Some time ago I read a book about the Guarnerius Quartet, one of this country's most outstanding and venerable string quartets. In it was mentioned that they didn't need to look at one another to know what each was doing musically. Seeing them in performance confirmed this. On Dec 6, 2010, at 5:31 PM, David van Ooijen wrote:
> On 6 December 2010 23:05, <[email protected]> wrote: >> Movement of the musician(s) is one thing for solo music, another for >> ensemble music. > > Slightly off-topic, but I cannot resist my experience of playing > sankyoku (music for an ensemble of three people) in Japan many years > ago. The Japanese are not known for their grand gestures, expressive > facial expressions or theatricals in everyday life. But what I > experienced on stage went far beyond this > For a public concert I was coupled to a koto and a sho player, both > very, very high professionals. I was playing shamisen and a beginner > on the instrument. We played Rokudan, _the_ classic instrumental > instrumental piece of the danmono repertoire. There was no time for > rehearsal, other pieces in other combinations of players (there were > more musicians, also amateurs, and I was playing lute and guitar as > well; a busy show for me) were more in need of rehearsing, and we were > all pros anyway, so we'd manage. But did I get a shock! On stage my > fellow musicians bowed to the audience, picked up their instruments > and started. No cues, no gestures, no nothing. I played along, > parallel seconds in the first measures! I must be wrong, I was > thinking, but jumping ahead or backwards might make things worse, they > are the real pros here, so I'll let them fix it. It needn't be fixed, > the score had parallel seconds (I had not seen a score, just my part, > and not heard the piece in this combination before). The gradual > accellerandi and subtle microtonal changes in pitch were all done > without visible cues. I felt so alone. But I also realised that I > could actually play along; I survived. This experience has opened my > ears in a way I had not experienced before. Ever since I need to rely > so much less on visual clues from my fellow musicians. > > my two yen > > David > > > -- > ******************************* > David van Ooijen > [email protected] > www.davidvanooijen.nl > ******************************* > > > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
