Mischa Santora and the Minnesota Orchestra

Evan Quinn’s predecessor at the Minnesota Orchestra, Associate Conductor Mischa Santora, conducted the subscription concerts this past week at Orchestra Hall.  This is Mr. Santora’s last season as Associate Conductor here, and these concerts were his last subscription concerts.  Unlike Evan, however, Mr. Santora will not be stepping up to a co-music directorship at the Minnesota Orchestra.  He built this week’s program around the Bruch First Violin Concerto (Leila Josefowicz, violin soloist), focusing on romantic stories of lovers — Romeo and Juliet, Tristan and Isolde (the ancient Celtic source material for Romeo and Juliet), and Daphnis and Chloe.  

As I sat in Orchestra Hall listening, I could remember a time when this ensemble sounded rather so-so.  Not bad, but also not great.  This week, the orchestra’s ensemble playing was so together, so disciplined, so intense, as if Mr. Santora were playing one instrument, not an entire orchestra, concentrated, passionate, completely inside the music together.  Absolutely breathtaking.  The energy dazzled and took me back to the day when I knew I’d finally gotten chapter 1 of Perceval totally right — the balance between Evan’s conducting and Evan’s memories –  a visceral tingling and a mental and emotional high.  I’ve had “peak” experiences before listening to the Minnesota Orchestra and I welcome them.

In the selections for the orchestral suites from Sergei Prokofiev’s ballet Romeo and Juliet, Mr. Santora and the Orchestra took us to the masked ball where Romeo and Juliet first meet.  But first, Mr. Santora set the musical stage with the feuding Montagues and Capulets, one of my favorite of Prokofiev’s themes.  Then, off to the ball, the delicate dancing, the removal of masks, and finally the two new lovers on Juliet’s balcony at daybreak.  The selections contrasted the belligerence of the hatred between the two sets of parents and the fluttering, exciting and all-consuming feelings of first love.  I’d never heard those particular selections from Prokofiev’s ballet in that order and that sound landscape led almost organically into the Bruch.

Max Bruch’s First Violin Concerto premiered in 1866 and represents romantic sentiment in sound at its highest level.  I’d heard many recordings over the years, but had never heard it in concert.  Leila Josefowicz commanded this concerto with intelligent virtuosity, equal partners with the orchestra throughout, and a rich, golden tone.  This concerto also has a muscular aspect to it, especially in the demands it makes on a violinist’s stamina.  Bruch gives the soloist few moments to rest.   

Richard Wagner’s Prelude and Liebestod from Tristan and Isolde began the second half of the concert.  That amazing chord!  I never tire of hearing it.  I’m not a huge Wagner fan, but I was impressed with the coherence of this rich, theatrical music’s performance in this concert.  Mr. Santora had saved the best for last, building up to the joyous music of Maurice Ravel’s Suite No. 2 from Daphnis and Chloe.  Nobody does orchestral colors the way Ravel does them.  Ravel’s musical voice sang, rising in a spectacular crescendo at the end.  Bravo.

For me, sadness tinged this concert.  As I’ve written before at this blog, Mr. Santora’s 6 feet 5 inch lanky frame makes him unique in the world of conductors and has given me a precedent for Evan Quinn’s height.  As with Evan, Mr. Santora’s height has no effect on his superb conducting.  I have enjoyed his concerts with the Minnesota Orchestra and I’m sad this is his last season with them.  I hope that he is moving on to equally interesting and fulfilling endeavors in music in the years to come.  And like Evan Quinn, will know much success as a conductor and musician.

One final Perceval thought:  I’m saving this program for Evan to conduct perhaps in one of the later novels…..  

   

Paying Attention as a Writer

Could the future of classical music be found on YouTube?  An article in last week’s Time by Vivien Schweitzer described the recent development of musicians auditioning by video on YouTube for the YouTube Symphony Orchestra.  Musicians submitted videos of themselves performing standard repertory to be evaluated first by members of the London Symphony and Berlin and New York Philharmonics who selected 200 finalists.  The finalists’ videos were posted on YouTube where users could view them and vote on the musicians they liked best.  Then conductor Michael Tilson Thomas reviewed those and chose who will play in the YouTube Symphony Orchestra.  It’s an internet American Idol for the symphony orchestra. 

As a way to bring classical music to the masses, this couldn’t be better.  Is it the future of auditioning orchestra musicians?  It could save on travel expenses, I guess.  But there’s one glaring thing about it that would probably prevent it from being used in a formal audition process: the player can be seen and identified.  Right now, musicians audition behind a screen — they can be heard but not seen.  The screen keeps the audition judges blind to the musician’s age, sex, color, etc.  All that’s important is the way the musician plays. 

But I started thinking about the future of classical music in a much different way because of the YouTube Symphony Orchestra.  What if orchestras, as a routine matter, recorded every concert on digital video to be “rented” or sold online?  What if orchestras, as a routine matter, performed online on a regular basis?  The concert hall could remain a viable performing venue for people who preferred the concert experience live (and it’s really special, I prefer it) while others could see the concert online from anyplace in the world.  My first thought is, how would the musicians and conductor be paid? 

Which brings up a concern I’ve had, and continue to have, about those of us who create something that is unique to us, and the internet.  I know that a lot of content on the internet is free, but I also think there should be “premium sites” where one has to pay for the content produced by people who are making their living from the resulting product (music, books, art, photography, journalism, etc.).  So, an orchestra’s website that also produces video of the orchestra performing could have a free section (clips and other info) and a pay-to-see-and-listen section.  Musicians make their living through performing or composing.  It’s a job, folks, and they need to make money to live just like the rest of us.

But you know, wouldn’t it be WONDERFUL if food were free?  Or clothing, houses, cars, anything one wants?  Just go take it.  But what about the people who provided those things?  I have thought long and often about how different a world we’d have without money and the need to earn it.  But I wonder if humans are ready for a world without money, without money as the purpose in life, as the reward, as the incentive for working or creating.  This is something I touch on in the Perceval novels for Evan Quinn’s future world — some countries have joined together to develop a transition process for eliminating money.

For me, I always seem to end up at Perceval and Evan Quinn.  Evan would not be impressed with the YouTube phenomenon.  He’s not really an internet type of guy.  He prefers the real world, real people (not avatars), real experience (vs. virtual).  For me as a writer, however, I pay attention and think about what I see in terms of the future and how I’ve imagined it, how it needs to evolve….

Rachmaninoff

Sergei Rachmaninoff’s music, whether for solo piano or full orchestra, sounds rich and passionate to me.  Listening to it this morning, a saying about performance popped into my head: if the performer is more interesting to watch than listening to the music, it’s not a musical performance.  My teachers allowed for movement, certainly.  But, extreme, vain or dramatic movement makes the performance more about the performer, not the music.  A performer is not there to distract but to play the music.

Listening to Rachmaninoff’s Second Symphony earlier today, my thoughts wandered to the question of why it’s not performed more often, then to visualizing a conductor conducting it.  Of all the romantic music in the world, this symphony is probably in the top ten.  To conduct it means to either go the schmaltzy, sentimental, freely interpretive route, or adhere strictly to the score.  Rachmaninoff’s music tends to be challenging to play, so I’d think this symphony would require a lot of work, both off and on the podium.  A conductor would be too busy, I should think, to indulge in any overly dramatic movements or to be thinking about himself in any way.

However…there is in conducting a certain amount of showmanship, specifically during concerts.  The conductor also has the unusual position of his/her back to the audience, and being alone on the podium.  There are no other musicians in his/her “section” to blend in with.  The best conductors I’ve seen generally use their showman position to guide the audience on their journey with the music.  It’s extremely rare to see a conductor conduct in an extremely overly dramatic way that calls way too much attention to him/her.  The best ones do try to “blend” into the action on stage so that the music seems to manifest into the world of matter. 

Now, I’d love to attend a concert with the Rachmaninoff Second Symphony on the program….

Thoughts and Updates

Another month has passed since my last follow-up letter to the literary agent who has the Perceval manuscript. Another month of silence. I’m beginning to give up hope for this guy. Is that what he wants? I have learned one thing from this experience: when an agent asks for sample chapters, send the entire manuscript. Then, if he wants to continue reading, he already has the complete novel and doesn’t have to wait for me to send it. I suspect he’s lost interest. Schade.

What next? I’ve been researching possible publishers for Perceval and their editors. The process is straightforward but takes time to dig for the information. I collected book reviews of novels also set in the near future. At Publishers Marketplace, I looked up the publishers in their new publishers and imprints database. Then I checked for the deals done in the last 2 years, searching for the specific novel that started the process. Each deal entry under the relevant publisher lists the editor and the agent. Very useful information.

The next step is to query each editor, much as I’ve been querying literary agents. However, I query the editors representing myself as agent. And the process takes just as much time as querying agents.

I’ve run into a roadblock with my market research for The Shadow, the excerpt from Perceval. So, I may put that away for awhile, come back to it later with fresh eyes.

In my internet travels last week I stumbled onto a photographer’s blog (I love photography!). Becca Dilley, the photographer, had worked an event at Orchestra Hall and taken some terrific pictures. There’s a particularly good one of the stage. Her blog can be found here.

The first draft of a short essay on December 21, 2012 is done. I’ve been working on another essay, Rare, that’s a short memoir. As I gear up to take on a non-writing job in the near future, I’ll be sticking to shorter forms of writing for awhile.