Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Foreword
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- PART ONE The Conductor's Mind
- PART TWO The Conductor's Skills
- PART THREE The Conductor's Hands
- PART FOUR The Conductor and the Musicians
- PART FIVE The Conductor and the Instruments
- PART SIX The Conductor, the Composer, and the Score
- PART SEVEN The Conductor and the Audience
- PART EIGHT The Conductor and “the Business”
- PART NINE Inside the Conductor
- 46 Concentration
- 47 Control and Power
- 48 Ego
- 49 Languages
- 50 Nervousness
- 51 Our Heritage: Some Ancestors and My Links with Them
- Suggested Reading
- Musical Example Credits
- A Note on the Illustrations
- Index of Conductors
51 - Our Heritage: Some Ancestors and My Links with Them
from PART NINE - Inside the Conductor
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2013
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Foreword
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- PART ONE The Conductor's Mind
- PART TWO The Conductor's Skills
- PART THREE The Conductor's Hands
- PART FOUR The Conductor and the Musicians
- PART FIVE The Conductor and the Instruments
- PART SIX The Conductor, the Composer, and the Score
- PART SEVEN The Conductor and the Audience
- PART EIGHT The Conductor and “the Business”
- PART NINE Inside the Conductor
- 46 Concentration
- 47 Control and Power
- 48 Ego
- 49 Languages
- 50 Nervousness
- 51 Our Heritage: Some Ancestors and My Links with Them
- Suggested Reading
- Musical Example Credits
- A Note on the Illustrations
- Index of Conductors
Summary
“Berlioz, Mendelssohn and Wagner—that is the trinity on which all modern conducting is based.” So wrote Harold Schonberg in 1967.
Berlioz, Mendelssohn, and Wagner represent opposite poles in conducting. Berlioz's beat was “neat” and “exact,” according to Russian composer Cesar Cui, and Mendelssohn's “movements were short and decided,” as described by composer Ferdinand Hiller. Wagner's style was different: “not that of a dry Taktschläger [time beater], but, rather, of a musician who spoke from the soul … through gestures that were pure music,” according to conductor Arthur Nikisch. Wagner's style, which showed the music rather than the beats, caused problems in London. The Prelude to Tristan and Isolde nearly fell apart because the orchestra, unfamiliar with the piece, couldn't tell which beat of the bar Wagner was on. His assistant Hans Richter wrote in his diary, “The musicians often did not understand the Master's beat.” Richter saved the show by jumping up and giving the musicians a clear six-in-a-bar. Wagner had a free and subjective approach to tempo, unlike Berlioz and Mendelssohn who took fewer liberties. The London critic Henry Smart wrote in 1855 that he reduced tempo by as much as a third in Beethoven's lyrical passages. Cesar Cui preferred Berlioz to Wagner in conducting Beethoven, because Wagner “often shows affectation, and introduces accelerandos of doubtful sentimentality.”
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- Information
- Inside Conducting , pp. 247 - 254Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2013