By |

Guest post by Adrian Ainsworth

It’s easy to assume the singer is the star in classical song – just like with rock bands. I’ve stopped counting how many album covers feature an accompanist-shaped gap.

As a player-of-sorts – not to mention a lieder nut living too close to London’s Wigmore Hall for his wallet to ever completely relax – I’m turning the spotlight towards the piano stool.

Accompanists are indispensible specialists. There’s a huge repertoire to learn, or suddenly be required to learn. Schubert alone wrote some 600 lieder, with other masters of song – from A (er, Brahms) to Z (um, Wolf) – comfortably filling more modest, but still handsome, box-sets with their output.

005
Ian Bostridge & Julius Drake (photo: Sim Canetty-Clarke)

Of course, there’s a fair amount of other piano music. But song comes with a special set of daunting quirks. Solo, pianists forge their style unfettered. Accompanists must make their mark while supporting and complementing the other artist on stage. And (without getting into divo/a clichés) the link between the emotion channelled by a singer and the sound they produce is uniquely, biologically close, bringing that frisson of nuance and unpredictability the pianist must always be prepared for.

Some of the best-known and loved song – for example, Schubert’s great song cycles – also comes in different editions to suit various voice types. As certain keys will be more comfortable across the pieces than others, I’ve often admired the pianist’s mental strength when working up the songs in their more thorny positions – and then making sure they even bring the right music. Is there a recurring nightmare, like falling naked into your maths exam (or something), where, about to perform ‘Winterreise’ with a baritone, you launch into your version for high voice..?

Star soloists sometimes step onto the accompanist’s pedals. It can work – Mitsuko Uchida has been a superb foil for Dorothea Röschmann in Schumann and Berg – audible empathy, unwavering attentiveness – and a jolt of unwelcome shock at the rarity of seeing women in both roles. At other times… I once heard a great pianist bring so much of their robust energy to ‘Winterreise’, they partly ‘took over’, and you got the sense the two performers would reach the end of the GODDAMN. JOURNEY. IF. IT. KILLED. THEM.

Let’s not forget that accompanists have their own differences in approach. Of the two I hear most often, Malcolm Martineau’s liquid expressiveness – and ability to play to the audience as if also ‘in character’ – makes me slightly favour him in French song, while Julius Drake’s thrilling, vivid style especially electrifies German lieder (I note that MM features on series of Poulenc and Debussy CDs while JD is working through Liszt). Other personal favourites include the sensitive, intriguing playing of Anna Tilbrook, and the brilliantly versatile Joseph Middleton.

They are all professional chameleons, who can keep their own style while shaping the sound around any singer. When you next go to a recital, give at least one ear to the piano, and reap the rewards.

Adrian Ainsworth writes for a living, but mostly about things like finance, tax and benefits. For light relief, then, he covers his obsessions – overwhelmingly music, but with sprinklings of photography and art – on the ‘Specs’ blog, which you can find at

Twitter:
 

By |

Who or what inspired you to take up piano, and pursue a career in music?
I started with a local teacher, Art Richards, an amateur who loved music deeply. He gave me freedom to develop at my own pace, and in my own way. After a few years, I found that I could play more advanced repertoire, and it became self-motivating. I went on to study with Paul Strouse, who had been a pupil of Nadia Boulanger and Wanda Landowska. He demanded much more discipline and gave me a more well rounded musical education, preparing me for music school auditions.

Who or what have been the most important influences on your musical life and career?

My teachers, John Ogdon, Michel Block and Maria Curcio. Ursula Corning, a wonderful patron, sponsored my first recordings. Her support also enabled me to give my London debut recital.

What have been the greatest challenges of your career so far?

To balance practicing, teaching, performing and the promotional/admin side of the business.

Which performance/recordings are you most proud of?

I’m pleased with all the recordings I have released so far, but especially Scarlatti and Debussy.

Which particular works do you think you play best?

Anything that I feel I have a clear and personal vision of.

How do you make your repertoire choices from season to season?

I choose pieces to play based on trying to form balanced programmes, largely with core repertoire, circulating old, familiar works with pieces that are new and fresh for me.

Do you have a favourite concert venue to perform in and why?

In London it’s a toss up between Wigmore Hall, for its intimacy and history, and Kings Place, for its clear, detailed acoustics and fabulous design.

Favourite pieces to perform? Listen to?

I always enjoy programming Beethoven Sonatas. In each one there are awkward, angular passages, but his genius makes them works that are greater than they can be performed.

Who are your favourite musicians?

Anyone who plays with focus and integrity, pretty much in any genre.

What is your most memorable concert experience?

Playing Beethoven’s ‘Appassionata’ Sonata outdoors at the Holloway Arts Festival in London. The piano was amplified on a powerful PA system. As I tried to play quietly the sound technicians kept cranking the volume up. So when the sudden fortissimo passages came the dynamic was ear-splitting. I was told the piano could be heard three miles away.

What do you consider to be the most important ideas and concepts to impart to aspiring musicians?

Keep your musical standards high and concentrate.

What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Maintaining a steady 2 or 3 percent improvement every day.

Mark Swartzentruber performs music by Bach, Ravel and Schubert at Kings Place, London on Wednesday 2nd March. Further details here

Mark Swartzentruber has performed throughout Europe, the USA and East Asia. London appearances include solo recitals at the South Bank’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, Wigmore Hall, Kings Place and St John’s Smith Square. He has performed live on BBC Radio 3. He has also appeared on BBC Radio 4 and Classic FM.

Mark Swartzentruber studied under John Ogdon in the United States before moving to London to work with Maria Curcio, the eminent protégé of Artur Schnabel. A committed teacher and educator, he maintains a vibrant private practice. He is an external examiner and adjudicator for the Guildhall School of Music and was formerly a teacher at the Royal College of Music, Junior Department. He has given masterclasses and has adjudicated competitions in Britain, Ireland, the United States and Korea.

Swartzentruber’s début album, of Schubert Sonatas, was released by Sony to critical acclaim. Shortly afterwards he co-founded Solo Records, an independent label. His CDs, of Scarlatti, Haydn, Beethoven, Schumann and Debussy piano works, have all earned excellent reviews in the international music press.

As a broadcaster, Mark Swartzentruber appeared weekly on BBC Radio 3’s Sunday Morning programme, presenting historic recordings, as well as producing the show. He has also had music features commissioned by BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4.

www.markswartzentruber.com

 

 

By |

“Wise artists seek out critical evaluations.”
–The Musician’s Way

As musicians it is important for us to receive endorsement for our work. This may come from teachers and mentors, colleagues, friends and family, critics and audience members: whatever its source, it has value.

Positive endorsement of, for example, our playing naturally makes us feel good and keen to stay the course on the musician’s journey. It boosts our confidence – and a confident musician will take positive endorsement at face value, whereas one who is less confident may try to read between the lines for a hidden agenda or see an imagined backhanded compliment.

Those of us who study with teachers like to be told we have played well, to receive praise from the teacher for our work, but even criticism, if framed with the right vocabulary, can be constructive and regarded as useful endorsement. Critiquing of our work allows us to develop and grow and it feeds our creativity, encouraging us to strive for better technical control, more vibrant sound, greater expression or more profound and original interpretations in our music.

Endorsement from other sources can be equally as meaningful and valuable as that which we receive from teachers and mentors. (Why else, for example, do we read reviews of our work?) Sometimes the most meaningful comments can come the audience.

Take endorsements and criticism at face value and be generous in your response, even if you don’t entirely agree with it. If someone says something you disagree with, perhaps ask them to explain their comments in more detail. Treat it as impersonal information, evaluate it and try to resist taking a defensive stance. Go away and think about the comments, and, if appropriate, act on them or reject them.

Of course, sometimes we come up against negative comments or criticism which has no real value to us. Musicians tend to be sensitive souls and despite our best efforts it can sometimes be very hard to retain a thick skin about negative comments.. In these instances, unless the negative feedback has any value, it is better to step back and move on. 

It is also important to “self-endorse” – to praise ourselves when our playing is going well. I encourage my students to self-evaluate, at lessons and in their practising at home, and being able to identify passages played well is as important as identifying areas which need extra attention.

 

By |

The Music into Words event, which I chaired earlier this month, attempted to explore some of the ways in which we write about classical music today and provoked a lively discussion, both at the actual event and online. Several issues emerged relating specifically to blogs which have exercised my thoughts in the weeks since the event:

  1. Without an editor, how do you ensure that what you write is intelligent, well-written, factually accurate, and interesting to read?
  2. Who are you writing for?
  3. Why a blog?

In my experience, readers will return to those blogs which are consistently well-written, interesting, accurate and assiduously self-edited. (This is borne out by the number of regular commentators and subscribers to this blog: WordPress provides very useful stats and analytics allowing one to track such data.) I have come across some truly dire writing on the internet (and also in newspapers, journals and books), and also much that is extremely high-quality (by academics, journalists, bloggers, musicians….), and one can of course learn a great deal by looking at what others are doing, or not doing. In the era of the spelling and grammar checker, there really is no excuse for sloppy spelling; clichés or hackneyed expressions should also be avoided (my particular pet hate is “smorgasbord”….). I’m very fortunate that one of my blog subscribers, who also happens to be a good friend of mine, will pounce on any inaccuracies of spelling or grammar with the eagle eyes of a skilled editor. In terms of fact-checking, I make sure I do my homework: this applies to my concert reviews too. I try to write in an accessible, readable and intelligent style, and one of the nicest compliments I’ve been paid when I met one of my readers in real life was “you sound just the same in person as you do in your writing”.

Which leads me onto “Who are you writing for?”. Initially, I didn’t really think I was writing for anyone but myself when I started this blog in 2010. I was playing the piano seriously again, having returned to the instrument after an absence of c15 years, and I wanted some way to record my thoughts and feelings about the music I was playing and hearing in concerts. Rather than keep an old-fashioned journal, I decided to write a blog (having had a modest degree of success with a food blog called Demon Cook), but I didn’t really expect anyone to take much notice of it. I suppose the unusual title helped (and by the way, I initially thought of calling this blog The Naked Pianist (à la Jamie’s Oliver’s Naked Chef) until my husband pointed out that this might attract “the wrong kind of reader”!), plus my interest in social media and a growing network of like-minded people (including a number of other bloggers and online reviewers), and gradually the number of daily visitors and subscribers crept up. When I was invited to review for Bachtrack.com (the owner of the site had read and liked my blog), I felt my writing finally had some currency beyond the confines of this site, and I have subsequently gone on to write guest blogs for a number of other classical music sites, including HelloStage, InterludeHK, Music Haven and The Sampler, the blog of Soundandmusic.org.

Subconsciously, I am probably writing for someone like me, someone who enjoys classical music, likes going to concerts and reading about them, maybe plays the piano too, who ponders the day-to-day practicalities of being a musician, amateur or professional (practising, repertoire, continuing study, teaching etc), as well as the more esoteric aspects of the musician’s life (motivation, performance anxiety, impostor syndrome, avoiding injury). Judging by the comments and messages I receive in response to my articles, it is clear my readership is now pretty wide, and international.

One thing I’ve never done via this blog, or indeed anywhere else, is set myself up as some kind of “expert”. People do come to me for advice about piano playing, careers in music, piano teaching and more, and I try to respond to such enquiries with honesty and courtesy. It is gratifying to be respected for what one does, but I believe a degree of a humility is crucial too (there are quite enough egos at large in the musical profession!). I enjoy the conversations that emerge from comments on articles here, I have made friends via this blog and I find the community of like-minded people which blogging creates very stimulating. To explore this further, I canvassed the opinion of a number of other bloggers who write on music and culture, and with whom I interact on a regular basis:

It started as a kind of “cultural diary” – a channel for me to enthuse about music I loved (plus some art and photography) and hopefully ‘share the love’.

First, I enjoy writing, and get special satisfaction in expressing my thoughts and ideas as eloquently as I can. Secondly, the idea that there are complete strangers out there reading what I’ve written flatters my vanity. Finally, there are so many ignoramuses on the net, spouting rubbish on matters they don’t understand, I saw no reason not to join them.

It’s cheaper than therapy

I think my single overriding reason is a desire to entertain.

The world of blogging is a curious one, and one which has grown hugely in the last ten years or so, to the extent that blogging now makes a significant contribution to writing and journalism. Many organisations, including mainstream newspapers, have blogs on their sites, often written by well-regarded journalists and commentators. (At the Music into Words event, one of the panelists, Imogen Tilden, classical music editor of The Guardian, acknowledged the important role of bloggers who “fill the gaps” in covering concerts and events her team of reviewers do not have the time or resources to cover, and who offer alternative opinions.)  The difference for the majority of bloggers is that we are independent – and the freedom to write what we like is very potent. Some people may regard bloggers as “privileged”, and are perhaps envious of the freedom we enjoy – freedom to write what we like without the pressure of conforming to editorial house style or deadlines, freedom to go to as many concerts, operas, plays or exhibitions as we like. I do regard myself as fortunate to be able to do this, but I also have a day job (two in fact), as do most of my blogging colleagues, and I don’t think blogging should necessarily be regarded as some kind of self-indulgent literary onanism or dilettantism.

From a more pragmatic point of view, a blog can be a useful tool to:

  1. Offer an overview of who you are – an extended CV, if you will
  2. Provide samples of your writing
  3. Connect with new people
  4. Organise your messy thoughts into coherent ones
  5. Create your own PR machine
  6. Stand out – according to the “1 per cent rule”, only 1 percent of Internet users actively create new content, while the other 99 percent just view it. Blogging separates from the 99 percent of people who don’t blog. Standing out is essential in an increasingly competitive world, whatever your profession or role
  7. Improve your writing skills – like piano playing, writing improves with practise
  8. Give yourself some headspace. The person who described blogging as “cheaper than therapy” makes a useful point – that writing can be therapeutic, regardless of the subject under discussion

So, if you’ve got something to say, maybe now is the time for you to consider writing a blog?

For more on the practicalities of writing a blog see Presentation for BASCA on Classical Music Blogging