answered my initial question, maybe for another time, but they seem to follow in the footsteps of ‘popular music’. They reward the hard work done and publicise some of the important hidden work of the real troopers in the business. Some rewards are obviously better to get than others and some are driven heavily by the recording industry. They add a bit of glam but perhaps they could do more. Could they be linked into the whole structure? We have all these separate pods of great goings on but if they could be linked maybe we would not only have something world class but really world leading.

Messiaen - Part 1

2009-04-08T15:10:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I have got my act together and managed to publish my first Messiaen article on the Web.

It is entitled:

How important was orchestral composition (until 1933) in the early compositional career of Olivier Messiaen, and what role did poetry and religion play in the construction of those works?

It is available to read here:

www.issuu.com/ensemblecb3

Hopefully my second article, on Messiaen's influence as a teacher will be available to read on the same site in May.

Yours

Fergus

Things to come....

2009-04-08T00:52:00.000-07:00

Ok - so still no Messiaen but that is coming, I might have to link it to a preview sight as my initial piece about Messiaen's early orchestral works is pretty long....but am working on another Messiaen article at the moment concerned with his teaching style and influence!

Also nothing about photos - but have had quite a few done recently for various things - John Batten at www.johnbattenphotography.co.uk is fantastic, I couldn't recommend him highly enough!

Have recently done an interview with Shropshire Life so in the next issue between sheep and cows there will be a bit about music!

Will write more about up and coming projects v soon!!

Ferg

Boulez and Luzern

2009-01-24T02:09:00.000-08:00

In March last year I was invited to study conducting (along with 3 others) under Pierre Boulez at the Luzern festival for a week in August.

Boulez, is without doubt a phenomenal individual. Much of what the Luzern festival is, especially the Luzern Festival Academy, is because of him. There a few musicians of the 20th Century that one could call 'genius' but Boulez must number amongst them (as possibly does his teacher, Messiaen). Whether you appreciate his compositions or not is not the factor which I feel makes Boulez great (as an aside, if you dont 'like' Boulez then try listening to his Rituel in memoriam Bruno Maderna: 1974-75). It is his persona and understanding which makes him iconic. He was seen as a revolutionary in Paris when he was young, but he made the world stand up and listen and as result IRCAM and EIC now exist and new music is what it is today because of him. You only had to be in the hall at Luzern to see his effect, when he entered, on the 100 strong orchestra, fresh from the conservatoires of the world, to see that he will be loved by the generations of today and tomorrow, once he is gone.

His teaching has a very 'fatherly' approach. When he criticised what we did, which was most of the time, he always did it with a smile on his face. It was certainly constructive, yet after the first session with him, when he stopped you, you knew what he was going to say, yet he always found a different way of expressing it. He may have been seen as brash and big headed when he was younger, but now, in his teaching role at Luzern, it is as if he sees his one duty to the world is to shape and enthuse the musicians of the future about new music. He has criticised the past, moulded the present and now he has turned to the future to resolve the problem of new music education of the young.

It's true to say that he has a pretty easy audience, all the orchestra and conductors have applied to this course, and been selected from many, to work with Boulez and the EIC coaches on a heavily 20th Century programme. Boulez, has a conducting style that is small. It is not restrained. He feels the orchestra gives what it gives, it is his duty to correct and ensure that the orchestra plays as one. He is certainly no Dudamel in his actions, yet the quantity of energy that comes from the podium is easily as much. He stands there. Every movement his body makes is as concentrated and distilled as it could be, and so each movement delivers its maximum effect. He has the benefit of 80 years of experience but when he is on the podium he ensures that it is the composer who is central to the work.

It was certainly a life changing experience, mainly because of Boulez, but also from the insight of the analysis sessions with Theo Hirsbrunner, and the setting of the academy and the nature of the festival itself. However what was so beneficial was the group of conductors working on the Rite of Spring, Symphonies of Wind instruments and Concertino. Eva Fyodor, Pablo Herras Casado, Geoffery Patterson and myself were able to discuss openly our styles of conducting and the problems we saw with the conducting styles of our fellow participants, as well as offering maximum support to each other all the time.

One should always only speak as they find, a motto I think more of the music world could do well to adopt, and for me Boulez is a confident yet supportive, generous and understanding master of what he does.

www.lucernefestival.ch

Posts to come (hopefully)...

2009-01-24T01:37:00.000-08:00

Just some of the things I hope to blog about...

Boulez & Luzern

Messiaen

Publicity Photos

Tokyo Philharmonic

A little behind...

2009-01-24T01:30:00.000-08:00

After my first blog things seem to have dried up slightly, but one of my new year resolutions is to correct this!

So stay tuned...

Yours,

Fergus

GCSE MUSIC

2008-08-08T10:05:00.000-07:00

An article in this months BBC Music magazine about the simple nature of obtaining a GCSE in music without being able to read music has caused discussion of the exam and the broader problem of the teaching of music in our schools.

Reportedly students can now achieve an A in music without being able to read a single note. It comes as no surprise as over recent years A level music has come more and more into disrepute. The situation has become so problematic that the likes of Oxbridge are considering whether an A level in music should be a stipulation tin applying to study music at an undergraduate level. However, it is true also to say that Music as a subject has changed hugely in the way it is studied as a subject at the highest level. No longer do composers learn their trade during a seven year apprenticeship with a senior composer. Nor does fugue or counterpoint play a critical part in a degree from Cambridge. Recently Oxford appointed a professor in music science and music as therapy and as a rehabilitative aid is becoming more accepted in the medical world. Thus should the qualification move with the times?

It is true to say that the qualification needs to adapt, and ensure it is not stuck in the dark ages. Yet it must keep the foundations of what it is trying to advance at the forefront of its teaching. As the cellist, Julian Lloyd Webber said, it is "like trying to study a language without learning the alphabet". The concept of teaching English at GCSE level without the students being able to read would be unthinkable.

Today in the world 'classical' music, accessibility to all are such buzz words that the exam boards seem worried to stretch the students by demanding from them what they should. Although not a theorist at heart and also being one who passed grade 5 theory just (getting the pass mark - all be it at the age of 9) it seems that theoretical knowledge is crucial to an understanding of music and a progression in the subject. It may be difficult to teach or 'boring' to learn yet no one would suggest not teaching times tables or spelling. By enabling people to understand theory not only does it allow them to study a major section of Western culture but opens the door to this 'exclusive' world of classical music, that so many politicians are convinced exists due to those who promote it. As Damon Albarn, the front-man of Gorrliaz and Blur said, "If you don't learn to read music, then there's a whole tradition that becomes very exclusive and shouldn't be."

It is important to be inclusive, and in a world where classical music has an aging population one needs to encourage followers, but not at the risk of loosing what is at the subject's heart. Maybe it is time for a separate GCSE to be developed; 'music appreciation' where one only has to listen and describe one's reaction on tape, therefore stopping the need of having ti be able to write to take the qualification.