Every so often friends send me pieces of writing they think I might appreciate. Two of these struck a particular chord, and I thought I’d share sections of them with you. Chick Corea and Richard Strauss come from very different musical genres, neither of them with any connection to the recorder, but I think their words still have something to teach us.
Cheap but good advice for playing music in a group
This is the title of a list shared with me by Steve Marshall, himself a composer who most recorder players will have encountered at some point. Steve has spent a lot of his life playing jazz, so naturally he would have a greater knowledge of the work of Chick Corea (1941-2021), an American jazz musician, composer and band leader, than I do. Of course, not all of Corea’s advice is applicable to playing the recorder, but these items which particularly jumped out at me as being pertinent to our own music making…
Play only what you hear.
If you don’t hear anything, don’t play anything.
Don’t let your fingers and limbs just wander – place them intentionally.
Leave space – create space – intentionally create places where you don’t play.
Make your sound blend. Listen to your sound and adjust it to the rest of the band and the room.
Don’t make any of your music mechanically or just through patterns of habit. Create each sound, phrase, and piece with choice – deliberately.
Guide your choice of what to play by what you like – not by what someone else will think.
Use contrast and balance the elements: high/low, fast/slow, loud/soft, tense/relaxed, dense/sparse.
Play to make the other musicians sound good. Play things that will make the overall music sound good.
Play with a relaxed body. Always release whatever tension you create.
Create space – begin, develop, and in for phrases with intention.
Never beat or pound your instrument – play it easily and gracefully.
Advice from the conductor’s rostrum
Richard Strauss, painted by Max Liebermann, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
Richard Strauss (1864-1949), whose life overlapped with Chick Corea by just eight years, occupies a very different musical style, but like Corea, he was a prolific composer and a musician whose words are still pertinent to the rest of us. This collection of musical advice was sent to me by another composer of recorder music, Michael Graham. Like myself, Michael spends a lot of his time conducting ensembles and orchestras, and he thought I might appreciate Strauss’s Ten Golden Rules for Young Conductors. While some of these comments may not be applicable to you as a recorder player, the humour is undeniable, and yet his words have a lot to teach about making music sympathetically with others.
Remember that you are making music not to amuse yourself, but to delight your audience.
You should not perspire when conducting. Only the audience should get warm.
Conduct Salome and Elektra (two of Strauss’s most challenging operas) as if they were by Mendelssohn: Fairy music.
Never look encouragingly at the brass, except with a brief glance to give an important cue.
But never let the horns and woodwinds out of your sight. If you can hear them at all, they are still too strong.
If you think that the brass is now blowing hard enough, tone it down another shade or two.
It is not enough that you yourself should hear every word the soloist sings. You should know by heart anyway. The audience must be able to follow without effort. If they do not understand the words, they will go to sleep.
Always accompany the singer in such a way that he can sing without effort.
When you think you have reached the limits of prestissimo, double the pace.
If you follow these rules carefully, you will, with your fine gifts and your great accomplishments, always be the darling of your listeners.
If you’d like to see Strauss’s conducting for yourself, this film from his 1944 recording of his own tone poem, Till Eulenspiegel, makes fascinating viewing. He’s a model of minimalism and economy of movement - something I know I could sometimes learn from!
With that I’ll leave you to ponder the advice of these masters, I’m off to figure out which section of a recorder orchestra is the equivalent of the brass, with whom Strauss evidently had something of a love/hate relationship! Many thanks to Steve and Michael for sharing these gems with me - if you’ve come across useful musical advice from an unlikely place which might help others why not leave a comment below so we can all enjoy it?