Exciting facts about favourite works unknown to music lovers.

[vladimirdounin]

Introduction. A couple years ago I asked one well known musical magazine to publish my article about a new way of teaching (see my Posts: “Look back … and ahead”, “Test: Teaching and Learning from a distance” etc.).

The editor in turn asked me to write for them an article about “Musical criticism”.

 After I had submitted my article the editor told me that he was going to publish my article in spite of “mutiny on his ship” because of it. Unfortunately, instead of the copy with my article I received only a message, that the mentioned editor is fired and my article can be published only on the condition that I will remove thoroughly any trace of the venom this article is soaked with.

 This story has confirmed my suspicions that I (like many other Russians) had absolutely wrong expectations regarding the “freedom of word” that Western broadcasters taught us in the days of communism. I do not like chewing gum in articles, I like pepper more. In any case I hope that all the exciting (for me, at last) facts in my article could be interesting and useful for other pianists. V.D.
                                                                                                 
                                                           
                                                                                                               By Vladimir Dounin

“ DOES MUSIC REALLY NEED A “MUSICAL CRITICISM”?”

Dear Reader,

What do you think about musical criticism and its role in modern musical culture? If it is exactly the very last thing you would think about, (because you love the music itself and you hate any stupid and boring speculations towards this great art) I want to shake your hand. I hate them too. However, let me share some true stories that had happened to me.

Several years ago I worked as a chorus master and rehearsal pianist at the “most technically advanced opera theatre on the planet”. That time we did Puccini’s “Tosca”. Unfortunately, we did it under the direction of the “internationally renowned” Mr. Nansen (the name is changed). He ordered the choristers to sing from the backyard through the microphones and amplifier instead of singing with their natural voices on the stage. If he ordered the singers to start singing, for example, from the bar number 17 on the page 53, he did not allow them categorically to start half of a bar earlier (even if they had to start in the middle of the word in this case). He gave Cavaradossi the wrong portrait to work on: instead of Mary-Magdalina, a former prostitute, he gave him Madonna with a Child. In this case the whole audience had to share Tosca’s suspicions regarding Cavaradossi’s fidelity, because the chosen model (local kind of prostitute) was obviously inappropriate. Etc.

I never played “Tosca “ before and was literally amazed by the abundance of typical Spanish music, and especially Spanish dances in the score. I had never noticed them when I listened to the orchestra before, and now I could not understand the reason for Spanish music to be used in a pure Italian opera. I asked my boss (a former opera singer), and he immediately recommended me to ask Mr. Nansen. “Do you think this old idiot can answer my question?”- I objected. My boss explained to me that Mr. Nansen was in fact a worldwide prominent stage-properties specialist. He had made stage props for the best theatres of the world. Then he started to direct operas. He did not know anything in music, but nowadays it does not matter in musical business as much as competitive price. Each time he had read everything available about a particular opera and eventually was able to direct the production. He has already done it in many countries.

I asked Mr. Nansen my question, and he immediately exploded. “ Where did you read about this? “–he shouted.. “Not one book, nor one article mentioned anything Spanish in this opera!” He called the conductor for help, and the conductor assured me that opera “Tosca” has nothing in common with Spain, and that he did not hear anything Spanish in this music either.

I browsed the score carefully and everything became clear to me. Many years ago I had worked with Musical Propaganda and now I detected easily all its elements in Puccini’s “Tosca”. I realize that you might not believe this, so let us look at the opera once more. 

There are two groups of characters: The first one consists of the “good people”. They fight for freedom; they hate religion, disregard marriage, and proclaim the principles of “free love” instead. Puccini wrote for them a magnificent, gorgeous music in typical Italian “Bel Canto”, “rubato” style.

The other group is the “bad people”, enemies. They support the monarchy, they are religious bigots, and they like everything that is Spanish: Scarpio wears Spanish costume, drinks Spanish wine, and the music of these ”bad people” is always based on elements of bolero, fandango and other Spanish dances, sometimes with specifically Spanish harmonies. Why? This is very logical, because dancing music is incompatible with the feeling of Freedom. The timing of each note in the dance is fixed rigidly, everything should be played strictly on beat without any rubato.  However why did Puccini use Spanish dances, and not Italian? And what on earth does “Tosca” have in common with Musical Propaganda?

 Here is the answer. If you, for example, want to compose some kind of “anticommunist opera”, which nation’s music will first come to your mind to portray the “bad people” – communists?
I am sure that it will be some popular Russian song. It is a stereotype - any audience will immediately understand what you meant. However if the next time you want to compose some kind of  “anti-capitalist opera”, your “bad characters” will sing “Yankee-Doodle”, of course. 

The same happened in”Tosca”. Spain – the motherland of Holy Inquisition - is an historical symbol of religious extremism and intolerance. This is the real reason, why the whole musical dramaturgy of this opera is based on the uncompromising conflict of these two contrasting musical spheres: Italian “ Bel Canto” and Spanish “Flamenco”.  In support to this assertion I would like to point out two very interesting exceptions to the rule in this Opera.

The first -  when a fugitive revolutionary, Angelotti, mentions the name of Secret Police’s chief, Scarpio, and gives the audience his “musical description”. Instead of before and after this episode singing in Bel Canto style, he sings at this only moment a typical Spanish “percussion style” melody (on the same repeating note) in the “Bolero time”.

The second - when Tosca believes Scarpio’s slander. Her music immediately becomes “Spanish’ at this moment, but she sings Bel Canto again in the next parts of the opera.

 The end of XIX century was full of struggle between “ progressive, new ideas” and “old-fashioned” ones. In this context “ Tosca” could be considered not only a great opera-work, but also a powerful tool of propaganda against “outdated and obsolete religious and moral dogmata”. It was Puccini’s contribution into deliberation of humankind from chains of the past and into future total victory of unrestricted personal freedom.

However Puccini’s artistic intuition and imagination prompted to him how dangerous and destructive are humans with mere pragmatism in mind without moral, conscience and religion. Puccini’s “Madame Butterfly” can be considered “anti-propaganda” against this “new type of human” who profits on goodness and sincerity of others.
 (Look around and ask yourself why now all the “leading nations” became extinct in their own countries and are replaced successfully with “less advanced” nations, which did not abolish ideas of family, moral and religion yet. Isn’t the idol of unrestricted personal freedom in spite of interest of society in whole the real reason of many modern problems?)

In “Madame Butterfly” we can see absolutely the same technique of “musical propaganda”. On the first day that we worked on this opera the conductor stopped the singers (Captain Pinkerton and US Consul) after they sang the famous toast “America forever!”, and told me: “How could Puccini write such an inappropriate music for these words?” (We had met before and he knew that I had disliked “this boring opera” as much as he did). But he did not know that during the past 3 month, that I played the score, I literally fell in love with this great music. He was very surprised to hear from me, that these “inappropriate words and music” were taken by Puccini from “Star-spangled Banner” – the National Anthem of USA (the old, Puccini’s time version: in 1932 the US Congress changed the words and something in the music as well).

 The conductor told me that he had been playing “Madame Butterfly” for over 20 years and had “never heard”, that all the  “Good People” in this opera  (honest and noble Japanese) sing all their music only in 4/4 or 2/4 time. The music for them is always in the “rubato”, Bel Canto” style, and the melodies are always beautiful and thrilling. At the same time all the  “Bad People” (crafty and cynical Americans) sing the whole opera only in 3/4 time and only the music related to the US Anthem..

The Italian style music that the Japanese characters sing sounds moving and inspired, whereas the music of the Americans sounds rational and cold. Once again there is one very interesting (typical for Puccini’s technique) exception to this rule. There is a moment in the opera where Cio-Cio-San  (Madame Butterfly) sings in ¾ time and just the music related to the US Anthem. This happens only during her conversation with the US Consul where she naively insists, that she is the legal wife of an American citizen, therefore she is now an American as well.  When she realizes that she has been betrayed and she is not “a spouse of an American citizen” anymore, she sings again in “rubato”, Bel Canto style and, of course, not in 3/4 but in 4/4 time.

The conductor confessed that he had never read this score before (it is not uncommon among the “normal” modern conductors), he had only listened to CDs and tried to copy them. On the day of our last rehearsal with the piano he said to me: “It is my last good day in this opera (because the next day he had to start work with an orchestra). Tomorrow I will again hear some kind of disgusting over-sweetened syrup instead of this great music”. Now I was surprised: “Why don’t you want to play exactly what Puccini wrote? ”He answered: “It will be like killing me by myself if I dare to play differently from “traditional Puccini” that is what everybody expects to hear. Nobody will tolerate it if I break the tradition”.

But “this tradition” is “as false as a three dollar bill”. You can attempt to try this experiment: screen the words in the score of “Tosca” or “Madame Butterfly” with stripes of paper and ask any literate pianist to play the score for you, and do not say that it is Puccini, of course. It’d be best if this pianist does not know these operas well and will not recognize the music immediately. (I am afraid that it is not a big problem nowadays to find such a pianist). Make a recording and compare it to any traditional one with the orchestra. I tried my best to find a recording with adequate performance of both these operas but failed: no orchestra played the genuine text of Puccini.

Are you not sure that all these mentioned above details are really important for us? O.K, picture this: “ Imagine that you are watching Hockey or Soccer. Can you understand anything on the television if all the players are wearing the same uniform, with both teams wearing absolutely identical colours?- It would be a complete, impossible nonsense, of course. Such an “innovation” should kill both these games undoubtedly.

 But the same word “nonsense” can be applied to an opera where all the characters are “dressed in the same musical clothes” and we can not recognize their “real” thoughts, feelings and intentions from their musical languages. Always in any normal opera the audience “knows”: whose words are the truth and who is a liar (just from the music, whatever the words are that characters “say” at the moment). However, try to forget the story, do not listen to the meaning of the words, and try to listen only to the music of “Madame Butterfly” (in modern interpretation).

From the music, you will hear a highly respectable, noble and honest person, who loves sincerely and with all his heart another noble, honest and sincere person, who is also full of true and whole-hearted love for him. And the result of these deep and lofty feelings is that one of these persons puts a knife in the stomach. Does it make any sense? Isn’t this a kind of musical absurdity? “Musical identification” is the key principle to operatic art as a whole. Therefore the “homogenized puree” made of Puccini’s music (instead of a clear and immediately recognizable gallery of musical characters) is the same nonsense as “one-colour hockey”. Such sort of show will inevitably lose its audience (isn’t it already happening to opera these days?)


By the way, if you bought any product and read on the box that it contains no sugar or salt, you know for sure that there is no sugar or salt in the product. However you can read the “scientific comments” on the “Madame Butterfly” CD and in any textbook that there are no genuine Japanese songs in Puccini’s score. I am not a scientist, but I do know a popular Japanese folk-song “Sacura, Sacura” and everyone can hear it in the orchestra music during the wedding scene in the opera. Open your ears, dear scientists.

How come that conductors, musical theoretics, historians etc do not see such obvious things, such as the ones I told you above?  Maybe they can not read properly?

To be continued in "Exciting facts. Part II"

[vladimirdounin]

Continued from "Exciting facts about favourite works. Part I.

How come that conductors, musical theoretics, historians etc do not see such obvious things, such as the ones I told you above?  Maybe they can not read properly?

No, of course not. I am sure, that some of them can read much better than I do. However, it is “much cheaper”, in all the meanings of this word (at first – “much safer”, you will see it below) to copy somebody instead of taking responsibility on one’s own shoulders. But that is not the whole explanation nor is the whole truth. The question is what are they prepared to see in the score? I will remind you one famous experiment done by psychologists. They gave to one random group 20 portraits of the “bloodiest and cruelest criminals of the last 50 years”. Another group received 20 portraits of the “greatest humanists and heroes of our epoch”. Both groups were asked to describe what all these faces have in common. The portraits were absolutely the same, but you can imagine,  what the first group wrote about “atrocious and beast-like faces” of their portraits, and the second group about the “noble and spiritually elevated” features of their portraits.
 
So who should prepare our musicians to read and understand the score? Whose job is it to give accurate and reliable information about the work, the composer, and the performances and performers? Musical critics have to do this job, but do they do it in a satisfactory way?   

I have a question. Why are we not scared when we are buying our food, driving our cars, and living in our houses? This is because of a huge army of highly qualified and well-trained inspectors and special institutions that protect us. We are sure that the food we put in our mouths is not poisonous, car will not fall apart on the highway, and the roof over our heads will not collapse.

The human society needs “quality control” in all the areas of life to be safe. However are you not scared to go to a concert where you do not know the performer and the repertoire well? You should be because even if you are not at risk physically, a few hours of your life still could be poisoned.

The mighty GM or VW can be forced to call back millions of their cars if any important defect is detected. This happens from time to time to any company.
However nobody ever had the guts nor authority to say to the great pianist Vladimir Ashkenazy, that he recorded Beethoven’s “Fur Elise” with 7 false “ D” s instead of “ E”s. ( These “E”s were written by Beethoven’s own hand and printed in all his life-time editions). Or that he recorded the wrong timing (duplets instead of triplets) in the Study No10 Op.10. Nobody said to the great singer Dietrich Fisher-Dieskau, that he miscounted some notes in his recording of “Winter Reise”; to the great conductor Herbert von Karajan, that he did the same in the “Introduction” to “Magic Flute” and in the finale of the 9th by Beethoven (“Ode To Joy”). They will not become less great than they are due to this pointing, but they will learn to feel themselves more responsible in front of the composer and history. (In spite of the fact, that “dead composers have no money to hire a good lawyer against them” – a quote from my artistic director). This is as important as stopping the spread of SARS, AIDS etc, for thousands will start to copy these infected recordings immediately instead of reading the original score in a healthy manner.

Any dealership will be closed down and its executives will be treated in lunatic asylum if they would try to remove unnecessary in their opinion parts from “Mercedes” and “Jaguar” and sell the cars with only one headlight or without figurine of jaguar to the customer. All the customers will be immediately reimbursed with apologies, of course. However you have no chances to get your money back, if you did not hear your favourite Habanera in “Carmen” or Cavatina of Figaro in “Barber of Seville”. Because any impostor-director “has right” to cut off any part of the opera if he/she considers this part “inappropriate for his artistic conception” instead of cutting off these paltry conception together with its idiot-author. These disgraceful practices must be put an end, but who can do it? 

Any jeweler will lose his customers if he sells imitations under the guise of precious stones. Any food business will be closed in a few days if they sell cats instead of rabbits and crows instead of chicken. But where is the responsibility of those people who sell food intended for our mind, heart and soul? If you bought, for example, a recent recording of the “Moonlight Sonata”, it will be most likely a vulgar imitation instead of Beethoven’s music. Because if you will ask any literate pianist to play the top voice (melody) and the bass of the famous 1st movement, you will hear undoubtedly a typical for Beethoven’s music Funeral march. Then, if you ask the pianist to play the middle voice - you will hear waltz-style accompaniment typical for “love-dream music” (e.g. remember Liszt’s and Chopin’s pieces). Beethoven’s genius combined them in a magical way that is clearly understood by any audience as “Funeral of Love”.

Some modern pianists “simplified and improved” Beethoven’s “Moonlight sonata” dramatically. They changed his original timing impertinently and removed any trace of “the funeral” from the 1st movement completely. After this castration it is a banal “just a waltz”. Now this obviously easier way to play is in great fashion. However, what is the sense then for a storm in the 3rd movement in this case?

I mentioned above only a paltry part of mistakes in recordings but all of these mentioned ones are unforgettable for me, because each of them brought a lot of trouble. For example, because of the lazy guys in the La Scala choir and their chorus master I lost my job (fortunately, only for 2 days).

All the men of my choir considered “Rigoletto” as “my day at last”. They were jealous for a long time that in all previous productions I paid much more attention to sopranos and altos and all the reviews have only mentioned about ladies as well. Inspired by this obviously the best for the male-choir (no female voices are used) opera they worked harder than ever before. Instead of standard 20 rehearsals we did more than 60 without getting paid for the extra 40 rehearsals. Eventually, everybody knew his job perfectly.

One evening the famous baritone, who sang Rigoletto in more than 40 countries all over the world and his permanent partner – conductor entered our rehearsal room.
They sat in the top corner of the room unnoticed. At the end of our rehearsal they unexpectedly came down and kissed each of my guys with congratulations. ”You are the best Rigoletto choir we have ever heard "- they said. “I can swear: this choir has an unlimited ability to “crescendo” the conductor shouted many times. Then one of the best baritones of our days sang in turn all the hits of his repertoire for the choristers till 01.30 a.m. It was the best day of my life as a chorus-master. My precious trophy for this production were “the second pay-cheque for the same month” from the CEO with his handwriting “You are doing a great job” and a memo from him as well. The memo said:
“Since now and on, the budget of the choir will be cut by 50%. We really do not want the choir to be mentioned first in the opera-reviews”.

And the very next day was the worst one. “Internationally renowned” Ms. Mouse (name is changed) did not know anything in music as well. Her method was based on watching video-recordings of famous productions and then doing the same “as seen on TV”. After 2 hours of our rehearsal she screamed: “What are you doing here instead of the opera? I can not recognize the music, I refuse to work!” The conductor tried to joke, addressing her with the famous words of the chorus “Piano, piano”, but she was absolutely serious. After 3 hours the CEO’s secretary gave me the famous CD of “Rigoletto” with Pavarotti and La Scala and asked me to explain in writing, why our choir-episodes and La Scala”s ones sounded so differently. All what I could write was a listing of "sforzando"s, "crescendo"s, rhythmical patterns etc, that were written by Verdi, but were ignored by this choir and chorus master. But why would the CEO have to believe me more than "La Scala?"

 After another 2 hours I was fired. Fortunately for me, the famous Ms. Mouse (a real aggressive feminist) already said a few 4-letters words to the conductor and Rigoletto as well, and they in turn refused to communicate and work with her without the presence of police. After another 2 days I got my job back.

By the way, don’t you think that it is very strange that the Italian Duke in this opera sings his famous “La Donna A Mobile” on the… Polish tune of mazurka? That during the storm scene, the choir sings exactly the left-hand part of Study N5 op 10 by Chopin? That the first pages of the first scene, the chorus “Duca, Duca” and many other episodes of “Rigoletto” comprise of the same Study N5 op.10 music, with even the same tonalities? And practically all the themes of this great opera are directly related to the piano works of Chopin? Did you read or hear about this ever?

Am I the only one in the whole world who knows about this fact? -  Not at all. Try to play or listen to the famous “Rigoletto” paraphrase, written by Liszt. What are the last bars of this piece, based on Verdi’s music? They are undoubtedly recognizable as the last two bars of the Study N5 op.10 by Chopin. No other piece in the world contains this unusual effective octave passage – it is impossible to confuse this one with others. Liszt even repeated this octave passage twice - in this way he told us explicitly: “Enjoy this great music by Verdi, but pay attention and remember what the musical roots of his wonderful opera are!  Do not forget Chopin as well! “( Liszt’s closest friend Chopin died just a few years before the premiere of “Rigoletto”).
 
Have you ever heard or read that Chopin’s Studies (at least many of them) in turn are based on genuine themes of other composers and popular songs? Such as the 1st Prelude from WTK by Bach, prayer “Holy Lord, Have Mercy”, “Dies Irae”, Spanish folk “Lullaby” and many others. As far as I know, this fact was never brought to the attention of the audience.


To be continued in "Exiting facts...Part III

[vladimirdounin]

The end.  See the beginning in "Exciting facts ... Part I, and Part II.

Have you ever heard or read that Chopin’s Studies (at least many of them) in turn are based on genuine themes of other composers and popular songs? Such as the 1st Prelude from WTK by Bach, prayer “Holy Lord, Have Mercy”, “Dies Irae”, Spanish folk “Lullaby” and many others. As far as I know, this fact was never brought to the attention of the audience.

 But it does not mean that nobody knows this fact. For example, Canadian Royal Conservatory prohibited the students to play at exams Study N 2 op. 25 by Chopin. One teacher explained to me that it happened… because the music of this study is based on the song of Russian Gypsies of bad taste and contents. The students are still lucky, that the examiners did not know the same about the famous Study No3 0p.10, because this piece is based on a popular Russian song about a legendary pirate and robber and the content of this song is absolutely unacceptable for any feminist.   

Why must we read so much boring and unnecessary information about music yet have no access to these amazing and exciting facts, which are, by the way, very helpful for performing and understanding? Aren’t they interesting and valuable?

I will give one example to answer. In 1996 I visited USA for the first time in my life. When I came back, my choir asked me about New York. I spoke almost for an hour but soon wanted to stop so we could start our rehearsal. The choir pleaded: please, please do not stop, continue… I immediately took the opportunity to remind everyone of a very important principle. I said: ”Almost all of you have visited USA before me, all of you could read numerous articles and watch videos about NY. Why do you ask me then to tell you more about this city?

 This is because my information is unique: no one was exactly in my place in NY at exactly the same moment of time; no one could see the same things from exactly the same point of view as I did. I told you only the things that really made myself excited and I believe sincerely that they should (in my opinion, of course) make you excited as well. These conditions are the basics of any art. (The Musical Criticism falls completely under the same rule, otherwise it is not an art at all).

However if I will read the best encyclopedia or best reference book about NY to you instead, you will fall asleep after 10 minutes. Because it is not an art and I will not make you excited. Exactly the same will happen if we will copy somebody’s CD instead of honestly looking at the score. Our audience will yawn and fall asleep. They are not specialists in music, but everybody will feel and hear our lie. They will never believe us. If one person sells things that are made by his own hands and another one sells stolen goods – their words will never sound in the same way and anyone will feel that.


I remember a funny gallery in South Africa. It was some witty music lover that posted the wall of a concert hall with 15 or 20 posters of American pianists that had played in that hall before. On each poster he fixed promotion articles with quotations from “NY Times”, “LA Times”, “Washington Post” etc The newspapers were different, but he highlighted the absolutely same sentences in each article about EACH of these pianists:. “Pianist “X “is undoubtedly the king of all the pianists on the planet and definitely the best one out of all the pianists living in our time” (I am citing from memory). I remembered immediately the same style of advertising for the concert of a famous American pianist with a very famous last name, say, “Peter Chopin” in 1966 in Moscow. The Great Hall of Moscow Conservatory was overcrowded, it was impossible to buy a ticket because they were sold out a few months before the date. Said pianist started his concert with the super-popular “Coo-Coo” by Daquen. However he was so nervous that he forgot the text (notes) a couple of times and eventually stopped in the middle of the piece. The same happened to him during the 2nd item of his program. The next items of his program had nothing in common with “artistic excellence” as well.

In spite of the high price paid for the tickets almost everybody in the hall (c.2000 people) stood up and went outside. I was one of the hundred spectators, who did not leave, and I witnessed that he was indeed a good pianist (exhibited in the second half of his program). After this concert he never could play in Moscow again (maybe due just to this obviously unprofessional musical criticism which had made him so nervous).
 
The fear to say anything new or unusual, lack of confidence and indecision, unwillingness to fight for the public interests and the most important principles of human society are only a few of problems of our musical critics. Why don’t they fight for all the music lovers’ rights and for the prosperity of our great art in the same way like numerous “watchdogs” of any other industry?

The answer is simple: because we do not have institutions in our modern society to teach and support music critics. We have no right to expect from them anything else because we did not give them the least chance to be better. Isn’t now a right time to think about the same kind of “Quality Control” in musical art (like all the other industries have) and start to educate these specialists that are highly important for society’s “spiritual health industry” as soon as possible?   

Only good, smart, highly qualified and educated musical critics can change the situation in musical culture as a whole. Nobody else can save it from its current degradation.


Vladimir Dounin,

Pianist.