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Summary of Subjects in the Message Archives
The table below lists, and often paraphrases and
abbreviates, the questions to which we have published answers.
This list is roughly in reverse-chronological
order. We have tried to distinguish the questions about technical
and performance matters versus those that might be asked by
performers and listeners alike (not always an easy call).
We also have tried to identify key words and phrases (far from
exhaustive indexing). Remember that you can also use your browser’s
“find” function (usually on the EDIT menu) to look for key words
on this page.
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Performing/Technical
- Rehearsal management
- Verdi’s ^
marking in Otello.
- Batons: wood or
synthetic?
- Meter changes in Rite
of Spring.
- Orchestras’ playing behind
the beat.
- Formal education
versus apprenticeship.
- What suggestions
do you have for starting out, especially how to run the
first rehearsal and how to study the score?
- Is the piano indispensable
for a conductor?
- Are there times when it is actually wrong
to follow the orchestra conductor?
- All French program.
- About Italian notation
and errata.
- When a soloist has a complicated passage and orchestra part
is fairly simple (as, in the third movement of the Sibelius
Violin Concerto), do you follow
or conduct?
- How do you keep people from applauding
inappropriately?
- I was wondering what advice you could offer to me to help
me practice score reading
at the piano.
- Preparing for conducting
test where the exercise is to rehearse and make corrections
with an orchestra.
- Why is it that conducting
auditions always require playing Bach chorales (four staves)
at the keyboard?
- How do you interpret Tchaikowksy’s indication of ffffff?
- What repertory [...]
for beginning conductors (conducting small ensembles)?
- Is there any source for scores
adapted to the piano?
- Can you comment on your use of attacca
between movements?
- Can you recommend a good recording
of the Jupiter Symphony?
- What should I look for in a graduate
program in conducting? Also, what tips can you give on getting
more exposure to orchestral conducting?
- Is Brahms
traditionally played slower than it should be?
- What is your perspective on left-handed
conducting.
- When writing music, how does one choose between the time
signatures of 4/4, 2/4, or 2/2? It seems that it’s
more than a matter of speed.
- What is the conductor’s role
in the music making?
- Interpreting markings in Mozart.
- Conductor training: scores
or gestures?
- Could you recommend some books on score reading? Any tips
on how to improve
one's ability to read scores?
- I am interested in your reaction to using a synthesizer
in composing for acoustic instruments.
- Repertory for student
orchestras.
- I was wondering if you have any hints
on communicating with an orchestra.
- What things should an aspiring conductor be working on to
help prepare for
graduate school?
- Tempo in Beethoven’s
Sixth Symphony (The Pastorale).
- Wind ensemble
“movement.”
- What are the most important questions that must be resolved
prior to your first rehearsal?
- Auditions, managers, and the Internet.
- Evaluating
conductors.
- Prelude to Madame
Butterfly, Act 2, Scene 2.
- Do you suggest any particular aria
substitution for Rosina’s lesson scene (Barbiere)?
- At the beginning of Elektra’s first aria, Strauss has the
violins re-tune
very briefly. How does this work?
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Other
- Conducting an inborn
talent or acquired skill?
- Comments on Bellini’s
I Capuleti ed i Montecchi (The Capulets & the Montagues),
with audio illustration.
- Does the conductor’s baton
go up or down on the beat?
- Where is the music?
- Tastes and preferences.
- Comments on the new Mozart
CD (audio sample).
- About composers
conducting their own works.
- Don’t you think that contemporary conductors and orchestras
should incorporate more
20th century music in their repertoires (including recent
compositions)?
- Comments on the new Brahms
CD (audio sample).
- Is it more difficult to do two
different operas in the same evening, like Cavalleria
and Pagliacci, than to do one?
- What is your typical day
like?
- Announcement: Addition of RealAudio®
to the site.
- Does a concerto soloist have the option to change the tempo
as desired?
- I would like to know more about “absolute
pitch.”
- About decision-making regarding
cuts, repeats, and optional notes.
- Comments on new recording (audio sample), specifically Mendelssohn’s
early violin concerto.
- When I hear a piece taken at a tempo
very different from any I’ve ever heard, I’m inclined to call
it “wrong” while my friend defends a musician’s right to his
or her interpretation. What is your opinion?
- Comic and playful
music versus “serious" music.
- Comments on new Beethoven recording, specifically the Eroica
(audio sample).
- What is music?
- Can you comment on working with and without a prompter?
- Do you work with original
instruments? How much consideration do you give to creating
historically authentic performances?
- I hear reference to “tenor clef” and other clefs (usually
with a groan). Can you explain what these other clefs
are?
- What was the single greatest influence
on your music-making?
- About ornamentation
and decoration (with illustrative audio files).
- When an orchestra tours with a program it will repeat at
each venue, how difficult is it to adjust
the playing to the acoustics?
- What rules of thumb do you follow regarding dynamics
and balance?
- Do you object to surtitles?
- Overview of conducting
technique (use of baton, beating patterns, gestures, etc.).
- When is a transposition
acceptable, and when is it not?
- Do you have any rules of thumb you follow with regard to
repeats and cuts?
Has performance practice gone “too far” in insisting on repeats
or opening cuts?
- How do you arrive at an interpretation?
- Toscanini and the problem of the Act 1 finale of The Barber
of Seville (with illustrative audio files).
- How do you go about planning
symphonic programs?
- In a house where the orchestra pit
will not accomodate the forces prescribed by the composer,
how are the “pruning” decisions made?
- What is the most difficult
score you have ever had to conduct?
- About computer
programs.
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Die Walküre
For comments on Die Walküre, see an interview
published December, 1997 in Montreal's La Scena Musicale. Click
here for English or here for français.
Reprinted here with the kind permission of La
Scena Musicale.
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