sjf1967
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Posts posted by sjf1967
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Yes, quite right. But if some people find that their taste lies at a different point on the composer/perfomer spectrum that's up to them as well. For me, this playing (a pianist, not an organist) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMAIag5IPDg is awesome and gets the balance exactly right between the two. Others may disagree.No, that is not what I meant. I think it is about getting the balance right between achieving a performance as how the composer intended alongside the character and interpretation of the recitalist.I have been to hundreds of organ recitals up and down the country and I have been disappointed how characterless organ playing can be. Technically secure, yes, any sense of the recitalist's character, often no.
Mr Fox, may express himself in a somewhat flamboyant (and say egotistical way) but I would rather listen to and be entertained by that rather some sterile and faceless recitalist in backwater provincial cathedral.
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For what it's worth there are no memory lapses in the performance, MM - he makes a cut in the Toccata which I'm pretty sure Durufle sanctioned before disowning the movement completely, but otherwise it's things like tempi and registrations which are at variance with the score. When you say the point of Fox is the art of the performer, not the music, and the latter is the means by which the former is delivered - for me, that's exactly the wrong way round...This is the nub of it, isn't it? Performers who seek to "improve" the work of a composer who took the trouble to write exactly what he meant are effectively setting themselves above the composer. This may matter little if the composer is a miserable hack (though it is still discourteous), but to claim to improve on the "greats" is arrogance itself. I doubt that any organists are that great - being a great performer is one thing; being a great composer is something else entirely.Wasn't that John Wayne? As in:
Cecil: "John, John: say it with awe!"
John W: "Aw, surely this was the Son of God."
Sorry - totally off topic.
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Lee - I think that I'd wonder about any performer on any instrument who was quite so free with the score as Fox is here. I don't have it in for Fox in particular. It implies that somehow the music in itself is not interesting enough to be taken seriously, or listened to closely, without the addition of layers of extraneous material - colouristic tricks, tempo fluctuations, added bars, or whatever. In the end it's a bit of a snub to the composer for any performer, not just Fox, to suggest in this way that the score is somehow deficient without their the benefit of their attentions - that their 'art' adds a missing dimension, rather than realising faithfully the dimensions already supplied by the composer (especially one as good as Durufle). If the piece is so dull that it needs that kind of help, then play something better instead. That doesn't mean the result of fidelity to the score has to be boring - you only have to listen to Carlos Kleiber's conducting to realise that.So sjf, because Fox did not hold steadfastly to Durufle in that performance, you would not want to hear him "play serious repertoire"? -
Which I think is why Fox's greatest moments tend to be in things which are more convincingly susceptible to that sort of 'recreation'. I'm not sure it's right to use the practice of the 17th and 18th century to justify liberties in the 20th. There is certainly more to music than the dots - but they still have to be respected or something crucial is lost. A pianist who added a couple of extra bars to the start of the Beethoven 'Moonlight' Sonata in order to express him/herself would not last long on the concert platform - why?But this is typical of the classical organ world. Dare to try something different, do something from the norm and you get shot down. No wonder organ playing is in the backwater and is a dying art.I say get it into the secular arena. Make more use of the organs in concert/town halls and venues. Encourage organ playing at home. People like Fox took the organ away from its ecclesiastical, conservative stuffy image and made it an instrument for all people to enjoy.
But in musical history composers have allowed for musicians their own interpretation of their pieces. For example in Early Music the performer could embellish passages, opera singers could add cadenzas.
I am not saying what Fox did was right but there is more to music than dots on the pages.
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I'd tend to the view that a composer as fastidious and self critical as Durufle, who destroyed a lot of pieces because they weren't up to scratch in his eyes, meant exactly what's on the page and nothing else.This does highlight the interesting question of what constitutes "interpretation". Where is the line between interpreting and simply taking liberties? With no wish to dwell on the specific example presented here, surely adding bars goes beyond interpretation and into rewriting - I mean, if the composer had wished those bars to be there he would have written them. I, too, am against boring and thoughtless renditions, but surely there is a limit to what is "acceptable", and a limit to what can be "excused" on the basis of interpretation? -
I'm a bit reluctant to get into this, Lee, given the evident strength of your feelings about the question. We have dramatically different views and had better leave it there.Fox did something different at the beginning of the Sicilienne? So what? He wasn't taking liberties on the scale of Arty Nobile, for example. Are organists not allowed to express themselves? I think the comment about not wanting to hear him play serious repertoire is very harsh and a misreprestentation of his ability and talent as an organist. -
Which was the the last thing I wanted to appear. I'm very happy to return to the amazing Jongen performance which is, as MM said, very remarkable indeed.Then maybe it is the fault of the original person who held Fox in that performance up as an example. Sorry, but I found your comments insensitive. -
I am not pontificating at all Lee. The entity that mainly concerns me in all this is Durufle, not Virgil Fox, and if you find that objectionable or unprofessional then I'm sorry.Sorry but it just confirms my perception that some organists and clergy seem to pontificate from their high organ lofts/pulpits with little compassion or sensitivity...or professionalism for that matter. -
For God's sake the guy is at death's door and all you can do, sjf, is criticize his playing. Call yourself a bloody Christian?
Calm down Lee. If it was supposed to be an example of triumph in the face of adversity that's one thing, as I tried to point out; I also said that I have the very greatest admiration for Fox's technical prowess in general and that I was fully aware of the emotional charge of the occasion. But this performance was being held up as an example of Fox's ability as a serious interpreter of repertoire, and his state of health has nothing to do with it - or with his need to add extra bars to the Sicilienne for no apparent reason. I don't think there's any need to start throwing the Bible at me.
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If Virgil Fox remains a unique phenomenon in the national musical life of America, and his many performances mark the high-watermark of the popularity of the great synphonic American organs, it is rorbably true to suggest that the controversy rages on. Bemused Europeans have, over the years, both admired and derided the Fox phenomenon in equal measure, and this continues in both the adulation heaped upon, and the criticisms levelled at one of his star pupils, Carlo Curley.
The Fox legend is both alive and relevant, in that the art of transcription has made something of a resurgence in recent years, and Fox played many transcriptions to rapt audiences.
Fox himself, when asked why he played music not originally written for organ, justified this by saying, "I play it because it is beautiful."
Virgil Fox had quite an unusual education, coming under the influence of an essentially European romantic source. At an early age, he listened to the very elderly Paderewski, which left a deep impression on him, and this is not without relevance to his own growth as a legendary performer.
Ask most people who Wilhelm Middelschulte was, and they will usually suggest that he was the organist who wrote a very difficult pedal-solo work, the "Perpetuem Mobile". This is something of a pity, for Middelschulte was a truly gigantic figure musically, quite a substantial composer of serious works, a highly respected contrapuntalist in the prevailing tradition of German Romantic organ-playing style. It is a measure of Middelschulte, that he was admired enormously by Busoni; possibly one of the greatest names in the history of piano playing and Bach transcriptions for the piano.
The link to Paderewski is interesting, because Paderewski had studied with Theodore Leschetizky in Vienna, and it was the
Theodore Leschetizky piano-playing method which Middleschulte brought to Chicago, and which he imposed on the young Virgil Fox. To this was added the pedal technique of the great Louis Roberts.
Thus, at a young-age, Virgil Fox had already met with the strands which would combine to create the unique Fox style; the highest pianistic virtuosity, a flawless pedal technique, a dazzling contrapuntal facility and the early success which would give him the confidence to project himself onto the world-stage.
Yet there was perhaps something else other than innate genius about the man, which to this day remains a little unsettling.
Although notoriously prudish in many ways, he was quite prepared to flaunt and even ce01lebrate his own homsoexuality; even to the point that when he was appointed as organist to the Riverside Church, New York, it was a joint appointment, with his live-in partner, Richard Weagly, being appointed Choir Director. (Clearly the Bishop Gene Robinson phenomenon within the American Episcopalian Church, had a high-profile precedent, and one which didn't start the alarm-bells ringing across America).
If ever a performer shouted, "I am what I am," then it was Virgil Fox, who combined the aggressive showmanship of Broadway with the highest intellect and innate ability. In effect, it could be said that his whole reason d'etre was to assert and impose his own personality upon an unsuspecting and adoring public, using music as his medium and the organ as his projectile; firing thunderbolts from his fingers and toes.
Should anyone doubt his awesome abilitites and musicianship, let them cast aside the reputation for "sexed-up Bach," the Middelschulte "Perpetuem Mobile" and the riotous renditions of the Bach "Jig Fugue" with full audience participation and animation.
Instead, they should spend awhile listening to him performing in a way for which he is perhaps not best remembered, as a very serious organist indeed.
The following will illustrate this perfectly, and Virgil Fox knew that he was terminally-ill when he played for this last performance at Riverside Church.:-
http://pipedreams.publicradio.org/listings/2040/
Durufle - Suite Op.5 (complete) beginning at 00.57:35 (with spoken introduction)
MM
Oh dear. I really tried, and wanted, to like this, given the extraordinary facility of Fox's playing elsewhere, and the moving circumstances of the performance; but this reading doesn't seem to have much to do with Durufle in spirit or letter. There are so many questionable things happening on so many levels - some them directly against Durufle's clearly expressed wishes - that it's sometimes hard to recognise the piece. If I have to restrict myself to one thing it's the start of the Sicilienne. Why does he do it? I do genuinely admire Fox's technical facility, but this performance embodies for me exactly why I never want to hear him play serious repertoire.
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Quite. But.... "Jesus" should be sung Geee-serss with much emphasis on the E vowel, the mouth has to be wide and hardly open, with lips tensed for best diction. I suggest choristers insert a wedge sideways to keep the jaw from relaxing and from falling naturally. We don't want want any of this correct English diction/tone talked about on here. Anyway, schools are far too busy teaching other languages to bother with correct English grammar and singing. Why should choirmasters bother to set a standard of excellence? The singing on SOP has much tro commend it.
R
Richard - here you want the boys' jaws tense - a few postings later you want them relaxed. Make your mind up.
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I've got a feeling you may be able to find some pages in facsimile on the net somewhere....Fair enough, Stephen. Thank you for the information - I was quite obviously mistaken in my assumption and now I have learned something about this particular piece which I am able to pass on to pupils.I think that all I was trying to say is that we can sometimes limit ourselves to thinking in a limited way about music - particularly the music of J S Bach. I suppose that this discussion is not that far removed from the (probably equally pointless) debate on the most suitable type of organ for Bach's music.
However, you have convinced me on this particular matter. Perhaps one day I will save up and purchase one or two different editions - I would be fascinated to see some of the facsimile pages which some publications reproduce.
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I forgot to say ....the lh texture that results from playing on two manuals in BWV 643 is quite unlike any other accompanimental texture in the chorale preludes in general, and certainly in the OB - very angular and with lots of parallel sixths and awkward tied notes. It ends up being like a particularly ungainly transcription texture - compare it to the accpt figurations in eg BWV 605 which are much more feasible. Vom himmel hoch BWV 606 can also be played on two manuals but you get the same problems of technical difficulty, which are so inelegant it's hard to believe that Bach wouldn't have found a better solution to the scoring of the texture, or have chosen a different figura for the prelude which was better suited to the 2 manual scoring.We're going round in circles now so I'll only add one more observation. The score is all there is, and it's as clear on this particular point as it is on the notes themselves. There isn't any kind of historical or musicological case to be made for disregarding the indications - in fact some rubrics seem to have been added to the score later than the pieces themselves, suggesting that opportunities for revision didn't lead him to add a marking to BWV 643. If there were no rubrics anywhere, then it would be fair game to pick and choose - but that isn't the case, and none of the numerous people who copied it into secondary sources after its composition thought it was for two manuals either. The idea that JSB left the notation unclear to allow performers 300 years later to orchestrate the chorales in novel ways to accord with performance practices as yet unknown to him is...interesting. He would have had little if any expectation that these pieces would still be in currency after three centuries; it's not until much later in his output that the idea of leaving scores to 'posterity' comes in and the OB is far too early for that. I don't think it's 'restrictive' to respect a composer's clearly expressed wishes. -
The trouble with this is that it makes the assumption that JSB was either flawless in his notation - or that he left nothing to chance, particularly for a later time when, for all he knew, performance practice may have been different.
I still think that one can be unnecessarily restrictive in approaching certain aspects of registration and performance.
We're going round in circles now so I'll only add one more observation. The score is all there is, and it's as clear on this particular point as it is on the notes themselves. There isn't any kind of historical or musicological case to be made for disregarding the indications - in fact some rubrics seem to have been added to the score later than the pieces themselves, suggesting that opportunities for revision didn't lead him to add a marking to BWV 643. If there were no rubrics anywhere, then it would be fair game to pick and choose - but that isn't the case, and none of the numerous people who copied it into secondary sources after its composition thought it was for two manuals either. The idea that JSB left the notation unclear to allow performers 300 years later to orchestrate the chorales in novel ways to accord with performance practices as yet unknown to him is...interesting. He would have had little if any expectation that these pieces would still be in currency after three centuries; it's not until much later in his output that the idea of leaving scores to 'posterity' comes in and the OB is far too early for that. I don't think it's 'restrictive' to respect a composer's clearly expressed wishes.
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The trouble with this is that everywhere else in the Orgelbüchlein - which was, don't forget, written specifically as an organ tutor for students - Bach was meticulous in specifying when he wanted two manuals used (and also those places where the pedals were to take a melody), so the absence of any such direction in BWV 643 is overwhelmingly likely to be significant. One can of course wonder whether Bach simply forgot to write in the direction... (but you'd need to look at the autograph to assess whether that's a tenable speculation).
Quite. And even those chorales which few people would think of playing on one manual - like O Mensch or Der Tag, both of which can be played on one keyboard - are given very specific 'a 2 man' markings. If he'd wanted two keyboards in BWV 643 as well it would have been marked. The chances that he 'forgot' the marking are slim. It also seems to me that the unusually dense motivic texture of 643 puts it in a rather different category from the other 2 manual settings, where the accpt is less rigorously worked.
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I agree - an 8' flute for the left hand, coupled down a quiet 16' on the pedal. I think an 8' Open Diapason for the right hand cf sounds best - and don't forget a slow tremulant, if available.
JSB is v specific about scorings throughout the collection - and doesn't mention 'a 2 Clav.' in the rubrics for this setting, which rather suggests that he imagined it should be played on one keyboard.
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The short answer is yes.On a subject at least slightly related to the original thread:Does anyone happen to know if the RCO are still collecting members' subscriptions? I do not recall being asked for this year's fee. Not that I am complaining, since I do not receive anything at all for my money. Apart from having to demonstrate my 'own' church instrument to a visiting group of RCO council and members a few years ago, I do not remember any other event which the RCO organised remotely near the area.
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Paul - the one to a part thing rests on pretty solid grounds. You have to distinguish between what Bach wanted and what he got. It's such a huge topic there's no room to rehearse the arguments, but there's a great deal of evidence that one to apart was the reality, even if his ideal was something different. Parrott and Rifkin are the people to read on this.It seems to me that musical scholarship is driven as much by fashion as any other part of life. Each generation discovers a new Holy Grail, and declares that the Holy Grail of 30 years earlier is now superceded. They would like you to think that the new truth is based on vast amounts of incontrovertible evidence, but often it is actually just one possible interpretation of a couple of paragraphs from a book that touches only peripherally on the point at issue. Often they generalise wildly from a special case.I won't give large numbers of examples, as I'm sure you can all find your own; but the recent question about the scantiness of evidence for varied ornamentation of repeats illustrates my point well enough. Another one that amuses me is singing Bach cantatas etc with one voice per part - it can be well done and be valid in itself, and there may be some historic justification for it in some special circumstances; but Bach had a choir to sing them each week, and asked for its size to be increased.
So enjoy playing Bach on an organ that Mendelssohn might have used, or listening to Virgil Fox, or Kreisler playing Bach violin concertos, or Richter playing WTC on the piano. It is, as you say, the music that counts in the end, and we can each show a little bit of it in our own mirror.
Paul
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...which sort of makes it all the stranger to tune one that's already on the organ sharp! The V Diap at Winchester was an essential sonority in mp-mf dynamics, especially as the 8 flute is a rather acidic Lieblich; now it's straight to the 4 flute (which doesn't blend all that well, also being a Lieblich) or whack on the Oboe.Yes. Almost nothing gets played at Romsey without it.But in a cost-conscious age you are left with a choice; build a huge Swell box that can take an 8' bass, or have a tenor C stop with or without grooved bass (or a bass outside). Hard to justify the former where space and money are tight, and hard to justify the latter on virtually all other grounds.
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Because as we soon discovered there is then not enough 8 sonority under the Swell upperwork. It was put there for a reason.....Whyever not? Marvellous idea!I very much enjoyed the "choir tuning book"... whoever instigated that one is MUCH braver than me.
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I don't - so it can't have been all that bad....Just after I left David H had the Swell Violin Diapason tuned sharp - I wouldn't let him do it while I was there....
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It's a while since I've been there, but I remember the D and C instituting some sort of tradition of quiet in the cathedral in the early morning, which was a bit annoying sometimes ...the building was always open from about 7 or 7.30 am but there are also said services of course.I think it is worth you enquiring exactly when your practice could start. I remember the bit about being quiet from 10ish/11ish for tourists and guides, but I think you ought to be able to get in (and onto the organ) a good bit earlier assuming you are able to get there, of course. I've done this gig several times and I'm convinced that I get more (loudish) time than that. -
Remember what, Alastair?And when I made a complete hash of a piece during a local organist's association visit in 1998 in front of the then Assistant DOM - I hope he does'nt remember.....AJJ
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No, that's how it was when I left it in 1999
The Virgil Fox Phenomenon
in General discussion
Posted
I think when it comes to Durufle, MM, you can pretty sure of the first - if there was a more craft-conscious composer in this tradition I can't think who it might have been. There's a long list of things to be said relating to your other points, but I'm not inclined to rattle anyone's cage. All I will say is that yes, ears are important - but so are eyes, and we should use them to decipher the information contained in scores about things like duration and tempo before trusting our ears to make all the decisions.