Insight to classical music
I just checked out the Wikipedia article for Emilie Autumn (whom my Guitar Cousin told me about).
She says that, when attending traditional classical music training, she was repeatedly told:
"You are not what is important. You are literally a vessel for the music of some a person has been dead for some hundred of years. You are meant to keep your individuality out if, because it’s not about you.”
I’m just too wildly independent and selfish for that. [...] yah it’s about me, because you’re dead and I’m not and I’m the reason why any body’s getting to hear your [...] music. And guess who would have agreed absolutely? They guy who wrote it. They would have never had a problem with that.
When I read that, I had an insight: Anyone who plays ''Classical'' music (Beethoven, Mozart, Brahms, etc.) is really just doing a cover of the original. And orchestras, and chamber music groups, are really just ''cover bands''.
Sometimes cover bands try to be as close to the original as possible: i.e., tribute bands. And other times, musicians tweak the original a bit. Or, a lot (e.g. Devo's ''(Can't Get No) Satisfaction".
And: both approaches are valid.
IMO.
--GG
posted by Gye Greene @ 12:34 AM
2 Comments:
"And guess who would have agreed absolutely? They guy who wrote it. "
Somehow I doubt that Mozart and many other composers would have agreed with that. They expected improvisation. I think most violin concertos were written with cadenza passages where the violinist was expected to show off.
I've definitely seen lots of pedantic teachers who felt that way, though.
C.S. Joholm -- Good point. I'd forgotten that a lot of composers -- a you point out -- left sections for the lead instrument to improvise.
Somehow, over the years, those sections have become codified, and folks don't feel as free to ''wing it''. ;)
--GG
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