Nineteenth-Century Performance Practice: Reassessing Tradition and Revitalizing Interpretation
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Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Music Faculty Publications School of Music 2014 Nineteenth-Century Performance Practice: Reassessing Tradition and Revitalizing Interpretation Deanna Joseph Georgia State University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/music_facpub Part of the Music Commons Recommended Citation Joseph, Deanna. “Nineteenth-Century Performance Practice: Reassessing Tradition and Revitalizing Interpretation” Choral Journal 54. 9 (2014): 18-31. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Music at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Music Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. NINETEENTH-CENTURY PERFORMANCE PRACTICE Reassessing Tradition and Revitalizing Interpretation Deanna Joseph Deanna Joseph Director of Choral Activities Georgia State University [email protected] istorically informed per- have been slower to make their formance procedures way into the mainstream. Classically H have become popular trained musicians of our time have over the past fi fty years. Music of grown up playing and listening to the Baroque period has arguably the music of Romantic composers received the greatest attention, and and frequently assume that what musicians are now aware of issues they have been taught is stylistically related to the number of singers authentic. There is a certain comfort in Bach’s choir, the use of period level with this repertoire, so much instruments, and expressive ele- so that contemporary performers ments such as tempi, tone color, and often have a preconceived sound articulation. However, performance concept and thus take performance practices of the nineteenth century traditions for granted. CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 54 Number 9 19 NINETEENTH-CENTURY PERFORMANCE PRACTICE Scholarship of the last few decades their approach to interpretation. Orchestral seating was a subject of has seen an increase in analysis of his- The following article will present great interest to musicians in the fi rst half of the nineteenth century, torical recordings, as well as research research on nineteenth-century seating and treatises often published into nineteenth-century books on sing- and stage placement, tempo and tempo diagrams of famous orchestras. They ing technique and interpretation and freedom, tone quality and vibrato, and almost always show the violins at techniques on playing the piano, violin, the use of portamento. the front of the orchestra, facing and other instruments. Many treatises one another on opposite sides. shed light on issues of tempo, phras- The winds were often placed on risers, sometimes quite steep, in ing, dynamics, and tone color, serving Seating and as guides straight from the pens of the rear, with the brass at the very Stage Placement back. Violas, cellos and basses might the performers and teachers of the be found almost anywhere. When Romantic era. Examining this historical The manner in which nineteenth- there was a chorus, it was placed evidence can lead musicians to reas- century orchestras and choruses were in front of the orchestra or at the sess many preconceived notions about arranged in concert is well documented sides. The conductor of a concert nineteenth-century music and revitalize in various treatises and seating charts: orchestra usually stood in the Für den Kapellmeister Nortenpult Sollsten 3 - 6 Thomaner-Chor 40 Männer 100 Altstimmen 90 Sopranstimmen Eingang Kapellmeister Eingang Nortenpult Pauliner Gesangverein 150 Personen 80 Basse 70 Tenöre 20 zweite 20 erste für Vlolinen Vlolinen für Orchester Orchester resp. Choir 2 Solo Cellos resp. Choir Männerchor Männerchor Männerchor 8 Sitzplätze 1 Sitplatz 1 Sitplatz 8 Sitzplätze 10 Cellos 10 Bässe Trommel Waldhömer Pauken Clarinetten Flöten Trompeten Posaunen Fagotte Oboen Orgel Figure 1. Leipzig Gewandhaus Seating Plan, 1880s – Bibliography: Kling, Henry. Der Vollkommene Musik-Dirigent. Verfasst und herausgegeben von H. Kling. Hannover: L. Gertel, 1890 20 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 54 Number 9 Reassessing Tradition and Revitalizing Interpretation centre of the orchestra, among the Figure 2. Seating plan for the 1843 performance of Haydn’s Creation in the Gesellschaft der instrumentalists; often he faced the Musikfreunde, Vienna – Bibliography: Schünemann, Georg. Geschichte des Dirigierens. Leipzig: 1 audience. Breitkopf & Härtel, 1913 The fact that the chorus was virtually Eingang in das orchester (Entrance to the orchestra) Triangel always placed in front of the orchestra 4 Violin 4 Violin 4 Violin 2 Violin 2 Violin gran Tamburo is irrefutable. In some cases, this type 2 Celli of confi guration even carried over into 12 Celli 12 Celli 2 the early twentieth century. One of the 10 Horn 1 Ophicleid 1 Bleichfagott 6 Posanuen 4 Trompeten biggest problems with arrangements of 1 Paar Pauken 10 Clarinetten 2 Contrafagotte 10 Fagotte Pauken 2 Paar this kind was that the chorus could not 3 Tamburin 10 Flöten 2ter Director 3 Tamburin see the conductor very well, if at all. 2 Trom- peten 10 Fagotte Hector Berlioz describes the layout of 8 Violin IIdo 8 Viola 8 Viola 8 Violin I forces in the amphitheater of the Paris 10 Violin IIdo 6 Viola 6 Viola 10 Violin I Conservatoire: 10 Violin IIdo 6 Viola 6 Viola 10 Violin I The violins and the violas are on 16 Violin IIdo 16 Violin I the stage, and only the basses and do wind instruments occupy the steps; 16 Violin II 16 Violin I the chorus is seated in the front 2 Violin 2 Violin do Violin I Director of the stage, looking toward the Violin II Director audience. All the sopranos and altos 2 Celli 2 Celli are unable to see the movements of the conductor, since their backs Bass Choir Tenor Choir are turned directly toward him. The 2 Celli 2 Celli arrangement is very inconvenient for this part of the chorus.3 1 Cont. Fagott To solve this issue, rather than mov- Accomp. ing the chorus behind the orchestra as Erster we do today, two or more conductors Director 2 Fagott 2 Violon 2 Violin were often used. A Leipzig Gewandhaus seating plan from the 1880s depicts a 2 Celli 2 Celli 2 Clarinet 2 Trompeten large chorus positioned at the front of Alto Choir Soprano Choir the stage. There are two conductors, and x 1 Violon 2 Celli the orchestra is arched in the back with 2 Oboen Soli the strings fi rst, followed by the brass Clavier and woodwinds on platforms behind 3 Posanuen Soli 1 Cello Director them.4 (Figure 1) An 1843 performance 3 Flöten of Franz Joseph Haydn’s Creation at the Bass Soprano Tenor Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna 2 Horn required a fi rst and second director, a Soli third keyboard director, and two addi- tional directors for the fi rst and second violins—fi ve directors in all.5 (Figure 2) From an orchestral standpoint, it is the violins and violas sat for theatrical Performances in venues outside interesting that “the eighteenth-century performances such as opera, where they major concert halls, such as churches, practice of standing to play in concert were required to play in a pit, and stood often created special problems due to situations still prevailed in many places in for performances that required them to the demands of the space. The position the nineteenth century.”6 Until this time, be on the concert stage. of the organ was the fi rst and usually CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 54 Number 9 21 NINETEENTH-CENTURY PERFORMANCE PRACTICE largest consideration and often forced Choice of Tempo Tempo is among the most variable and diffi cult issues in musical perfor- fl exibility regarding seating of the or- and Tempo Freedom chestra. Regardless of sight lines and mance. The idea of intuiting the proper other logistical issues, the chorus was still tempo or “feeling it” was popular with Every sensitive musician is aware that consistently placed in front or to the side progressive composer-conductors such the quest for historically appropriate as Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner to- of the orchestra—never behind—and tempos must be concerned with ward the end of the nineteenth century. perhaps modern-day experimentation plausible parameters rather than with placing the chorus in front or to the with precisely delineated or very Wagner was particularly opinionated on side of the orchestra may reveal a new narrowly defi ned absolute tempos… the subject, stating, “If one wants to sum- sound world or solve balance problems. many psychological and aesthetic marize what the correct performance (See the section at the end of this article factors, as well as the varying physical of a piece of music is for a conductor, it titled “Putting Research into Practice” for conditions in which performance is based on his always setting the right takes place, militate against the more on incorporating this research into tempo; for the choice and determina- notion that a piece of music tion of that tempo immediately allows performances of today.) should be rigidly bound to a single immutable tempo.7 us to recognize whether the conductor understood the musical composition or not.”8 Though many nineteenth-century musicians chose to print metronome marks in their scores, by and large these marks were meant to be taken only as general indicators. The fi rst edition of Ein deutsches Requiem contained markings for every movement, yet Brahms had them removed from all later editions Let your music and commented repeatedly that the metronome encouraged mechanical be heard… performances. In 1880 he expressed his general view in a letter to George in Germany Henschel: “Those [markings] which are found in the Requiem are there because & Austria! good friends talked me into them. For “We had a tremendous I myself have never believed that my experience on every level. blood and a mechanical instrument go The entire trip was very well well together… What I know, however, executed.