The Historically Informed Performances (HIP) debate

[Florestan]

I know this isn't helpful, but I have a memory, probably fallacious, that that's exactly what she was implying in that interview that I started a thread about in 2013, and which has now been removed from the web.

I've read all the interviews on this page:

https://www.google.com/search?q=angela+hewitt+interview&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b

but I couldn't find anything even remotely similar to such absolutist pronouncements. Maybe your memory is indeed fallacious. 

[prémont]

Please, give us some examples of "people, who swear to the Romantic style" and who "want to impose their taste upon those who prefer the more obvious Baroque style".

Barenboim, Sokolov among others.


Or listen to Dagmar Boyles AoF.

[San Antone]

Barenboim, Sokolov among others.


Or listen to Dagmar Boyles AoF.

How do they "impose" their style on you?  No one is forcing you to listen. 

[prémont]

If strict, uncompromising, rigid and literal adherence to "the score as written" was the best, nay, the only way to go about it, then the best performance --- nay, the definitive one --- would be that of a robot programmed to play exactly what's written in the score, nothing more and nothing less*. That would also spell the death of musical performance, for why bother trying to replicate what a machine can do better and why bother doing things differently if the result is going to be frowned upon as an unwarranted and unwelcome deviation "from the score as wriiten"?

* and good luck to the programmer(s) with those scores without any tempo indication whatsoever.

Problem is that, afaIk, strict, uncompromising, rigid and literal adherence to "the score as written" is utterly and completely alien to the Baroque performing philosophy.

Pleas reread what I have written above, and realize that you have misunderstood it. Baroque performing philosophy nowadays does not at all imply a rigid adherence to the score.

[Florestan]

Barenboim, Sokolov among others.


Or listen to Dagmar Boyles AoF.

How do the impose their taste on you, I really wonder? Have they ever grabbed you by the neck and forced you to attend their recitals or buy their recordings?

EDIT: I see San Antone beat me to it. 

[Florestan]

Pleas reread what I have written above, and realize that you have misunderstood it. Baroque performing philosophy nowadays does not at all imply a rigid adherence to the score.

I wasn't actually addressing your point, but Gurn's. My bad for not quoting his post so as to avoid misunderstandings. 

[Florestan]

I just stumbled upon this:

[W]e know very little about how fast or how loudly or softly people played. Occasionally we might find a small clue, but it will be in one location, one source, or one church. So you cannot take that as being appropriate for the whole of Italy or the whole of Germany. Today we have timid players and we have furious players. And we have to remember that so many of the treatises of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were evidently written because the author was angry with what he saw going on around him; he saw people doing things he thought were incorrect and wanted to correct them. With Bach we have a tendency to accept that whatever we know of the circumstances of the acoustics or the number of his performers was his ideal. So therefore the acoustics of St. Thomas' represented what Bach wanted. We don't know anything about such matters. He might have hated the acoustics of St. Thomas', or the fact that the gallery was too high, and so on, just accepting what he had and getting on with the job. We give far to much credibility to the idea that everything a composer met with in his working conditions was what he wanted.

(emphasis mine)

What do you folks think? Agreed? Disagreed?

[prémont]

How do they "impose" their style on you?  No one is forcing you to listen.

That's true. And this is why I only listen to them once or ½ce. But Florestans question, which I answered, was also put in a more general way, and not specifically directed towards me.

[North Star]

I just stumbled upon this:

(emphasis mine)

What do you folks think? Agreed? Disagreed?

I think it's a mistake to put too much weight on speculation about whether an instrument, ensemble or performing space was exactly what the composer wished to have at their disposal. The composer worked with what they had, and surely did their best to write music that for the most part suited the instruments, musicians, and venues that their music was written for.

[Florestan]

Florestans question, which I answered, was also put in a more general way, and not specifically directed towards me.

Not quite. I did ask you to give some example of people with Romantic taste who want to impose their taste on those with a different one. Honestly, I think neither of those you cited qualify, and also honestly I don't think you'll be able to come up with anyone who qualifies. 

[prémont]

I just stumbled upon this:

[W]e know very little about how fast or how loudly or softly people played. Occasionally we might find a small clue, but it will be in one location, one source, or one church. So you cannot take that as being appropriate for the whole of Italy or the whole of Germany. Today we have timid players and we have furious players. And we have to remember that so many of the treatises of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were evidently written because the author was angry with what he saw going on around him; he saw people doing things he thought were incorrect and wanted to correct them. With Bach we have a tendency to accept that whatever we know of the circumstances of the acoustics or the number of his performers was his ideal. So therefore the acoustics of St. Thomas' represented what Bach wanted. We don't know anything about such matters. He might have hated the acoustics of St. Thomas', or the fact that the gallery was too high, and so on, just accepting what he had and getting on with the job. We give far to much credibility to the idea that everything a composer met with in his working conditions was what he wanted.

(emphasis mine)

What do you folks think? Agreed? Disagreed?

We know that composers adapted their works to the circumstances they had to face, so there is a strong connection in these matters. And if we suppose, that Baroque composers "hated" these things, then we are really entering a slippery slope of guesswork.

[prémont]

Not quite. I did ask you to give some example of people with Romantic taste who want to impose their taste on those with a different one. Honestly, I think neither of those you cited qualify, and also honestly I don't think you'll be able to come up with anyone who qualifies. 

Well, just the fact that they play as they do in public and on recordings, means that they want their performing style spread around.

[prémont]

I know this isn't helpful, but I have a memory, probably fallacious, that that's exactly what she was implying in that interview that I started a thread about in 2013, and which has now been removed from the web.

I read the article by then and recall something similar. Probably we didn't both dream this.

[Florestan]

I think it's a mistake to put too much weight on speculation about whether an instrument, ensemble or performing space was exactly what the composer wished to have at their disposal. The composer worked with what they had, and surely did their best to write music that for the most part suited the instruments, musicians, and venues that their music was written for.

The quote I cited does not contradict anything of the above, it just points out that we don't know what they really thought about their working conditions and that the idea that these and only these conditions should be used for playing their music is speculative at best.

The same source adds:

in truth most of our playing is based on hypothesis. That is because we cannot do better. Perhaps we may be able to do a little better, but at the moment much of what we do is pure hypothesis. We really do know very, very little.

[San Antone]

Rubsam's recent recordings of the WTC on lute harpsichord sound to me as utilizing more stylistic freedoms than Schiff's recording on piano.  The choice of instrument does not necessarily mean anything regarding the interpretation.  Although Schiff plays a piano he does not use the sustain pedal.

[Florestan]

We know that composers adapted their works to the circumstances they had to face, so there is a strong connection in these matters. And if we suppose, that Baroque composers "hated" these things, then we are really entering a slippery slope of guesswork.

But the quote I cited doesn't suppose at all that Baroque composers hated those things, on the contrary, it points out that precisely the opposite supposition, that this is what they really wanted, is too often taken for granted.

Well, just the fact that they play as they do in public and on recordings, means that they want their performing style spread around.

Are you sure you didn't miss an emoticon here?

First, it means nothing of the sort. It simply means they do their job as performers: perform in the hope that the audience will enjoy their recitals or recordings. The only way they can spread their performing style is by taking pupils, which by its very nature has a very limited influence.

Second, what do you suggest? That they should be forbidden from performing in public or recording just because you find their style insufferable and take their performing in public and recording as an attempt to force it down your throat?

[prémont]

The quote I cited does not contradict anything of the above, it just points out that we don't know what they really thought about their working conditions and that the idea that these and only these conditions should be used for playing their music is speculative at best.

The same source adds:

in truth most of our playing is based on hypothesis. That is because we cannot do better. Perhaps we may be able to do a little better, but at the moment much of what we do is pure hypothesis. We really do know very, very little.

I find it even more speculative to question the actual conditions. A similar absurd question: Did Shakespeare actually hate the Globe and prefer his works performed on an imaginary modern theater no one had heard of at that time.

And who is your source, if I may ask?

[San Antone]

Richard Taruskin has written a lot about the false notion of "authenticity" in the HIP camp.  In email exchanges  I've had with a few prominent early music musicians, no one talks about it anymore. I think most admit that everyone is performing the music according to modern tastes despite using so-called period instruments.

[Florestan]

I find it even more speculative to question the actual conditions. A similar absurd question: Did Shakespeare actually hate the Globe and prefer his works performed on an imaginary modern theater no one had heard of at that time.

And who is your source, if I may ask?

I actually hoped you'd ask. It's Gustav Leonhardt. 

https://www.earlymusicworld.com/gustav-leonhardt-interview

[prémont]

But the quote I cited doesn't suppose at all that Baroque composers hated those things, on the contrary, it points out that precisely the opposite supposition, that this is what they really wanted, is too often taken for granted.

I answered this, well, concerning Bach:

With Bach we have a tendency to accept that whatever we know of the circumstances of the acoustics or the number of his performers was his ideal. So therefore the acoustics of St. Thomas' represented what Bach wanted. We don't know anything about such matters. He might have hated the acoustics of St. Thomas', or the fact that the gallery was too high, and so on, just accepting what he had and getting on with the job. We give far to much credibility to the idea that everything a composer met with in his working conditions was what he wanted.[/u][/b]