Intro to performance practice 2014

Performance Practice Session

2014

Glen Gould – an extreme

Baroque Gesture! Another extreme – Ian Caddy

Books •  C. Lawson & R. Stowell: The Historical

Performance of Music (Cambridge University Press, 1999)

•  H. M. Brown, ed: Performance Practice, vol.2 (New Grove Handbook, Macmillan, 1989

•  P. Le Huray: Authenticity in Performance (Cambridge University Press, 1990).

•  A Burden. Ed. Performer’s Guide to Music of the Classical Period (2002, ABRSM)

Lecture 1

•  1. Review of the nature of 'performance practice'

•  Lawson & Stowell: pp1-41 and Kenyon: chapter 1 •  further reading in Brown pp97-116 & 424-458 or

article in Grove7 on Performing Practice 19, 349-350

•  2. The application of primary sources •  Surviving instruments – archival & literary

sources – editions – musical taste •  Lawson & Stowell: pp42-64

What is it?

•  The understanding today of the circumstances and practical considerations that surrounded the composition and performance of music at the time that it was composed and for the period in which it was circulation, and the application of that understanding to performance in the present day.

More definitions

•  Dunsby: •  A frame of reference for how they [musicians]

think about music in general, and how they go about their training and their job and pastime.

•  Grove: •  As applied to Western music, the subject involves

all aspects of the way in which music is and has been performed, and its study is of particular importance to the modern performer concerned with historically informed practice.

Topics Include:

1. notational issues, especially concerning such matters as rhythm, tempo, and articulation

2. improvisation and ornamentation 3. instruments, their history and physical structure,

and the ways in which they are played 4. voice production, tuning, pitch and

temperament 5. ensembles, their size, disposition, and the

modes in which they are directed

Sources of material

•  It may involve: the study of treatises and instruction books, critical writings and iconography, actual instruments and original archival sources of music (manuscripts, first editions, early recordings, etc.).

•  You need to understand the precise meanings of musical symbols in each period of music history and attempt to discover how they changed over the years.

Freedoms and Conventions

•  You need to establish the degree of freedom allowed the performer in any given musical genre.

•  and to understand the unwritten conventions - determining which aspects of performance were not fixed on paper during a particular period.

Original Sources •  Francesco Geminiani The Art of Playing the Violin

(1751) •  Joachim Quantz, Versuch einer Anweisung die

Flote traversiere zu spielen (1752) •  C.P.E.Bach, Essay on the True Art of Playing

Keyboard Instruments (1753, 1762) •  Leopold Mozart, The Art of Playing the Violin

(1754) •  Charles Burney, A General History of Music

(1776-89) •  Pier Francesco Tosi Opinioni de’ cantori antichi e

moderni (1723)

Examples of editions

•  3 Versions of Caccini’ s ‘Amarilli Mia Bella’.

•  Comparing the Peter’s Edition of 1894 With the original Il nouvo musici 1602 edition

and the modern edition (A-R 1970 edition)

Original

Peter’s Edition

With Music

Recordings of Pieces

•  Mozart Piano Concerto 23 Adagio •  Version 1 played on period instruments –

reproduction fortepiano with added ornamentation. Robert Lewis

Modern Piano

•  Version 2 played on modern instruments by the English Chamber Orchestra – Mitsuko Uchida

Saul

•  Two recordings of Handel. •  Saul Overture (1738) •  1984 with Nicolas Harnoncourt –

Concentus Musicus Wien. •  2005 with Rene Jacobs – Concerto Koln •  Both on early instruments and at baroque

pitch – but entirely different.

Things to Consider •  Performance context – original and now. •  2. Genre – and performance tradition •  3. Melody, Harmony, Texture, Form – in

what sense is it baroque/classical/romantic •  4. Speeds (rubato?) •  5. Edition and sources •  6. All the detail of performance -

articulation, melodic inflection, accentuation, tempo, rhythmic alteration, ornamentation, extempore embellishment, improvisation, continuo - if it applies