Piano Performance in a Semiotic Key Acta Semiotica Fennica Approaches to Musical Semiotics Editor Eero Tarasti Associate Editors Paul Forsell Richard Littlefield Editorial Board (ASF) Pertti Ahonen Henri Broms † Jacques Fontanille André Helbo Altti Kuusamo Ilkka Niiniluoto Pekka Pesonen Hannu Riikonen Kari Salosaari Vilmos Voigt Editorial Board (AMS) Márta Grabócz Robert S. Hatten Jean-Marie Jacono Costin Miereanu Gino Stefani Ivanka Stoianova Department of Philosophy, History, Culture and Art Studies Faculty of Arts University of Helsinki PIANO PERFORMANCE in a Semiotic Key Society, musical canon and novel Discourses Lina Navickaitė-Martinelli Academic dissertation to be publicly discussed, by due permission of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Helsinki, in auditorium XII, University main building, on 14 November 2014 at 12 o’clock Helsinki 2014 This book is a publication of The Semiotic Society of Finland E-mail orders: [email protected], [email protected] Reviewed by Prof. Dr. Jean-Marie Jacono Prof. Habil. Dr. Leonidas Melnikas Cover photo by the author Cover design by Dario Martinelli Layout by Rima Bukaveckienė © Lina Navickaitė-Martinelli 2014 ISBN 978-952-68257-0-0 (paperback) ISBN 978-952-68257-1-7 (PDF) ISSN: 1235-497X Acta Semiotica Fennica XLV ISSN: 1458-4921 Approaches to Musical Semiotics 18 Printed by “BMK Leidykla”, Vilnius 2014 PIANO PERFORMANCE in a Semiotic Key Society, musical canon and novel Discourses Lina Navickaitė-Martinelli Acta Semiotica Fennica XLV Approaches to Musical Semiotics 18 Semiotic Society of Finland Helsinki 2014 To Dario Abstract In an attempt to expand and enrich the existing trends of musical performance studies, as well as exploit the potentials of semiotic analysis, this dissertation offers the theoretical perspective that would enable us analyzing and unfolding the multiple (musical, cultural, as well as social) meanings generated by and communicated through the performer’s art. Such an approach, as well as the theoretical framework of the thesis, may be considered interdisciplinary. Without denying that musical performance, particularly that of Western classical piano music (which is the focus of this dissertation), is inevitably associ- ated with the opus, the semiotic approach, it is proposed here, should invoke a broader viewpoint and study performance as encompassing all the exogenic meanings that do not necessarily depend on a musical work. Thus, the focus of the present dissertation is the figure of a classical music performer as a significant part of society, as well as cultural, institutional and personal discourses that both generate the art of music performance and originate from it. The main targets here are: a) mapping the predominant tendencies of the art of musical perform- ance during the twentieth century; and b) proposing a form of semiotic analy- sis of different representations and self-representations that musical performers, pianists in particular, put into action in their interactions with social and cul- tural contexts (including different types of performer-listener communication processes, scholarly analyses of the art, the various media through which the art of music performance is disseminated, and aspects related to the consumption, marketing and/or ideologizing of today’s performance practices). The dissertation is structured into four parts. Part 1 introduces a semiotic framework for studying musical performance. Part 2 discusses a variety of mean- ings communicated through the performers’ art as well as the media in which the art of classical piano music performance is operating. Part 3 of the dissertation positions the performers’ art within the Western musical canon by examining Beethoven interpretations as played by pianists of various cultural and historical backgrounds. The concluding Part 4 presents novel discourses on the art of mu- sical performance by analyzing eleven personal websites of Lithuanian classical pianists as an important vehicle of contemporary performers for communicating their artistic identities with their audiences. It is claimed in this dissertation that the combination of semiotic and musi- cological approaches provides significant research tools for the analysis of musi- cal performance. The chosen methods and case studies are relevant and revealing in the study of musical performance art in that they strongly make a case for current musicology to elaborate increasingly interdisciplinary paradigms and modes of investigation. 7 PIANO PERFORMANCE IN A SEMIOTIC KEY: Society, Musical Canon and Novel Discourses Contents Abstract . 7 List of Illustrations ........................................... 14 Acknowledgements ........................................... 16 Introduction ............................................... 20 PART 1 Unveiling the Significations of Musical Performance: A Theoretical Challenge .................................. 30 1.1. ‘Performance’ as the Object of Study: Terminological Premise . 31 1.2. Signifying Music and the Self: Semiotically on Musical Performance . 36 1.2.1. A Semiotic Approach to Musical Performance . 36 1.2.2. Selected Semiotic Studies on Musical Performance .............. 40 1.2.2.1. Roland Barthes’ The Grain of the Voice: New Perspectives for Writing about Music . 40 1.2.2.2. Naomi Cumming: ‘Voice’, Body, and Other Signs of the ‘Self’ in Musical Performance . 42 1.2.2.3. Eero Tarasti’s Analyses and Conceptualizing of Musical Performance ........................................... 44 1.3. Semiotic Identity of a Performer: Endo- and Exo-Signs in the Art of Interpreting Music ............................. 48 1.4. Gino Stefani’s Theory of Musical Competence as Applied to the Study of Musical Performance ......................... 53 1.5. A Theoretical Model for Semiotic Analysis of Musical Performance . 62 PART 2 Meanings and Media of the Art of Music Performance ....... 68 2.1. Performer (Not) as a Medium: On Socio-Cultural Practices of Music Performance ..................................... 69 8 PIANO PERFORMANCE IN A SEMIOTIC KEY 2.1.1. Introduction ........................................... 69 2.1.2. A Performer-Oriented Approach . 70 2.1.2.1. Performer as Mediator ................................ 70 2.1.2.2. Towards an ‘Emancipation Paradigm’ ..................... 72 2.1.3. Music Performer as a Social Figure .......................... 74 2.1.4. Musical Performance as Event and Contest . 78 2.1.4.1. Significations of a Live Performance Experience . 78 2.1.4.2. Performance Art as a Cultural Commodity ................. 82 2.1.5. Concluding Remarks . 87 2.2. The Body Is the Message: On Performance and Corporeality . 89 2.2.1. Introduction ........................................... 89 2.2.2. A Performer’s Corporeal Identity . 91 2.3.3. Semiotic Models for Analyzing a Performer’s Corporeality . 99 2.2.4. Concluding Remarks . 106 2.3. ‘Creative Lying’ and Other Ways to Signify: On Music Performance as a Creative Process . 108 2.3.1. Introduction .......................................... 108 2.3.2. Artists’ Views on Creativity in Performance: Two Case Studies .... 110 2.3.2.1. The Role of a Performer .............................. 111 2.3.2.2. The Performer’s Relation to the Composer/Work ............. 113 2.3.3. Concluding Remarks . 115 2.4. From Werktreue to ‘High Fidelity’: On Authentic Performance . 118 2.4.1. Introduction .......................................... 118 2.4.2. ‘Authenticity’: The Concept and Its Usage . 119 2.4.3. Semiotic Contributions to the Issue of Authenticity in Musical Performance ............................................ 124 2.4.3.1. Eero Tarasti’s Semiotic Theory of Musical Authenticity ........ 125 2.4.3.2. Dario Martinelli’s Categorization of ‘Authenticity’ in Music .... 129 2.4.3.3. Elaboration on Martinelli’s Categories within Art Music Performance .......................................... 131 2.4.4. Concluding Remarks . 133 2.5. ‘Mechanization of Music’: On Recorded Performance .......... 136 2.5.1. Introduction .......................................... 136 2.5.2. Sound Recording as Communication: The Performers’ Attitudes and the Listeners’ Experiences ............................... 138 9 PIANO PERFORMANCE IN A SEMIOTIC KEY: Society, Musical Canon and Novel Discourses 2.5.3. The Impact of Recording Technologies on the Art of Musical Performance: A Semiotic Perspective .......................... 142 2.5.4. Concluding Remarks . 146 2.6. Frontiers of Style: On Schools of Performance as Markers of Cultural Identities . 148 2.6.1. Introduction .......................................... 148 2.6.2. Specialization and Standardization of Music Teaching . 150 2.6.3. Boundaries of National Schools in Music Performance Art ....... 153 2.6.3.1. The Definition of a ‘School’ . 153 2.6.3.2. National Schools of Piano Playing in the Twentieth Century . 155 2.6.4. Mapping the School: Is There a ‘Lithuanian Tradition’? . 158 2.6.4.1. The Path of the Romantic Individualists .................. 160 2.6.4.2. The Many Ways of the New Generation . 164 2.6.4.3. Concluding Remarks ................................ 168 2.7. Inside and Outside the Canon: On Performers’ Repertoire Choices .. 172 2.7.1. Introduction .......................................... 172 2.7.2. Performance Art and the Imaginary Museum of Musical Works ... 174 2.7.3. The Pros and Cons of Performing New Music . 180 2.7.4. Local Musical Canons . 189 2.7.5. Concluding Remarks . 195 PART 3 (Re)Interpreting Musical Canon: On Beethoven Reception and Performance ................ 198