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I am not trying to be a wise ass, in the past I have not listened to much Classic music, but have started to listen to more as I get older (hitting 60 next year) anything non-Opera, just can't get into Opera as much as I try.
I have a bunch of different versions of Holst Planets conducted by everyone from Ormandy, Bernstein, Zubin Mehta, Munch, Solti, etc and they sound pretty similar to my ears. Just how much of on an impact does an conductor have on the way a piece of music sounds?
Also I notice that certain conductors are hardly mentioned here as having the definitive version of a piece of music, such as Ormandy, Zubin Mehta, Stokowski, Toscanini, Ozawa, Previn, etc. Is that because they are not considered great conductors or that they are just backlash because they are or where very popular (sort like the Eagles or Bee Gees in rock music)?
As I am in the process or building up the Classical part of my music collection, I am just curious about why some conductors are considered better than others. One last question I enjoy mostly late 19th & 20th century composers such as Ives, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Gershwin, Barber, Sibelius, Kahachaturian, Hanson, Tchaikovsky, Berlioz, etc. are there conductors that do a better job with one type (period) of music then another?
Sorry for all the questions, but I just trying to understand the impact a conductor has on the music.
Jeff
We're Burning Daylight
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Tim Bailey
Skeptical Measurer & Audio Scrounger
Changing the conductor provides enormous changes in the result. Almost all American orchestras are considered quite good. Fighting over who gets the great conductors is won by the richest cities usually.
In recordings, people have their favorites. You will have to find your own IMO.
The conductor gives his/her interpretation and understanding of the piece in the performance. A couple weeks ago on another thread, I listened to four different conductors/orchestras doing the Beethoven 4th. *Huge* differences.
Conductors also work over time to develop their orchestras, and the musicians in the orchestra I'm sure influence their conductor. Vanska/Minnesota and Levine/Met come to mind. Sadly, post-Levine Met also comes to mind, as most perfs in the last few years have been without him, and the level of their playing has suffered.
Some years ago I heard Vanska/Minn do the Mahler 1st. It was overwhelming; one of those rare nights when a good part of the audience hung around in the plaza for a while afterward, mostly not talking, because we really needed a little time to decompress. A few weeks later I heard Alan Gilbert conduct the NYPhil in the same piece. Everyone enjoyed it. I kept thinking, "You don't know what you've missed."
The notion that conductors just keep time is nonsense. For conductors and orchestras, it all happens in rehearsal - that's where they develop what they're doing, and how to get across their understanding of the piece. If you ever get the chance to attend an orchestra rehearsal, jump at it. When you have a great conductor, it's an amazing process.
And yes, there are many recordings of uninspiring performances out there. If it doesn't grab you, if it doesn't move you, move on.
WW
"A man need merely light the filaments of his receiving set and the world's greatest artists will perform for him." Alfred N. Goldsmith, RCA, 1922
One way I think of the conductor is as the 'master clock' governing each individual clock going on within a performer. It is the musicians job to be in sync with the conductor and the wise conductor emits sufficient 'timing signals' to help/cause the musician do that.
As a musician - say you're playing an instrument that doesn't play all the time, such as cymbals or the glockenspiel or you've got an important solo on the flute at a quiet point in the score - you might spend most of your time counting out measures where you're not playing. A wrong entrance or otherwise miscounting will spoil the entire performance. As the time for your part draws close you will keep closer and closer tabs on the conductor because he will cue you.
If you as listener, knows a piece of music well, watch for that interaction between the conductor and individuals or sections and see how the conductor signals performers.
As a musician, just prior to your part, there is sometimes a 'set-up' done with the eyes - it is significant when the conductor looks at you and usually you better be looking back - then the conductor will cue you with his hand or baton or a nod of his head. This gets honed and refined over time in rehearsal, so things happen like, well, like clockwork during the performance.
Here's 2 examples.First if you enjoy Tchaikovsky pick up Igor Markevitch on Philips conducting the 4th Symphony. In the final movement, he has the musicians playing to the top of their game so that in my imagination I see them falling over in their chairs at the end. Never heard it better. I can't help but belt out a "Bravo!!!" at the end myself.
Second, listen to the Adagio in The New World Symphony conducted by Rodzinski on Westminster... absolutely exquisite and emotional and magical.
Sim
Edits: 02/01/16
I think the conductor has a singular vision of the piece and how it should be performed. I think a collective could possibly pull this off. Nevertheless, it's clear to me that the same music can sound quite different with different conductors leading the orchestra. As a former rock and roller, I am by no means an authority on this. It would be great to hear from the classical musicians in this group.
Sim
without a conductor? I would think so. Much great music was originally played w/o a conductor as we know them.
By denying scientific principles, one may maintain any paradox.
Galileo Galilei
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It's amazing that hipsters who think they can hear the little steps in interpolated digital waveforms can somehow fail to hear the surface defects in their own vinyl records.
I once heard a story where the worst performances were conducted by those who were OK conductors - good enough to have the orchestra actually follow them. Poor conductors actually could be giving good performances because the orchestra ignored the conductor.
As others have pointed out, there is the matter of interpretation. I lived in LA in the 70s and heard the LA Phil with Mehta and Giulini - very different sounds and interpretations. Giulini had hit his slow tempo stage by then, and every performance was an event, but one that occurred in the slow lane. With the same orchestra, Mehta was more "exciting" but IMO shallow and he did not manage transitions well. While I would agree that Holst's Planets may not have the widest range for interpretation, listen to Mehta, and then to say, Steinberg - what I hear is a much more coherent sound picture with Steinberg, even though Mehta has superb sound.
A lot of the movement during a concert is for show, I believe. The conductor's real work is done during rehearsal.
My experience, from the bottom of the barrel (which is me):
I used to play brass, and I used to work at an arts-focussed summer camp owned by an orchestra conductor. He was an assistant to Stokowski for years, and had the baton himself for an orchestra in an outer borough of New York. So not exactly a household name, but a working conductor.
The summer camp's music director was a very gifted pianist who is a well -known classical DJ. He was great. The camp orchestra had kids from 8-16 in it, and me, on my period off, anchoring the low brass which was in short supply those years. Some kids were good, some not, I was OK then but no great shakes. We were all right for what we were.
But on two numbers per summer, the owner (the conductor) guest-conducted. And having him up there, feeding his energy to us, treating us, despite our greenness, like a damn orchestra-- made those two numbers stand up and move. He'd cajole, threaten, praise, grimace-- he pulled the music out of us. Nobody knew why it happened, but damned if it didn't.
Very interesting question; thanks for asking. Are there parallels between a conductor and a movie director? It would seem to me that both are working off of a script, and interpreting it in their own ways.
A conductor does way more than hold the orchestra together in a difficult work or interpret the music, he/she can also extract more out of the orchestra musicians simply by their attitude. Some have a strangle hold on the way the music is being played, others have a looseness and confidence that the musicians will play the way the conductor wants them to play to get to the end result.
My first experience under a good conductor was with, Kurt Adler. Nobody followed the stick, it was a loose guide, you followed the music and the section leader. Later I was fortunate to work under Eduardo Mata, he was the boss, very strict, down to the shape of the note. Others think they have to scream and yell to get what they want out of the orchestra, to the point of ridiculing the musicians, that's why they have musician unions, I guess!
Thomas
And every conductor was after a different context, speed, or emphasis. Some were brass nuts, others were string freaks, others enjoyed woodwinds or percussion.
Interestingly, if we were playing the same piece over a close period of time, they would sometimes change things up to keep it fresh.
I think I have most of my favorite orchestral pieces with 5 to 10 conductors and a wide variety of labels. Every performance sounds like a unique take on a well known classic.
One of those shouters you discussed I had the opportunity to experience. One day, I played every note 1/4 tone sharp so the sound would literally "beat."
After two or three minutes he stopped the practice looked at me and said stop that. I said I would stop when he stopped shouting. I fully expected to be tossed but something about that experience changed him.
I think he learned something that day. Because from then on he treated me with respect abd shouted a lot less.
Great Post!
"Help support our school's Music programs"
Two similar stories. I have no idea how much truth there is to them.
Toscanini: Moments before a concert, a clarinet player rushed up to him and said his instrument was broken and he could not play an E-flat (or whatever). Toscanini held up his hand, closed his eyes and a moment later said, "You do not play that note tonight."
Andre Previn: Players in an orchestra he was guest-conducting wanted to test his perfect pitch. So the oboist tuned the orchestra a half-step high. Previn let them all get in tune and just as he raised his hands to begin conducting, said, "Everyone transpose a half-step up."
The kind of stories that make you wish they are true!
-Bob
One of my more memorable experiences with a conductor was down in Mexico, playing with the UNAM Filarmonica. They would invite new European conductors that were looking for experience, one of these conductors was from Romania, he didn't speak Spanish or English, so there wasn't any verbal direction, he would simply make motions with the baton and his hands and body, stomp his feet when he wanted emphasis. When he got the sound he wanted, he smiled and nodded. I thought the orchestra never sounded quite as good as it did under that conductor.
Thomas
Until one day when I was listening to several of my Beethoven cycles & realized the immense differences between interpretations of the same symphony - differences to the point where I almost didn't recognize the piece. I should add that at this time I was just beginning to become relatively familiar with the works. If you don't believe me, just compare the Toscanini vs. the Karajan vs. the Klemperer & see for yourself! That is one of the things that makes this hobby fun (and maddening!) for me...
Later Gator,
Dave
If you look at an orchestral score, there are relatively few style markings, and these are (deliberately?) a bit obscure. Forte (loud; but how loud is loud?), andante (slow--actually, walking--but how slow is slow?), crescendo (growing; but how rapidly? to what level?. And how loud should the trombones play in comparison to the first violins? Should an inner melody in certain passages be brought to the fore? Some composers were pretty explicit about what they wanted and loaded their score sheets with detailed instructions. Most did no, pretty much leaving all but the actual notes up to interpretation.
The conductor makes all of those decisions and many more. How good are his/her players? What is the reverb in the hall? A string quartet might make all of these decisions by mutual agreement--spoken or otherwise. But try that with Mahler's Symphony 8 ("Symphony of a Thousand") and it would be complete chaos.
To confuse the issue even more, certain conductors seem to be more at home with the romantic repertoire; others more with the classic.
So, continue to do as you have been doing: listen to the same piece in different interpretations and develop your own tastes. There is no right answer and the journey is very rewarding.
Discovering the differences a conductor makes is kind of like discovering the difference pieces of audio gear make: You've usually got to be very familiar with one before detecting the difference another one makes.
Try this if you haven't already: Pick a piece of music and listen to one performance of it over and over, until it almost becomes part of you. (You can't just HEAR the music; you've got to really LISTEN to the music, focusing exclusively on it.)
Then listen to other conductors perform the same work. I venture to say you will be quite surprised by the difference a conductor's perspective can make. As with audio gear, the difference may be subtle, but it is likely to be very, very real. I find that hearing these differences is among the most rewarding aspects of listening to classical music.
-Bob
Obviously they "conduct" or steer the orchestra according to the chosen manner.And *sometimes*, very fastidious conductors will at least TRY to work closely with the recording team so that a certain type of sonic perspective might be produced - one that accords with the conductor's personal vision or imagination, a sonic ideal if you will. Although, as Learsfool below implies, it was easier for a conductor to exert this type of influence back in the days when Karajan and Bernstein were conducting.
What you hear when you listen to any classical performance is much more than a simple, literal translation of some composer's score. In fact, it could be argued that a "literal translation" does not/cannot exist.
Edits: 01/31/16 01/31/16 02/01/16
Listen to Beethovens 5th Symphony from Karajan, Zander, Kleiber and Monteaux. They are quite different. A week ago I was listening to Beethoven's Violin Concerto played and conducted by Salvatore Accardo and I was totally disappointed. It was slow like molasses. I actually hated it. And this is usually one of my favorite violin concerto's. And than there is the Zeitgeist. Just compare various classical pieces from 50-80 years ago to the recordings from today.
Yes, there can be quite some differences in who is conducting what at which time period.
---
Comparing is the end of happiness and the beginning of discontent.
Listen to Beethovens 5th Symphony from Otto Klemperer and then let me know what you think about the conductors roll...Otto Klemperer Berlin Philharmonic in May 1966 vinyl record, not the cd version.
Edits: 02/01/16
n.t.
but the longest 5th I have heard was Boulez/NYP clocking at 47 min! ( stereo Klemperer is 40 min. Mono Klemperer is 35 min. )
Of course no CD. Who listens to CD? ;)
I will have to hunt that down. When I have it, I let you know.
Thanks for the tip,
Best,
Rudy
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Comparing is the end of happiness and the beginning of discontent.
A classical performance is the conductors personal view of how a piece should be performed. The details are worked out in rehersal. The conductor determines tempos, dynamics, phrasing and even playing techniques. Also conductors who have been with an orchestra for a long time have typically hired most of the musicians in the orchestra. Musicians who can give him the performances he asks for. Remember of all the musicians in an orchestra the conductor by far is the highest paid. Someone thinks he is important
Alan
is the highest paid on campus but if most of them vanished, the school would work just fine:)
By denying scientific principles, one may maintain any paradox.
Galileo Galilei
aa
"Once this was all Black Plasma and Imagination" -Michael McClure
If conductor's vanished, orchestras would play just fine.
No conductor. But, it takes time to work it out. Not easy!
Well, if the conductor is the orchestra's music director, and has been for many seasons, he or she has probably had a significant impact over time in many ways. But a guest conductor? Probably not as much. It can matter more in recordings.
Actually, in recordings the conductor usually has less influence, not more, especially nowadays. There is very limited recording time, and it is all about just making sure that the recording is note perfect and tight ensemble-wise. Almost all of the time, especially with the umpteen million mikes used with digital recording techniques, balances are completely and totally determined by the recording engineers. Very few conductors even bother with it anymore, except to approve the overall sound. Most common now are "live" recordings, where each performance over a weekend is recorded, and then there is a short patch afterwards. I have seen it happen where none of these times sounded any good by themselves, but somehow they are edited into something that sounds great, and nothing like the actual performances or patch. Recordings are now pretty much completely and totally fake in this way. This is why especially current orchestral musicians always roll their eyes when audiophiles start talking about "fidelity to the recording." The recordings themselves have absolutely nothing to do with what actually happened in almost all cases now, and they damn sure almost never care about recreating the actual sound of the space, either. I think Chris came up with the stat that in any one classical recording there is an AVERAGE of over 1000 edits? This would be a conservative estimate, in my experience.
Someone else mentioned that the conductor determines playing techniques. This is almost never the case, especially in the very best orchestras that are recorded the most. They all have their own unique sounds, and conductors very rarely mess with that. And rbolaw is correct that a guest conductor in particular usually wouldn't dare. Even phrasing is usually left to the players, especially of solos. What the conductor is most responsible for is the time - tempos, and their fluctuations. This is by miles the number one responsibility of the conductor, as Wagner famously said. As I mentioned in a post on a thread in the music asylum, you must remember that especially in the finest orchestras, almost all the players in them have much more experience with the rep than whoever is conducting them does. We know how the pieces go. Yes, there is of course individual interpretation going on by the conductor, but they have much less influence on the overall sound of the orchestra than many music lovers think. I'm bad at links here, or I would link to that post of mine. If anyone in this thread cares, I could go back and copy it here.
Alas, generally true with standard repertoire, no doubt. But with newly-composed music, I think a skilled, well-prepared, knowledgeable conductor can have a lot to contribute, whereas a less able conductor can be disastrous. Sadly, the composers themselves often seem to stumble slightly (or greatly) when conducting their own music. Good thing for those recording engineer wizards!
Hi rbolaw - I find it interesting that you say "Alas" that the orchestra musicians have more experience with the rep than the conductor. Why "Alas", out of curiousity? If you have inexperienced musicians in the orchestra, the end result will not be as good as it will be with very experienced ones, no matter how technically gifted they are.
That said, a skilled, well-prepared knowledgeable conductor will have a big impact on standard rep as well - my point is that is just not as much as people think. The other post here is good as well, I'm sorry I can't see the name of the poster while typing this!
Tempo is controlled by the conductor. You follow the stick, or you just look foolish. But orchestra members have good will and accommodate what is perceived as the conductor's interpretation. The more definite the concept, as well as the more reasonable the concept, **and the better communicated through conducting style** is the concept, the more the orchestra will be able and will want to accommodate the interpretation. On the other hand, when the conducting style is confusing, especially if the orchestra has not worked very much with the conductor, the confusion can be cancerous. In general though, it is not the case, and if it were to happen, the conductor may not get asked back and certainly will not be asked to make a recording. For this reason, various conductors are scouted out (literally) and are given various trials as guest conductor. The more it works out, the more they get asked back, provided the person has an open schedule and wants to work with the orchestra. The conductors in demand do one project in neglect of another possibility.
Having said all that, the very best conductors, come in, you see the stick, and you KNOW exactly what they are asking of you. And with videos today, you can see how good the conductor is by how clear the intent and execution. Long story short, live recordings are the best. Real music.
The concept of definitive recording--if you like that idea--is o.k. if you think that there is a definite recording. But it's strictly your opinion. In general, professional musicians do not think that there are "definitive" recordings--or at least realize that it is strictly one person's opinion. Everyone has an opinion.
Mahler chips away at my will to live regardless of who's on the podium, so nobody matters, in this case. :(That aside, my feeling is that the conductors who've really mattered aren't alive anymore. Toscanini has become something of a cliche -- his name is a credible answer when you're absolutely pressed to opine about the "greatest conductor". But he's my favorite. Eugene Ormandy and Fritz Reiner are tied for second place, IMO.
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In a technical discussion, one number is worth ten thousand adjectives.
The heart of technical research is aimless speculation. ~ 90% of audiophiles
Edits: 01/31/16 01/31/16 01/31/16
Compare Furtwangler and Toscanini for extremes - same piece of music
or Furtwangler
I still recall the 1st time I heard Toscanini. The performance was like no other I had ever heard.
In my opinion, Toscanini remains the greatest conductor ever recorded.
Jeremy
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