Conductor's Notebook
Writings, including academic papers and music criticism, as well as videos, audio, notes, and other content.
Viewing entries tagged
Rehearsal
According to Klein, humans have at least 9 grand Sources of Power. They include storytelling, metaphor, and intuition. They also include rationality (Kahneman’s more deliberate “System 2”), although in highly dynamic environments where time is short and information is imperfect, rationality quickly falls apart. And, over long stretches, rationality gets tired while intuition remains.
Music sits at the mouth of the river. It is the source, the way, the Tao… The organization must be built around a common love for the joy of excellent orchestral repertoire, performed at the highest artistic level.
...There are quite a few other techniques that I would broadly lump broadly into this category. Each could have their own essay, and some already do. Here are a few examples:
Knowing when to stop and fix something.
Knowing how to prioritize between competing priorities.
Knowing when to move on from a passage.
Knowing when practicing under- or at-tempo would be (in)effective....
"these differences are equally plain, yet only to those who have been initiated by practical work."
Simon Rattle rehearses the choir and orchestra of the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra as they get ready for a performance of Haydn’s Creation. This brief clip demonstrates rehearsal instructions centered choral diction around a brief passage in Haydn’s Creation. The frequent stopping and starting indicates rare high-quality footage of a professional organization engaged in a true detail rehearsal, not merely a dress rehearsal run-through.
Edmondson gives four characteristics of an Intelligent Failure
The failure takes place in a novel situation.
The context “presents a credible opportunity to advance toward a desired goal.”
Due dilligence (practice, preparation, research, deliberate process, etc.) is undertaken….
…while removing context can cut away the unimportant, it also runs the risk of cutting away the glue that holds the music together in the first place.
