Good, back to Spring,

for now, anyway.

Things are looking up. I have been putting in a few hours of hard work in the garden, on my own, sadly.  Handsome Hunk works well, when he comes, that is. No matter how intensely I beg him to come at least every two or three weeks, all he says is "I'll ring you", and then doesn't. Wiry and Willing hasn't properly worked for weeks either, but he has an excuse. He has sciatica badly. He is seeing doctors and physios but nothing seems to work. He came last week but after an hour I sent him home. He looked bad and sat on an upturned bucket to rest his back and leg. He will come when he can, of that I am sure. HH will come too, I just don't know when.

In the meantime it's down to me. I am still pruning and cutting back, there is little point in doing much else, this weekend there will be mild frost again. I can't say that I am totally happy with the hellebores and hyacinths in the first and third pictures. I find the colours rather garish. But I do love the gorgeous quince flowers. (Japanese quince or Chaenomeles) The whole wall is covered in them. If the frosts don't kill them I will have masses of shiny yellow quince in late summer. I no longer make quince jelly, it's far too much work and I don't eat much in the way of sweet jellies. The fruits are not to be eaten raw, they are potentially harmful, but boiling them takes many hours.

I had great pleasure at the garden society last night. A delightful, very enthusiastic grower and gardener gave a talk on how to create a border with interest and appeal for the whole year. Whenever I watch garden programmes on the TV (some of you may have heard of Monty Don and Gardeners' World?), or visit a show garden, or attend a talk on garden design, I come over all itchy and raring to go. While I am sitting watching, I can do anything. In practice not so much. But until such time that it becomes impossible I will struggle on. Did I mention that I have agreed to open again at the end of June? The saints preserve us! Next week I am planning a visit to a nursery for a splurge on plants. Well, why not, I rarely treat myself to anything nowadays.

I've also attended my first concert of the year. Excellent but very complicated music. I was exhausted from just listening. I hadn't realised it was a private performance, by invitation only. The concert was given in the barn of a friend (good acoustics), there was wine and nibbles beforehand and during the interval, and altogether it was quite an occasion. I was fully aware of the honour of being on the guest list in spite of having initially misread the invitation. I had thought there was something funny about it, no tickets to purchase! Still, I enjoyed the outing and behaved impeccably! The performers were doing it all again the next night, this time on a stage, with a ticket price. Afterwards, I thanked the cellist for inviting me and he let out that they were, in fact, using the barn performance as a kind of dress rehearsal and needed a knowledgeable audience to be present, with the feel of a proper performance. Ah well, gift horses spring to mind. But a pleasure and an honour all the same.

 

Sunday with Hildegard of Bingen (1098 - 1179)

my ornamental Japanese cherry tree in full autumnal splendour

 

This morning I woke up a little subdued - I don't want to make my mood sound darker than that; subdued is a good enough word for now. I have been very aware of the days getting shorter, the nights drawing in and leaves turning colour prior to tumbling off the trees. Loneliness is so much worse in winter. Time to beware of the black dog.

So, what to do to make today, Sunday, a little special? It is all too easy for me to let one day run into another without any marker, and time at this time of life speeds up and before you know it, another month has passed. 

Let's start with breakfast, maybe a couple of slices of fruit bread and marmalade? Some ham and a sliver of mature Welsh cheddar? During the week I eat muesli and stewed fruit and nothing else; it's quick and easy and fairly healthy because of the dried fruits, nuts and seeds that I add myself.  And how about a large mug of fennel tea to wash it down. The main thing is to eat consciously, taste every bite and savour the hot drink going into my stomach. 

And while I am eating breakfast I have chosen to be accompanied by Hildegard of Bingen's heavenly sounds. Instead of almost deliberately depressing myself - I know what happens when I read the daily news reports - why not refresh my knowledge of this early medieval polymath, visionary, composer, writer, poet, botanist, philosopher, medical writer and practitioner and abbess of two convents, which she founded. Hildegard was born into the Rhenish aristocracy in 1098, she spent the remainder of her eighty years as a nun.

Hildegard von Bingen. Line engraving by W. Marshall

Hildegard became very powerful in a male dominated Church. She prevailed against various abbots and bishops and even attracted the attention of the pope in Rome who gave her permission to record her visions. She completed her great musico-poetic work around the year 1150. Seventy-seven songs and a music drama are extant today, more than of any other single medieval composer. When the mood takes me I will happily spend an hour in her company.

Hildegard was not universally popular in her time, powerful women were not then and are not now. Nothing much changes. It is said that her nuns, all noble ladies, wore jewellery and extravagant headdresses, and pursued an active life of the mind - without spending too much time in hair shirts, or on bread and water in freezing cells. (I made that last bit up.)

In spite of a lifetime of poor health Hildegard had a vast output of work. She has become important in our time for many reasons. The Feminist movement has embraced her and her ideas on holistic natural healing have been incorporated into the New Age canon.

On Oct. 7, 873 years after her death, the Vatican finally gave her the highest recognition for her considerable achievements. She was elevated to Doctor of the Church, a rare and solemn title reserved for theologians who have significantly impacted Church doctrine. There are 34 Doctors of the Church, and only four are women (Catherine of Siena, Teresa of Ávila, Thérèse of Lisieux and now, finally, Hildegard von Bingen).

I admire her but most of all I like to listen to her music. Nothing can soothe the anxious spirit like her music can. for today the black dog is banished.

What to do?

I've been struggling, the black dog came down for a visit and, as always when that happens, I felt unable to blog. You all appear so positive, upbeat, competent, even-minded in the posts I read that it's almost embarrassing to admit to my failings. I blame Covid and the solitude caused by Covid.

I've been having poor sleep as well, many hours of wakefulness when the thought carousel whirls and twirls; in the end I give up and go downstairs to the warm kitchen, pour a glass of sherry, have some crackers, read a bit and am shocked when I realise that it's almost morning and sleep has once again been unattainable. Naturally, that leaves me even more depressed and tired.

Last night was a bit better. What a difference a few hours of sleep makes. 

I wrote the above very late on Sunday evening, still feeling a tad sorry for myself but having sent the black dog into kennels for a while. 

So, what to do indeed.

First of all, when I got up, even before making breakfast, I rooted around in the music cabinet ( no longer holding sheet music since Beloved died) for some mood changers. In the olden days, when we still listened to radios back in the old country, Mum always had Sunday morning concerts on. So music was the first go-to, some CDs from the classical collections, a Beethoven symphony (Pastoral) on full volume. Music is magic, Beethoven helped right away. Toasted sweet fruit bread, tea, a sliver of well aged cheese, marmalade, and my inner woman was quieted. Roasted duck breast (a repetition of Christmas dinner) and a tasty lentils mess for a late lunch, followed by a long phone call with my son, both of us opening up about aspects of our lives which are not entirely pleasing, helped things along nicely. 

A walk in the garden next; looking closely with open eyes, I found a few welcome friends, much too early some of them. In spite of a mostly grey day I was cheered by aconites and hellebores in the woodland garden,

and snowdrops everywhere else, carpets of them. Ditto cyclamen.

I've taken and posted so many pictures of all three of them in the past I don't want to bore readers of this blog by posting yet more.

In the evening I finished off Frederik Backman's "My Grandmother Sends Her Regards and...." . I have enjoyed his humorous yet slightly bizarre writing (if you've read "A Man Called Ove" you'll know what I mean: depth and comedy at the same time. Backman is definitely one of my recently discovered favourites for a rainy afternoon.

A couple of documentaries on the BBC came next: the delightful and evocative "Wonders of the Celtic Deep". about animals and birds (are birds animals? Hm, yes, they must be) on the Pembrokeshire coast of Wales, the nearest stretch of ocean to Shropshire, and then, deeply disturbing, the beginning of a Paul Theroux series called Forbidden America about the impact of social media on US society; he begins the series by meeting the new online influencers of the far right. As faaaar right as can be, deeply frightening, in fact. Normally, I avoid such programmes. A pity that I should end the day on such a distressing topic. Maybe not the best idea after a few weeks of the black dog.

However, he has stayed away today too in spite of the scaffolding having gone up next door. No doubt I'll be woken by the noise of metal on metal tomorrow morning.

Some Cultural Pursuits

Did you know that? Do any of you live in or near one of the Stratfords mentioned here?

Do these Stratfords have theatres similar to the Royal Shakespeare Company in the original Stratford-upon-Avon in the UK?

I had no idea of any of it until we went to see King Lear the other day. Isn’t that a splendid Bottom?

Titania isn’t half as grand.

Every time I see King Lear I hope that this time he isn’t going to fall for his conniving, dishonest, fawning daughters’ flattery and that he sees them for the grasping, treacherous witches they are. No, Lear remains blind to reality and favours appearances over truth. Cordelia is silent and he throws her out. Goneril and Regan are free to pursue their evil machinations. Lear goes mad, Gloucester has his eyes gouged out and lots of people die.  That’s the trouble with Shakespeare tragedies, once they’re written they stay written, no matter how many centuries pass.

Tristan and Isolde with the Potion (1916) by John William Waterhouse, oil on canvas

As for Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde, the whole disaster hinges on a love potion. If Isolde’s handmaid Brangane hadn’t swapped a poisonous tincture for a love potion the whole five hour music drama would have been over in less than one. As it was (again, once written, a thing stays written), misunderstandings, secret trysts, honour and skullduggery abound and are thoroughly demonstrated by thunderous music and dramatic voices. Practically everybody dies here too. If Brangane had at least come clean a bit sooner rather than at the end when death was but a foregone conclusion, Tristan und Isolde might have lived happily every after.

Okay folks, seriously. Both King Lear with Antony Sher in the title role, one of the greatest parts written by Shakespeare, at the RSC in Stratford, and the transmission of Tristan und Isolde from the Met in NYC were experiences I wouldn’t have wanted to miss. Beloved didn’t come to Stratford, he’s seen King Lear many times; he finds the journey tiring now and will only undertake it “if it’s worth it” for him. Although it was sad that he stayed at home it was also a bit of a relief for me. For once I could enjoy a theatre visit without having to have half an eye on his wellbeing.

Wagner was a different matter. The transmission came to the screen at a small local theatre, which takes less than twenty minutes’ drive. He sat through the five hours’ performance without a murmur.  Actually, that’s not quite true, he once snorted a loud ‘Nonsense’ and another time he complained that the interviewer made it look as if the English horn solo in Act III was to be played by a cor anglais. But he had nothing to complain of in the orchestra or even the singers. Not many can do these roles justice but the Met ensemble did their very best. Although he detected a slight wobble in Isolde’s voice he praised her accuracy. That’s the trouble with musicians who have spent their life playing at the big houses, for world famous conductors and have had the privilege to hear the greatest voices for over forty years. They do tend to have an opinion!

Luckily the audience was small, seating was ‘cabaret style’, that is small tables for individual parties, wine, cake and hot drinks were served during the two intervals and, in spite of some minor niggles, the music was simply overwhelming. We are lucky, almost the entire Met season is to be transmitted; Wagner was only the season’s opening.

Orchestral Conductors - Mud From A Scraper - No.7 In An Occasional Series

I saw that Prufrock at Prufrock’s Dilemma has published a serious and learned guest post on the Art of Conducting. Those of you of an equally serious musical bent might like to pop over and read this well researched and well written essay. Anyone of a lighter disposition could continue reading here, although !WARNING! this may well turn into an overlong post. (I don’t expect comments)

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“What! up and down, carv’d like an apple-tart?”

Taming of the Shrew - Shakespeare

With the exception of a few who are truly great, conductors are either popular with audiences or the orchestra; to have a large public following and to command the respect of the players at the same time, is not given to many.

Whilst most lay audiences will admit to their incompetence in judging matters of sound, they claim the right to pass judgement on what they can see. Orchestral players assess the merits of a conductor solely by the quality of his music making, and find any unnecessary display on the podium merely distracting. A beat that looks impressive from behind is usually difficult to follow, whilst a stick technique, from which all extravagant gestures have been amputated, affects an audience no more than would a metronome.

There are as many types of beat as there are conductors - or ‘carvers’ as they are known in the profession. Some of them beat in circles, some diagonally, some give no down beats, some nothing else; some sweep the stick decisively from one extremity of their reach to the other, and some oscillate their elbows and expect to produce cohesion.

All carvers however, though differing in every other imaginable way, expect an orchestra to play the final chord of any slow pianissimo cadence on the fourth waggle of the stick, and not before.

A conductor should understand all instruments and be able to play several. He must be capable of judging balance and tone and appreciating the finer points of orchestration; he must be a student of human nature and applied psychology, and he must be able to understand the composer’s intentions - which is often overlooked. A great conductor can do all these things. He also has an attitude of humility to his art, and a great respect for his players. He achieves his results by taking an orchestra into spiritual partnership and treating them as equals. He never loses his temper or bullies players - nor does he need to do so.

There is a regrettable attitude among conductors that, by virtue of their craft, they are the social superiors of mere instrumentalists.  An orchestra is quick to judge the character of a carver. Musicians will co-operate with a conductor who is sincere and who has a musician’s approach, even though he has no pretensions to greatness. They will not approve of incompetence, over-theatricality, or simply lack of musicianship.

Given a good orchestra, any musician can stand on the rostrum and conduct it - provided that he makes it clear when the players are intended to start and to stop. The result will always be passable with a well-known work, because the performers can, and often do, play it from memory.

Conductors’ musical reputations are made and lost at rehearsals. No orchestra will co-operate with a carver who keeps going over a passage without saying what is wrong with it, or one who stops and points out an accidental error from ten minutes ago. To a certain extent, an orchestra knows its own failings, and if a conductor points them out he is considered sound. Musicians will, however, find means of retaliation if a conductor complains about a section that musicians know to be in order.

Musicians will rarely approve of a visiting carver’s new interpretation of an old familiar work. An interpretation that has been accepted for twenty years is not to be upset by the whim of any jack-in-office who couldn’t conduct a tram. A conductor who has earned the orchestra’s respect may, however, break convention in moderation without losing face.

The least pleasant conductor to play under is the composer. His technique is rarely any worse than that of a professional carver, but he will know every note of the score, and require to hear them all; he will also enjoy himself and expect to see the orchestra fascinated by his brain-child.

There are many symptoms by which a conductor can tell whether or not an orchestra likes him, should it make any difference to him. Sabotage is rare, being difficult to reconcile with an artistic conscience and wrong notes played at concerts are generally accidental. Passive resistance, however, is frequently indulged in, and, among other time-wasting efforts, consists of a general lack of concentration at rehearsals.

Finally, should any orchestral musician, through misguided ambition or avarice, aspire to become a conductor, he must be prepared to renounce all his old friends and allegiances; also in so doing he will encounter all the mistrust and suspicion otherwise only experienced by a man who meets his ex-wife’s relations.

A Library on the Coffee Table

Normally, I’d have had my head in a book these last two or three weeks of withdrawing from the world. True, I read. A dozen and more books, but all on the e-reader.  I see a title reviewed or a friend recommends an author. I check if the book is available in e-format, order it and within seconds it’s there for me to read. Any time of day or night. Where’s the fun in that?

Getting away from the misery of the black dog via stories, true or invented, often works for me. While I’m immersed in someone else’s life my attention is focussed away from myself. I’ve also concentrated on humorous writers, recommended by a friend. Evelyn Waugh was new to me, I started my journey with him with ‘Decline And Fall’, a darkly witty social satire, which brought forth an involuntary bark of laughter on practically every page, in spite of feeling slightly uncomfortable throughout. Nancy Mitford too was a new discovery. Her novels (I’ve read three of them so far) read like eating ice cream laced with sharp plum sauce. I shall finish her oeuvre and read more of Waugh, but not ‘Brideshead Revisited’, which made him known to those who don’t read. There were a few by Wodehouse and E.F.Benson, who are funny, but without the painful bite. Barbara Pym came in somewhere too, I used to like her years ago; she still has something that appeals, although nothing she wrote could ever cause offence. I have Muriel Spark’s ‘Memento Mori’ ready to go, also recommended by the same waspish source.

Too much of the same diet makes for indigestion, so I interrupted the satirical reading with Penelope Lively’s quasi memoir cum musings on aspects of a long life ‘Ammonites And Leaping Fish’; I like her novels and these essays address ageing, memory, time and a life in the 20th century.  A few mysteries leavened the broth further, Christopher Brookmeyer is a thriller writer I can bear to read and I’ve also recently discovered that Jill Paton Walsh, a very reasonable writer, has picked up the Dorothy L. Sayers baton and is prolonging the literary life of Lord Peter Wimsey. So you see, there’s plenty up there in that Cloud waiting for me, all wrapped up in one slim volume.

If only they were waiting in a tottering pile on my book table. Going to the library or, much better, to a book shop, browsing the shelves, talking to the librarian or the bookseller, getting chatting with other book lovers, comparing notes, flicking through a book, getting trapped by a passage, finding a new writer and wondering ‘should I give them a try’;  no, Amazon has none of that. It’s a lonely business, ordering books and music online (heavens, do you remember the old record shops where you stood in a narrow booth with clunky headphones and listened to an album prior to purchase?). Taking your treasures to the till, having them wrapped in the store’s bag and proudly bearing them off home - half the pleasure was in that.

And now I use ITunes for music downloads and Amazon for books. The record shops have gone and my eyes, damn them, have grown feeble and prefer e-books where I can adjust the size of type. I’ve been thinking of buying the book favourites anyway and maybe even a cd instead of downloading to an e-device. But that would be silly and unnecessary, wouldn’t it?

Anyway, all that reading (and listening to music) have made me feel a lot better.

Walking With Luciano

Black dogs are everywhere. 'Be More Sociable', a University study says.  Another one says ‘Fake It ’Til You Make It’; or there’s the one that advises you to ‘Compare Yourself With Someone Who is Worse Off Than You’. As if I cared about someone else’s misery when that black dog has me by the throat. ‘Listen to some sad music or read a sad book’. Weep. Apparently, that’s catharsis, about which the ancient Greeks knew a thing or two when they invented the concept. Guaranteed to make you feel better.

So there I am, one black dog scampering at my heels, the other one firmly clamped atop my shoulders, pushing my head forward and down. The blackthorn is in full bloom. I have a smile on my face, a rictus grin to split the atom, but I still can’t ‘Make It’. That one is a waste of effort. The sociable bit is better. Luciano* is with me, pretending to be Cavaradossi waiting for his execution in the morning, but admiring the bright stars anyway.  E lucevan le stelle. Yes. He is definitely worse off than me, particularly since Tosca, the one he loves, is going to throw herself off the battlements, although he is spared that knowledge, since he's dead by the time she jumps. I once saw her do that and bounce back up. They’d made the mattresses too springy.

The company of Luciano/Mario and his sad story should, according to the professors who research such subjects, have had me gambolling like a new born lamb. Instead of which I plodded along. Perhaps Pete** would help.  He might not have been the most cheerful folk singer but he was wise enough to know that the seasons must turn, turn, turn and that there is a time for every purpose under heaven.  He also says that We Shall Overcome, aiming this splendid mantra specifically at people with a pessimistic outlook.

I was humming along to Luciano and by the time I got to Pete, I actually sang a verse or two. Things were looking up until i remembered that I was walking with dead men.

Visiting Llareggub (try reading it backwards), the sleepily subversive Welsh town of Dylan Thomas’ play for voices Under Milk Wood which, according to the (also dead) actor Richard Burton is ‘entirely about religion, sex and the idea of death’ suited my mood perfectly. We went with friends, both alive, which made my grumpy rude mood unforgivable. I should wear a warning sign round my neck : Beware Of The Dog.

The play was brilliant. Polly Garter, the ever pregnant girl who scrubs floors and sweetly sings about her lost love, little Willy Wee, and sleeps with everybody who asks, almost made me cry. I covered it up by concentrating on the pure and pitch perfect voice of the singer. Then there’s Gossamer Beynon, the schoolteacher who thrills to the ticklish sensation of a sailor's "goatbeard"; Bessie Bighead "kissed once by the pig-sty when she wasn't looking"; and Dai Bread who dreams of "Turkish girls. Horizontal". And has there ever been a more poignant image of spinsterly unfulfilment than Myfanwy Price's "lonely, loving hotwaterbottled body”?

If you can’t make it to a performance - it’s coming to the States too in this, the centenary of Thomas’ birth, and the 60th anniversary of the BBC’s posthumous premiere of his final, never-quite-finished masterpiece, at least read it. The language will blow your mind. It’s sheer poetry.

Catharsis guaranteed.



*Luciano Pavarotti
** Pete Seeger

Permutations Cubed

We had a whole day without rain yesterday; it blew and blustered, of course, but there were minutes when the sun pushed through a gap and showed its face. I know that lots of you are worse off than us in the Shropshire hills. Some of you have ice and snow and heat waves and biblical floods. I am truly sorry for all of you, but somehow that doesn’t make it any easier to bear what we have here: rain and permanent grey cloud cover. It’s like telling somebody to eat up their greens because there are starving children in Africa who’d give their eyeteeth for a plate of food. Your own experience of misery is always greater than an imagined one.

Millie and I grabbed the opportunity and took the lane up the hill; only tarmac walking is possible at the moment. Small streams of water running downhill met us and the ditches were full to bursting. No matter, at least we weren’t drenched. Even Leonard Cohen coming over the earphones couldn’t dampen my newly resurgent spirits.

I said yesterday that I was going to explain about music in our house. Beloved is a professional musician. All his life he has played with, and for, extraordinary performers, singers and soloists. He is incapable of listening to a piece of music, any piece of music, without judging and dissecting and analysing. It used to drive me mad. In the end I gave up unless I knew it was something or somebody he would listen to without comment. My tastes  are eclectic, you might even say, indiscriminate. For me it all depends on the mood of the moment.  Having finally got round to modern technology, late, as with everything, I am now able to indulge my musical preferences at any time, even in the same room as Beloved. Mind you, I still have to be careful when and where I give croaky voice in enthusiastic accompaniment!

If only I had had children to introduce me to the powers of modern technology; I could have been dancing and singing years ago. Oh, hang on, I did have! One of these days I might even tell you what happened to them.

Permutations Squared

Having stirred the hornet’s nest so late at night, naturally I couldn’t sleep. Busy minds are a sure way to keep the sleep angels away, you know the ones I mean, the four that stand at the corners of your bed and softly rock you to sleep, bestrewing your covers with rose petals and fragrant cloves; surely you know Brahm’s Lullaby? No? Your loss.

Try it, this is only a short excerpt. I sang it when I was small; I can’t recollect my mum singing it to me, although I remember her singing, a lot, once times were normal again. I, in my turn, sang it to the youngest child of an English family, usually in the rose garden, just before her bedtime. I spent less than two months with them and long after I’d gone again, every female voice she heard singing on the radio, she’d stop what she was doing and say:”that’s U.”

Anyway, I decided to get up and make for the drawer with the sleeping pills and promptly got side-tracked by the computer. The next time I looked it was 3.30 in the morning. Still raining outside.

Talking about singing: I had been feeling particularly happy the  previous afternoon, because I’d managed to grapple with downloading some of my old CDs on to my iphone via the mac desktop. I also bought, via the ipad, a few CDs of German folk music and Lieder, stuff I hadn’t heard in decades. Going through my CD shelves I found a collection of Mittel-European music, songs my mum used to listen to on the radio and hum or sing along to. Operettas,  Kaffeehaus songs, Chansons,Viennese songs. Not being a techno whizz and working with three different digital gadgets, I could feel myself getting more and more excited when it all came together. I was also looking forward to getting stuck in with the earphones. Excitement and happiness are not good for me, a visit to the medicine drawer was indicated,  for a tranquilizer to take me back down a bit.

Music can be a little problematic in our house. ( I shall have to explain about that tomorrow.) Music via earphones is fine, I can listen undisturbed, even when I’m in the same room as Beloved. There I was, stretched out on the sofa in the living room, stupid smile on my face, positively swooning. The perfect occupation for a wet afternoon. Beloved reading, Millie dreaming by the fire, Not such a bad life after all!

Except that, by the time Marlene Dietrich oozed nostalgia and the heartbreaking strains of ‘Lili Marleen' into my ears, I was bawling, tears streaming down my face, more homesick than ever.

This version is in English.

                                                                               

I want to wallow in peace, so no comments. Yet.

Musicians - Soloists

Mud From A Scraper

No. 6 In An Occasional Series

An instrumental soloist is a musician who, by virtue of an over-developed technique and an excess of individuality, is unsuited to playing in orchestras. His task is a thankless one, for he is always conscious that there are fifty or more performers behind him watching for flaws in his performance. A solo violinist feels that he is being accompanied by twenty players who have studied the work he is playing in detail, and who know that they could play it better. A cello soloist is more fortunate, in that he rarely performs before more than eight of his critical colleagues.

Pianists are in a happier position as they seem to be divided into two classes: a) sensitive ones, who benefit from comparison with the insensitive ones who ignore the orchestra, and b) those others who are oblivious of any hostility they may arouse.

Singers are judged by different standards. It is an old saw that people are either gifted with musicianship or with a good voice; thus a singer exhibiting the slightest trace of artistic sensibility is welcomed by an orchestra however inadequate the voice may be. The majority are praised or condemned for their intonation and the quality of voice, and except in rare cases will be unfavourably compared with famous singers of the past, not only for their voice but also looks and sex appeal. Players know little or nothing about vocal technique, but refuse to relinquish their prerogative to criticise anything in earshot.

The artistic merit of any soloist can be gauged by the amount of applause afforded to him or her by the orchestra. Most players tap their stands at the end of a concerto or aria as an act of thanksgiving that the piece is over - but it also signifies gratitude for the audience the soloist has attracted. If they continue to tap whilst the soloist is taking his second bow, it means that they approve of the performance. If they are still tapping when he is recalled for a third bow, they think he is really good. However, no player applauds after this, lest the soloist be encouraged to play an encore.

Many orchestral musicians entered their careers under the illusion that they would one day be soloists. Despite this, there is no trace of jealousy in their indictment of concerto players, for they come to realise, after fifteen years in the profession, that though there is no kudos to be gained in their work, theirs indeed is the higher calling.

Musicians - The Platform Manner

Sir Simon Rattle and The Berlin Philharmonic at the Royal Festival Hall

Mud From A Scraper

No. 5 in an Occasional Series

Aside from all considerations of individual and orchestral technique, there is a strict code of behaviour on concert platforms which has evolved through many generations of musicians. Failure to observe it results in the offender being branded as a beginner. The correct attitude of mind assumed by all members of orchestras is one of vague resentment, directed indiscriminately at the programme, which could be shorter, the management, which could be less grasping, the rest of the orchestra, which could be better, and the conductor, who could hardly be worse. No true professional admits to any enjoyment in his work, though the opus in question may be one of the few he really likes; should any aspect of contemporary music be mentioned in conversation, all remarks are of a deprecatory nature.

The correct posture, except for front desk players, differs from that which is taught at the schools of music. The left elbow of violin and viola players rests on the left hip or any other convenient object, and the right arm is held as low as possible. Cellists and bass players conform more nearly to the scholastic ideal, as it is not possible for them to hold their instruments any lower; instead, they lean on them in the most relaxed manner.

When there is a prolonged pizzicato passage, the violinist, and the violist, puts his bow on his knee, and either turns his instrument so that his chin is resting on its ribs, or lowers it altogether, supporting the scroll on his knee, with the button or end-pin, on the middle of his waistcoat.

It is generally understood that if the conductor wants any extra refinements, he will ask for them. Whether or not his requests will be granted is another matter. A professional rarely uses vibrato, save on the longest notes, and when particularly exhorted to do so. Anyone who does so too often is, again, branded as a beginner, because vibrato, besides being useless in many passages, is never specified in any contract, and musicians are specialists in the art of working to rule.

No-one normally uses a different style from his neighbour, as there is rarely enough room on a concert platform. Most performers habitually harass their neighbours for a few extra inches. Cellists are especially sensitive to lack of space, and indeed, develop a form of claustrophobia if any other instrumentalist comes within a bow-length of them.  

There are similar customs among the pit fraternity in theatres and opera-houses. Apart from never having enough room, the pit musician never has enough light, and constantly complains to management and electricians. In contrast with the symphony-player's preference for a well hidden position on the platform, the opera-player struggles to be placed near the audience, so that he can better watch the stage. Or when he becomes bored, which is his natural state, he amuses himself by fitting tunes of a frivolous nature to the accompaniments of the most impassioned arias.

The pit-musician will show interest only in the length of an opera. He may have a hidden preference for Aida, but will enjoy Traviata more. He may not have much sympathy with Puccini, but La Boheme is always popular. The Ring is unspeakable, and Meistersinger is beyond the pale. He only really likes one opera - Salome, which is over by 8.45 pm.

Musicians: The Professional Approach

At Rehearsal

Mud From A Scraper

No. 4 in an Occasional Series

"I say 'silver sound', because musicians sound for silver"

Shakespeare

The first rule that must be learnt by those who would understand the character of musicians is that few members of an orchestra are interested in music. Each plays his instrument because that is his trade - because that is the job for which he is physically and mentally suited, and that is the best way he knows of earning a living.

His aim is, like the average man or woman, to earn the maximum income with the minimum effort, though this is not so straightforward as it sounds, and even the minimum effort is very strenuous. Owing to the fact that there are a few eccentrics in the profession, who exhibit excessive interest in their work, who are insensitive to the hostility they arouse, and who have relations in the management, an unnecessarily high standard of conduct has come to be expected. It requires a great deal of skill to find the mean between doing as little work as is compatible with an artistic conscience, and doing as much as a conductor demands.

The location of this compromise is determined not only by the general pattern of behaviour of the particular orchestra, but by the position of the player in question: The further back in the section the musician is, the less he needs to keep up appearances. Those at the back may need to make a better showing than their immediate superiors in order to remain in the orchestra at all; those at the front, who are heard and watched by all, are expected to look efficient even to laymen, and must behave as though they enjoy playing the same old hackneyed works year after year.

All other points of orchestral technique are based on this principle. It governs the posture the player adopts, the energy he expends in playing, the time he arrives at rehearsal and the colour of the socks he wears for concerts.

It may be thought that the height of a musician's professional ambition would be membership of one of the top symphony orchestras. It is not so; even members of the top symphony orchestras yearn to be invited to play with the small, light combinations which broadcast so frequently under so many names. A contract job is considered stultifying, and though the financial security is useful, a free-lance player with the right connections can earn in a week as much as a symphony player receives in a month, though he may be unemployed for the two subsequent weeks.

Above all, a player must have the attitude of mind which goes with this concept of the profession. The biggest crime one can commit used to be called 'arty-crafty' or 'British West Hampstead'.  This consist of understanding counterpoint, going to concerts, tracing the influence of Stravinsky in the works of Villa-Lobos, and working out unconventional fingerings. Such behaviour may make a good impression on an amateur orchestra or on the lunatic fringes of the profession. It is anathema to the experienced player.

True Story

WILLOW'S MAGPIE No. 68

Reg Barker was the leader of the Percussion Section at the orchestra of the Royal Opera House.  It was part of his duties as leader to study the score before a new work was performed, working out which of his section members would play which instrument, for instance, would the side drum have enough time to get to the cymbals, etc.

On call for a performance one evening shortly before rehearsals for the new opera started, he decided to use the interval to go down to the library and start on the job. He was only half way through the task when the interval bell sounded, calling the musicians back to the pit. 

Reg had a glass eye; when he heard the bell, he took it out, shuffled the papers into a pile, placed his eye on top of it and said: "here, keep an eye on it for me, and carry on, if you would. I've got to get back to work".

Musicians On Out-Of-Town Engagements

Mud From A Scraper

No. 3 in an occasional series.

Musicians on Tour

- between rehearsal and performance -

One of the least popular features of the orchestral musician's life is the out of town concert, or gig. This usually involves early rising, a long coach or train journey, the expense of buying meals, and a late return as well as the customary rehearsal and performance. For all this, the player receives little extra remuneration.

There is invariably great anxiety about catching the return train, and it is accepted that the last movement of the last work in a concert is always played faster than on any previous occasion. The conductor may object to this, but is usually overruled. Experienced musicians have a wide knowledge of the shortest route from every concert hall to the nearest station, via some public house.

Touring may consist either of a string of provincial concerts spread around the country, or of a longer period in just one or two towns. The first kind is generally detested, as the player is away from his customary haunts, and is not long enough in any one place to settle into a routine; the second is more easily tolerated and some musicians may even enjoy such a sojourn as it provides an opportunity for making new acquaintances and playing on fresh golf courses. Whatever its effect upon musicians, touring is a long-standing custom, part of their contract. A beneficial side effect of touring is that it boosts sales of recordings.

The main problem attached to visiting strange towns is that of finding reasonably priced accommodation. Alas, some musicians welcome tours as a justifiable excuse for getting away from wife and home, and, in common with sailors and commercial travellers, tend to have a sweetheart in many towns. Such players rarely have accommodation problems.

Musicians pay one of their few tributes to culture when working out-of-town, for no beauty spot, abbey or historic building in provincial towns is left unvisited. The purpose of this is two-fold: to be able to say they have been there when asked by curious grandchildren and also to help prove to suspicious wives that they have really been away on a job at all. Most take their cameras to add evidence to their stories; some have even been known to hand these to accomplices to take pictures for them, when their motives for going out-of-town were less than professional.

A Picture Book Week in Spring

Do you sometimes have a run of really good days?

As weeks go, I wish last week could last a little longer, or come back for a repeat performance. Lots of inviting sunshine made for a happy disposition and tempted me to spend lots of time walking and gardening; several pleasant social and cultural occasions  added a little spice to my usually quite humdrum existence and blogging became a pleasure again.

It all started with another birthday party, a celebration of 90 years of music and adventure. This is Bert, a bassist and tuba player, who even now, at 90, performs with local amateur groups. Bert's always been a bit of a ladies' man; he still has his groupies who collect him at home, carry his instruments for him and take him to the venue in their cars. Several ladies at the party were having a good-natured discussion about their relative rank in the pecking order of Bert's affections.  If this is what 90 can be like, why would anyone be afraid of getting old?

The subject for last week's poetry group meeting was 'Quodlibet',  i.e. bring your favourite poems. I always find it difficult to choose a favourite anything, be it film, poem, music, etc. I'm one of these unimaginative people who need to be 'told', who need instructions, guide-lines; given free rein, I dither and find it very hard to make up my mind.

On the gloriously sunny morning of the day of the poetry meeting, Benno and I went up into Sowdley Woods, a wild area full of fallen trees, a brook and the small lake it forms at the bottom of the hill, overgrown rhododendron thickets, and an incongruous plantation of giant redwood in the snowdrop wood, which a long dead owner of the small manor house, where John Osborne used to live and which is now owned by the Arvon Foundation, must have thought a suitable addition to an English wood. The manor is used as a writers' retreat and residential  creative writing centre. I'd still not made up my mind  which poems to take in the evening when I found several of the birches in the same plantation above 'The Hurst' (the name of the house) had white sheets of paper attached to them. Surely not warnings that "Trespassers will be prosecuted" ? I thought. Far from it. I had found poems pinned to trees! Answers to my prayers! Could anything have been more serendipitous?

Gerald Manley Hopkins' 'Inversnaid'. was one of them:

It starts:

This darksome burn, horseback brown,
His rollrock high road roaring down,
In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam
Flutes and low to the lake falls home.

suitable for the place and suitable for me.

A last minute concert added to the week's  stand-out nature. Beloved met a friend on his way to fetch the newspaper who asked if we we were going to the concert given by the Mid Wales Chamber Orchestra Soloists in Newtown, over in Wales. We hadn't even heard of it. Tickets were still available, the friend very kindly gave us a lift and we enjoyed a varied and excellently played performance.










All that and a wonderful day's gardening to end the week.  Gardener came yesterday and we dug up, divided and replanted many of the overgrown clumps of herbaceous plants like phlox, campanulas, geraniums and several grasses.

This morning I took my second cup of breakfast tea out into the garden and admired the fruits of yesterday's labour.  These neat, small clumps of plants will soon shoot up and fill the tidy brown earth around them, lean into each other and jostle for space. I can't wait.

"Spring's messenger in every spot

Smiling on all - Forget-me not"

John Clare

These patches of forget-me-nots appear all over the garden at this time of year. Some people barely tolerate them for being self-seeded and slightly vulgar, but I welcome them. They are such friendly and accommodating little plants, their modest pale blue flowers light up dark and bright corners alike and when their day has gone, they give in very graciously and leave without complaint.

Introducing The Audience

Interior of Covent Garden Theater, London
ca. 1808
Thomas Rowlandson (1756-1827 British)

Mud Gathered From A Scraper  -  Part 2 in an occasional series.

Part 1 was an introduction to orchestral Musicians


How many members of an audience realise that whilst they are looking at and commenting on an orchestra, the players are equally looking at them?  -  and how many people sitting in the front row of the stalls realise just how unintelligent and depressing they appear to those on the platform, or in the pit?

If members of the public are dressed informally, they are held to look scruffy, and players resent wearing formal clothes for them. If the audience is immaculate in evening dress, the players blame it for maintaining the convention that makes dinner jackets compulsory.  It is the view of the audience a player has from the impersonal elevation of the platform, before the houselights go down, which determines his opinion that all audiences can be divided into ten categories, regardless of the time, place and programme.

The first group, to which of course all readers of this blog belong, is of genuine music-lovers, who listen to the performance, and do their best to understand the music. They do not necessarily sit in the best seats, and may know little about the intricacies of first movement form, but they are the core of the audience, and the only people to whom musicians are always glad to play, however few in number they may be. There is also a type of listener who imagines that he belongs in the first group. He will exchange knowing remarks about the orchestra with his neighbours, and when he recognises a melody, will hum it to himself, in another key. Many members of amateur orchestras belong to this group.

Another kind of concert-goer tries to give an impression of being musical by studying the score during the performance. Should he not possess a score, or should he become hopelessly lost, he will shut his eyes, assume an expression of concentrated ecstasy and sway slightly, in time with the music. A fourth category is composed largely of old ladies, who appear to be enjoying a concert intelligently, and who will say, in conversation with a performer, how they love good classical music, like "In a Monastery Garden".

Soloists are often engaged for concerts on the strength of their following.  The soloist's fans do not bother to hide their boredom during the works preceding the concerto or aria; they are sullen and fidgety and usually leave when their idol has taken his or her last bow. The only point in their favour, from the musicians point of view, is that they make the concert a financial success.

Some people buy season tickets for a series of concerts; thus they can hear six programmes for the price of five. They will attend each programme in order to get their money's worth and can easily be recognised by their air of determined enjoyment, which is similar to that seen at a holiday camp during wet weather.

Smaller sections of audiences may consist of young lovers who consider the surroundings more conducive to successful courting than the cinema. Then there are school parties, who pay reduced rates; pupils regard the occasion as an outing of much the same sort as a conducted tour of the local gas-works. Parents occasionally bring their families to concerts, hoping to 'do them good'. When the youngest member starts whimpering during the slow movement, they leave their seats in the middle of the row, red-faced, kicking as many shins as they find on their way out.

And finally, there is unpunctuality, which is a common failing among all sections of an audience. Although concerts rarely start at the advertised time there is still a core of determined late-comers delaying the performance to the annoyance of players and conductor.

In spite of the foregoing, players need their audience, so please come and listen;  they also need to pay the rent.

Introducing Musicians

WILLOW'S MAGPIE TALES No. 48

Every orchestral player, so scenario-writers would have you believe, carries a conductor's baton in his case. This is not true: open any instrument case in any bandroom at any time, and you will find a near-black bow-tie or flimsy scarf, seven old assorted programmes, an outdated lottery ticket, a sandwich and a dirty duster.

There may also be an instrument of some sort, but there will be no more sign of a conductor's baton than of a poached egg. Probably less.

There is a great deal of romantic nonsense written about musicians. Novelists endeavour to convince the public that members of the profession wear an air of glory, and manage to infuse them with a spirit of romance and adventure, that is denied other mortals. A musician's life is, in reality, as prosaic as any; there is no more glory attached to it than to the lot of a shop assistant, and no more adventure than to the life of a travelling salesman.

The concert goer is, perhaps, more deluded than one who knows less about music. After weeks of happy anticipation he listens, entranced, whilst sixty black-clad performers play his favourite symphony. It is only natural that he should place these beings on a mental pedestal, and imagine that if they do have the same sordid necessities and vices as the rest of the species, they at least forget about them whilst they are playing for his benefit.

The concert goer also holds the idea that musicians play chamber music in all their leisure moments. The opposite view is also widely held: that musicians play poker whenever they are off duty, and are too sharp to admit that they are on an easy racket. The two opinions, in a nutshell, are that musicians are either long-haired or bald. Some of them are, of course, but never at the same time.

The first thing a player does when he comes on to a stage, having made sure that he has the best available chair and sufficient room to play, is to study the audience. Very attractive members of the audience, male or female, will occasion an appreciative titter. Critics will cause mournful glances in the direction of the conductor, blaming him in advance for the performance's shortcomings.  Any player spying a fixer - these exalted beings rarely attend concerts - will keep the sighting to him/herself and play like they've never played before. Getting on to the A-list of a well-known fixer is what every musician aspires to; fixers have such sought-after money-spinners as light music sessions, film sessions and TV jingles in their gift. Jingles pay the most for the least effort.

Musicians develop, very early in their careers, a fine technique of conversation with the public. They will size a layman up from his first sentence, and adapt their remarks to suit his taste, on the principle that every member of an audience is a potential employer, or at least a possible supper. There is no propaganda for musicians, only for music, and it is incumbent on every player to convince as many people as he can that he is a fine artist and a nice chap and that the orchestra to which he belongs is the finest in the country.

During their career, most players adopt a fatalistic attitude, and have difficulty in keeping up the attitudes that are expected of them. They would really much rather be at home painting the bathroom or sorting their stamp collection.

. . . . . . . . . And How!

Schubert At The Piano
by
Gustav Klimt

To understand the post title you have to go to the last post. If you don't want to do that, just watch me gloat!

Can you hear me buzz?  See me fizz? A bee in high summer with pollen available by the bucket load couldn't buzz louder. The best vintage champagne has nothing on me when it comes to fizz.

I have had the most marvellous day yesterday.

It started with a very positive review from he The Weblog Review People which put me in a good mood. Try as I might, I couldn't find the derisive laughter between the lines, so I gave up searching for it.

First stop of the day was a new venture. I have joined a proper creative writers group, with a teacher who actually rips your work to shreds. She is a tiny person, slim and lively, with a sharp mind, a quick eye for a ridiculous turn of phrase and the capacity to reduce her pupils to gibbering wrecks, in a nice way, of course; give her her due, she grudgingly allows you the hint of a brownie point when you've done well.

A quick stop in a lay-by to swallow a sandwich, then off to the next Buzz stop, a meeting of the German Conversation Group of the University of the Third Age (U3A), where we listened to Schubert Lieder and  discussed the (very average) poetry which Schubert used for them. The 'poets' were his friends, hence his, to my mind, rather misguided choice. Never mind, we soon dismissed the poetry and gave full  attention to his music. These were old recordings by Dietrich Fischer Dieskau, still among the best ever.

The group has a leader who is a highly intelligent, widely read, multi linguist, who used to be a teacher and has the teacher's failing, in that he likes the sound of his own voice.  (Sorry all you lovely teachers among my blogging buddies, but you have to admit that talking comes easily). This teacher, an excellent fellow otherwise, also likes to add a little giggle to the end of many of his sentences.

By the time evening came round I was too high to worry about cooking,
so we went to The White Horse at Valley's End.

The table in the alcove by the wood burner was waiting for us.

All that culture gives me a thirst.





PS: I really like teachers, some of my best
friends, etc, etc.

It's Not What You Know But Whom You Know.

Sir Adrian' s Head  . . . . . . . .

A young musician, a female clarinettist, having played in an orchestra for a few years, decided that medicine was her first love after all and she gave up her job and returned to medical training. During an important anatomy exam, she stood at the dissecting table and watched an attendant carry a tray holding an object covered with a cloth towards her. Students were not given exam details in advance and she therefore awaited disclosure of the object nervously.

The cloth was removed and to her utter amazement, there, on the tray, rested the head of Sir Adrian Boult, which she recognized immediately and which she had last seen attached to his body, very much alive, conducting her and the orchestra from the rostrum.

Sir Adrian Boult had died and left his body to medical science.



. . . . . . .  and Sir George’s Reputation.


It is a well-known fact that medicine and music have a great affinity for each other. Medics often love music as much or even more than musicians do.

Beloved tells a story, which goes something like this:

When he was in imminent danger of losing the use of his fingering arm (i.e. the arm that holds up a string instrument), a very serious and potentially life-threatening operation to his neck was the only option. The famous medic, who happened to be the Queen’s official Neurosurgeon, who was to perform the operation, found time for a chat during prepping.

“I hear you are a musician at Covent Garden; what do you think of Solti”?

Beloved was one of only two members of the orchestra who actually liked and admired Sir George Solti for his rigorous and exacting approach to music and who was therefore known as a bit of a slave driver.  Beloved admitted his admiration with a clear conscience.

“That’s good”, said the great man, “ the last time I had dinner with George . . . “

The operation went well, the arm and Beloved’s career were saved.

Sad Times

It's been on the cards for a while

but now it's official:

music will have to be locked in a box, never to see the light

of day, of concert hall, of salon again.

The enemy

made his presence felt long ago, 

his advance has been steady,

now the invasion is complete.

The war is lost, 

arthritis rules the day!

The Consultant said so: there is no chance of the shoulder joint being repaired to make any meaningful playing possible. What has brought pleasure, now brings pain: an occupational hazard.

Strangely, I am by far the sadder of the two us.