Essentials in Conducting Part 4

This implies skilful accentuation of melody, subordination of accompaniment, increasing the tempo or force in some portions, decreasing them in others, _et cetera_. Clear enunciation and forceful declamation in choral music are also included, and in it all, the performer or conductor must so subordinate his own personality that the attention of the listeners will be centered upon the composition and not upon the eccentricities of dress or manner of the artist.

[Sidenote: THE BOUNDARIES OF MUSIC]

It is inevitable that there should be considerable difference of opinion among composers, critics, listeners, and performers, as to just what music may or may not legitimately be expected to express.

Some modern composers are apparently convinced that it ought to be possible through music to suggest pictures, tell stories, or depict moral and intellectual struggles on the part of the individual. Others contend that music exists solely because of its own inherent beauty, that it can arouse _general_ emotional states only, and that if it is good music, it needs no further meaning than this. Even "pure music,"

the champions of this latter idea urge, may express an infinite variety of emotional tones, from joy, encouragement, excitement, tenderness, expectancy, invigoration, and tranquillity, to dread, oppression of spirit, hesitation, harshness, and despondency. A modern writer on esthetics treats this matter at length, and finally concludes:[11]

Is the symbolization pervasive enough to account for the steady continuing charm of lengthy compositions?... The symbolizations ... mostly resemble patches; they form no system, no plot or plan accompanying a work from beginning to end; they only guarantee a fitful enjoyment--a fragment here, a gleam there, but no growing organic exaltation like that actually afforded by musical compositions.

[Footnote 11: Gehring, _The Basis of Musical Pleasure_, p. 89.]

At another point in the same work, this writer again discusses this same matter (page 120):

Music is presentative in character, not representative.

Measure, to be sure, may correspond to the beating of the pulse, and the final cadence may picture the satisfaction of desires; the coda may simulate a mental summary; but the composition in its totality, with its particular melodies, harmonies, and rhythms, and with the specific union of all these elements characteristic of this composition, does not represent any definite psychical or material fact.

The majority of us would doubtless take a middle-ground position, admitting the beauty and power of music, _per se_, but acknowledging also the fact that abstract beauty together with a certain amount of suggested imagery, in combination, will usually make a stronger appeal to the majority of people than either element by itself. Many of us are entirely willing to grant, therefore, that a more complex and more vividly colored emotional state will probably result if the auditor is furnished with the t.i.tle or program of the work being performed; _but we contend nevertheless that this music, regardless of its connection with imagery, must at the same time be sound music, and that no matter how vividly descriptive our tonal art may become, if it cannot stand the test of many hearings as music, entirely apart from the imagery aroused, it is not worthy to endure_. It is not the _meaning_ of the music which makes us want to hear it repeated, but its inherent _beauty_; it is not usually our intellectual impression, but our emotional thrill which we recall in thinking back over a past musical experience.

Those of us who take the middle ground that we have just been presenting contend also that descriptive music can only legitimately arouse its appropriate imagery when the essential idea has been supplied beforehand in the form of a t.i.tle or program, and that even then _the effect upon various individuals is, and may well be, quite different_, since each one has the music thrown, as it were, upon the screen of his own personal experience.

[Sidenote: EXPRESSION CONCERNS BOTH COMPOSER AND PERFORMER]

It will be noted that in this discussion we are constantly using the word _expression_ from the twofold standpoint of composer and performer, each having an indispensable part in it, and neither being able to get along without the other. But in our treatment of conducting, we shall need to come back again and again to the idea of expression from the standpoint of interpretation, and in directing a piece of music we shall now take it for granted that the composer has said something which is worthy of being heard, and that as the intermediary between composer and audience, we are attempting to interpret to the latter what the former has expressed in his composition. It should be noted in this connection that wrong interpretation is possible in music, even as in literature. One may so read a poem that the hearer, without being in any way to blame, will entirely miss the point. So also may one conduct a musical work, whether it be a child's song or a symphonic poem, in such a fashion that neither performers nor audience gain a proper conception of what it means.

[Sidenote: INTERPRETATION IN VOCAL MUSIC]

In the case of vocal music, the key to the emotional content of the work may almost always be found by carefully studying the words. In preparing to conduct choral singing, master the text, therefore; read it aloud as though declaiming to an audience; and when you come to the performance, see that your vocalists sing the music in such a way that the audience will be able to catch without too great effort both the meaning of the individual words and the spirit of the text as a whole.

The great Italian tenor Caruso expressed himself forcibly upon this point during an interview for the _Christian Science Monitor_, in 1913. In reply to the question "Where do you locate the source of expression in singing?" he said:

I find it in the words always. For unless I give my hearers what is in the text, what can I give them? If I just produce tone, my singing has no meaning.

"Thereupon" (continues the interviewer), "vocalizing a series of scale pa.s.sages such as are used in studio practice, Caruso commented":

Now, when I do that, I don't say anything. I may make musical sounds, but I express nothing. I may even execute the notes with a good staccato or legato (again ill.u.s.trating with his voice) and still, having no words to go by, I make no effect on my listeners.

Look at the question in another way. Suppose I were to sing a line of text with a meaning in my voice that contradicted the idea of the words. Would not that be nonsense? It would be as much as though I were to say to you "This wood is hard," and were to say it with a soft voice. People have observed that I sing as though I were talking. Well, that is just what I mean to do.

"Singing, then" (the interviewer goes on), "as Caruso began to define it, is a sort of exalted speech, its purpose being to illuminate the imagery and sentiment of language. The mere music of singing he seemed for the moment to put in a subordinate place.

"By way of further emphasizing his point, he referred to a theme in Donizetti's _L'Elisir d'Amore_, which is used in two opposing situations--by the soprano in a mood of joy, and by the tenor in a mood of sorrow. He sang the measures of the soprano as though laughing. Then he sang those of the tenor as though weeping."

"But those two pa.s.sages of melody cannot be identical,"

objected the interviewer.

"Oh, yes, they are," the tenor declared; and he quickly proved it by singing them over again with a less marked indication of the moods. "Here you plainly see where expression must start. It has to be from the words, of course. The performer puts in the feeling of gladness or sadness without regard to the notes, paying attention only to the text."

Expression in choral music is dependent upon the text to just as great an extent as in the case of solo singing; and choral conductors may well ponder upon the above words of one of the world's greatest singers, and apply the lesson to their own problems. The average audience is probably more interested in the _words_ of vocal music than in anything else; and since both vocal and choral performances are usually given before "average audiences" it behooves the conductor to look into the minds of those before whom he is directing, and to adapt the performance to the att.i.tude of the listeners.

CHAPTER V

INTERPRETATION IN CONDUCTING

(_Continued_)

TEMPO

[Sidenote: EXPRESSION IN INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC]

In the last chapter we discussed expression and interpretation from a general standpoint, closing with certain comments upon the interpretation of vocal music. But it must be admitted at once that expression in instrumental music is a vastly more intricate matter than in the case of vocal music; and in order to get at the subject in any tangible way, it will be necessary for us, first, to a.n.a.lyze music into its expressional elements; second, to decide which of these elements belong exclusively to the composer and which are shared by the interpreter; and third, to examine each of these latter elements in turn from the standpoint of the conductor as interpreter.

[Sidenote: THE ELEMENTS OF EXPRESSION]

There are eight elements upon which expression in instrumental music rests. These are:

1. Rhythm 2. Melody 3. Harmony 4. Pitch registers 5. Timbre 6. Phrasing 7. Tempo 8. Dynamics

Of these, the composer is able to indicate _exactly_ the first four, to convey his meaning fairly well in the fifth and sixth, but to give only a relative idea of the seventh and eighth. The interpreter is thus concerned with the first four only as it becomes necessary for him to find out from the notation what the composer intended to express. On the other hand, he is considerably concerned with the fifth and sixth factors (_timbre_ and _phrasing_) and has the main responsibility in the last two (_tempo_ and _dynamics_). This being the case, we shall treat _tempo_ and _dynamics_ first of all, as being the two primary factors of expression with which the conductor is concerned.

[Sidenote: IMPORTANCE OF TEMPO]

Wagner, in his famous essay on conducting, takes the rather radical ground that everything else is dependent upon the proper selection and management of tempo. He says:[12]

The whole duty of the conductor is comprised in his ability always to indicate the right tempo. His choice of tempi will show whether he understands the piece or not.... The true tempo induces correct force and expression.

[Footnote 12: Wagner, _On Conducting_, translated by Dannreuther, p.

20.]

In another place in the same work he treats the matter further, as follows: (p. 34)

Obviously the proper pace of a piece of music is determined by the particular character of the rendering it requires.

The question therefore comes to this: Does the sustained, the cantilena, predominate, or the rhythmical movement? The conductor should lead accordingly.

It is doubtful whether many modern conductors would entirely agree with Wagner's statement that correct tempo always "induces correct force and expression." Nevertheless tempo is so important that probably no one will quarrel with us if we at least give it first place in the order in which the elements of expression are discussed.

In modern music the composer indicates the tempos of the various movements much more definitely than was true in earlier days, so it would seem as if not nearly so much responsibility rested upon the conductor; and yet there is still a wide difference of opinion among musicians about the matter, and in many cases the conductor subst.i.tutes his own judgment for that of the composer, a.s.suming that the latter either made a mistake in indicating the tempo, or else that he had not tried the composition at the tempo preferred by the conductor, and therefore did not realize how much more effective it would be that way.

[Sidenote: FINDING THE CORRECT TEMPO]

In the main, there are five methods upon which the conductor depends for determining the correct tempo of a composition. These are:

1. The metronome indication, found at the beginning of most modern scores.

2. The tempo or mood expressions (_andante_, _allegro_, _adagio_, _et cetera_), which have been in universal use for two centuries or more, and which are found in practically all music, even when a metronome indication is also given.