30 Seconds

Yesterday I took ten minutes to play the piano.  I played through a few simple piano pieces and read a choral octavo by Rachmaninoff.

So let me take a moment to talk about how I initially begin to look at choral pieces.  I don't mean the entire process, but rather the initial searching.  I glance through the piece and get a "feel" for it.  However, I have never really taken the time to document what I'm actually doing.  Many times I think I'm just going off of gut feeling.  But that's not true.  This is my attempt to verbalize what happens in the thirty seconds I first look at a piece of music.

I often skim through pieces with my eyes and make sure it's not too boring- is all the rhythm similar?  Are the ranges limited throughout the entirety of the piece?  Yawn.  Nobody wants to hear that.  Although to be fair, I don't mind strophic pieces- as long as each verse gives me something different (textually) so I can shape the music and build the story.  Do the alto parts sit extremely low the entire time?  I don't do that to my alto section, which is often at least half comprised of sopranos.  If it's modern, I look at dynamics and articulation.  If the composer has something in mind- a story, a feeling... the music must wrap around something.  Unless of course, it's Arvo Pärt or something similar.  Then it requires more like three minutes for the initial "look through" so I can plunk out a few sections and see how the composer creates tension and growth.  I automatically throw out pieces that are clearly over edited and makes the primary language English when it was clearly written in a different language.  In those cases, if the music itself looks interesting, I'll look for another edition.  If it's an early music piece or uses counterpoint, I look at how the voice parts interact with each other, what might be difficult and determine if my particular group has the independence for it or if they can reach that particular level of independence before the performance.  I also look for where the music goes.  If it's there pages of the same three motives without much variation, it's probably going to be boring.  It needs to flirt with other tonal areas, have exchanges between voices, and moments that are important, and the music needs to be working it's way toward those moments, not just wandering aimlessly.  Unless, of course, the music is trying to make a philosophical point about... something.  But then I probably won't program it.

And then I put the music into three piles: 1) No.  Should probably throw the music.  I mean recycle.  2) Maybe.  I'm not sold, but I want to hear what it sounds like when I play it.  (My internal hearing is not as developed as I would like it to be.  That's a whole other blog post- I used to think I was lucky because I was a conductor that played the piano.  I wondered what my colleagues did who didn't play the piano.  Now I almost wish I didn't play the piano, because it's easy to rely on that instead of my inner ear to "hear" a piece).  3) This piece is a yes.  Maybe not this concert (but maybe), but certainly someday.  Remember it.

The Rachmaninoff piece?  It's now in the third pile.  I have plans for it.