WHAT MAKES A GREAT
CONDUCTOR?
Dr David C F Wright
In my article What makes a great composer?
I set out for each individual's consideration,
suggestions as to the essential elements
of being a great composer. Unfortunately
some people read the essay incorrectly
as if it was a definitive plumbline
and some even misread it saying, for
example, that I did not regard Bach
as a great composer, which I always
have.
What makes a great conductor?
As with the original article it has
to be said that I am not talking about
a popular conductor, of which there
are many, but a great conductor. I would
like to set out for your consideration
some essential qualities for us to arrive
at an accurate conclusion..
May I advocate first of all that a
great conductor performs exactly what
the composer wrote, and that he does
not add to, or subtract from, the composer's
score? He does not alter the orchestration.
He sticks to the tempi given and realises
as faithfully as possible what the composer
indicated.
In a video of Beethoven's Choral Symphony,
Karajan has two timpani players playing
the same material simultaneously. That
is not in the score and it is completely
unnecessary. He also adds to the number
of wind instruments which is not authorised
in the score and, again, it is unnecessary.
Inthis he is changing the composer's
wishes and making a sound which the
composer did not intend. Karajan is
adding to the score. He is not being
faithful to it.
You will ask, Does it matter?
The great conductors I have known have
always had the policy: If that is what
Beethoven wrote that is what Beethoven
will get!
Some will say, it is a matter of interpretation
The word ‘interpretation’ is misused
and by so doing covers a multitude of
sins. In English and in music it means
the correct translation and meaning
of a given text. Parlez vous français?
means Do you speak French? It does not
mean I wish I could speak French. It
does not mean I am learning French.
Those two examples may convey similar
ideas but neither is a faithful translation
nor a correct interpretation
In music, people employ the term interpretation
to excuse liberties with the music.
In crude terms, they muck about with
it!
When I consider great conductors and
follow their performances with the score
in front of me I can see that they are
being faithful to the composer's instructions
and, to me, that is the first essential
of being a great conductor.
I submit for your further consideration
that the conductor is the servant of
the music which is a natural progression
from the first point. It is the composer
and his wishes that are paramount not
the charisma or opinion of the conductor.
Sadly we live in days, and have done
so for a while, when the conductor is
often given a glamorous status and the
servant is greater than his lord. The
conductor is greater that the composer
and also greater than the music he performs.
In the world of pop music this issue
is more clearly defined. Invariably
the song is identified with singer or
group not the person who composed it.
Even in light music printed on the score
is 'words and music by Bill Jones and
Harry Crumb' but which one wrote the
music? The song Unchained Melody was
written by that marvellous film composer
Alex North but is often announced as
Unchained Melody by Robson Green and
Jerome Flynn who presumably are two
who sang it. A modern song Black Velvet
is expressed as by Alana Miles but she
is not the composer but a performer.
It is the glamour of the conductor
that seems to take pride of place nowadays.
We hear about Simon Rattle's Beethoven
but what about Beethoven's Beethoven?
Like Karajan, Rattle does not adhere
to the score and his performances often
do grave disservice to Beethoven. Do
conductors know better than Beethoven?
What right have they to 'muck about'
with the music and defy the composer?
Tempo is important. I saw Rostropovich
conduct Shostakovich's Tenth Symphony.
It was slow and tedious. The life in
the music was extinguished. He was conducting
a corpse. He added nine minutes to the
overall structure. It was simply dreadful.
If that had been my introduction to
this work I would have never wanted
to hear it again. Conductors and other
performers can do a great disservice
to music. Bernard Haitink recorded Walton's
Symphony no. 1 and added eight minutes
to it. It was a simply dreadful performance
and yet because Haitink has a good name
some critics were afraid to speak against
it but called it a 'revolutionary performance.'
Had Rostropovich and Haitink obeyed
the composer's instructions the music
would not have run so seriously over
time.
Lest I be hung, drawn and quartered
may I say at once that Haitink is a
very good conductor in certain music
(his Mozart for example) but in 'modern'
works he is lacking.
This raises another issue. Conductors
do conduct music that they do not have
sympathy with or understanding of. Barbirolli
was absolutely hopeless at modern scores
yet competent at conventional uncomplicated
music. Sir Adrian Boult recorded Humphrey
Searle's Symphony no. 1 but admitted
he was not in sympathy with it but admired
its genius and openly said so. As a
result, the performance is 'safe' and
lacks vitality. Boult did not like the
music of Elgar yet he performed it.
I am glad that I have on video Boult's
classic remark spoken by himself, "
If Elgar's music is played badly, you
blame the orchestra; if it is played
well you blame Elgar!" Conductors are
paid to perform poor music.
Yet Karajan was different. I have never
been able to understand why he refused
to conduct Brahms's Piano Concerto no.
1, a truly superb work. He recorded
the Second Concerto but dug his heels
in about the First and was scathing
about it.
It is the arrogance of some conductors
that plays an important part in both
their eccentric and unfaithful performances.
I have videos of Karajan conducting
in performances in which he was the
director of the video and told the camera
operators what to film. In these we
see the orchestra very rarely and 95%
of the time the camera is fixed on Karajan.
You can count the hairs up his left
nostril.
In another video there are four solo
singers and they are soloists of excellent
repute. You never see them and when
the credits go up you read that the
film was produced and directed by Karajan.
Karajan would rehearse orchestras in
scores they knew very well and tell
them that they had been doing things
wrong for years and that it was a good
job he was correcting them. Furtwängler
said of Karajan, "His conducting is
over-nuanced and individual voices are
over-emphasised" and he was right.
I have met and talked with many soloists
who worked with Karajan and they all
said of him, "His approach always created
unnecessary difficulties." Nonetheless
his best performances are due almost
exclusively to the very fine soloists
he employed. But he was a control freak.
The only right way to do it was his
way and he demeaned soloists with verbal
abuse. He sacked the great mezzo Agnes
Baltsa from a production in one of his
tempestuous and unreasonable rages.
It is always widely reported that if
a performance was not good he always
blamed the sound technicians or the
recording people. It was never his fault.
His pride is shown in many remarks such
as the famous oft-repeated one, "If
you do not agree with me, you are yet
another grouser."
All the evidence points to Karajan's
full support of Hitler and the Nazis
although this has been glossed over.
When he agreed to perform Britten's
War Requiem there was a hue and cry.
How could Britten invite a Nazi supporter
to conduct this work which condemned
war and those who were responsible for
it? Karajan performed it twice in Berlin
in 1964 and it opened wounds and caused
a lot of distress which, coupled with
objectionable remarks from both Britten
and Karajan, inflamed the situation.
But does this deny Karajan being a
great conductor? Does it not merely
reveal his character?
Or is it that his pride and character
made him the conductor he was?
Consider the conductor Evgeny Mravinsky.
He was a truly great conductor in the
context of the terms I have used. He
was faithful to the score. His tempi
were always well-judged. He did not
take liberties. He was a faithful conductor.
His Shostakovich is the best ever. His
control and understanding of all the
music he conducted is without question.
Listen to his staggering live performance
of Tchaikovsky's Francesca da Rimini
as an example. Is the fact that Mravinsky
was a very religious man and valued
morals a consideration and factor? He
was always kind to his orchestra and
soloists.
Is it not the music that is paramount?
I am also concerned by gimmicks. In
a televised performance of a Mahler's
Second Symphony, Rattle had the chorus
singing while they were sitting and
only standing for the final minutes.
He also instructed the children’s choir
to sing through cupped hands as if they
were megaphones. This is not in the
score and serves no useful purpose.
It is absurd.
And yet it prompts the question, Does
it matter?
It made Mahler look ridiculous and
was condemned in all the broadsheets
and all the music journals I read. And
so it does matter.
There are other strange things that
conductors do which are out of character.
Istvan Kertesz was a very fine conductor
(his Dvorak symphonies /overtures are
the best you can buy) but what does
he do at the end of Shostakovich Symphony
no. 5? He does not broaden out the final
pages but maintains the allegro. Staying
with Shostakovich, the superlative Symphony
no.12 in the recording by George Prêtre
is very poor conducting since the conductor
fails to recognise the clear changes
of tempo. It ruins the work. Again,
listen to Mravinsky who follows the
score and turns in an electric performance.
It is a curious thing that often composers
do not make good conductors even of
their own music. Walton and Stravinsky
were rather poor. Mistakes happen to
fine conductors. The premiere of Tippett's
Symphony no, 2 conducted by Boult started
badly and had to be restarted. Sometimes
they are not mistakes. There is a comparatively
new version on CD of Paul Creston's
Symphony no. 2 reviewed by one person
who said what a fine performance it
was and how close it was to the composer's
wishes. The reviewer did not know what
he was talking about. This performance
left out the important piano part and
so his recommendation was worthless.
Reviewers must be musically competent
to do their job. When Creston wrote
about this symphony he spoke of the
vital piano part.
Was Otto Klemperer a great conductor?
Most of his performances are so slow
that the life is not in the music. That
he was a fine musician cannot be disputed
but was he a great conductor? Compare
him with Karl Böhm who always turned
in a good performance without extreme
speeds. Bryden Thomson usually took
music slightly slower than most conductors,
but only slightly, but in so doing he
revealed more detail and clarity.
Some conductors have been called mavericks.
Leopold Stokowski took liberties in
order to obtain sound effects and while
most of them are thrilling and some
of the time his recordings were announced
as his arrangements it does question
his faithfulness to the score.
If Stokowski is a maverick so is Karajan
and Rattle in their unorthodox, and
incorrect, reading and performances
of scores. Some musicologists have called
their performances, and therefore themselves,
musically dishonest and I have to say
that, using English correctly, that
is true.
Arrangements are acceptable if they
are so defined. Sir Henry Wood made
a magnificent orchestration of Bach's
famous Toccata and Fugue in D minor.
But Mahler re-orchestrated the Schumann
symphonies thus 'correcting' the 'poor
orchestration'. While I was admit that
there is too much doubling in Schumann's
orchestration it is quite adequate for
what it is and I will say emphatically
that his Symphony no. 2 in its original
form is truly superb in every way. The
recording by Muti, once on Classics
for Pleasure, is a must.
Of course, a conductor must understand
the orchestra and each instrument, what
it can do and what it cannot do. So
must a composer. There are many stories
about Britten writing notes for instruments
that they could not get and, instead
of admitting his mistakes, he would
sack conductors as incompetent. Norman
Del Mar was one such casualty and yet
Del Mar was both an expert on orchestration
and conducting.
It is also true that a conductor must
have personality. If he barks and dominates
he may not get the best results. If
he is honest and fair, courteous and
thorough, he will win respect and the
orchestra will perform well for him.
A conductor must know the music very
well, otherwise he cannot teach it.
He is part of the team not a dictator
or a tyrant. From 40 years of personal
experience I know this to be true.
I will have to conduct further research
but it is widely reported that Fauré
depended on others for the orchestration
or assistance in the orchestration of
his works. There exists some dreadful
orchestration in some pieces. Much as
I liked Edmund Rubbra as a musician
and as a man there are some poor orchestrations
in his work. Take the scherzo from the
Symphony no. 5 where an extended jaunty
tune is given to the horn. It does not
work. It is obviously a clarinet solo.
When I have performed the work I have
retained Rubbra's orchestration .
And so what makes a great conductor?
It is my contention, and this is endorsed
by most musicians and composers that
I know, that a great conductor knows
his art and performs the music as written
as far as possible. Those who do not
are not being faithful to the score.
This for me makes Boult, Reiner and
Thomson great conductors.
Dr David C F Wright
Copyright Dr David C F Wright 2003.
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