The conductor as composer

[M forever]

The question of how derivative the compositions of composers who were principally engaged in conducting the music of other composers is one which others might care to make comment.

That question is actually fairly irrelevant and can't be discussed in such a general way either. Obviously, most musicians who are interested in composing study the works of other composers in one way or another, by analyzing the scores and maybe also by performing them as conductors, pianists, or whatever their musical performance talents are. It's not as if musicians who don't conduct don't get to know other composers' music. More or less all new music is in some way or ways derived from music that has been written before. Studying composition techniques and compositions thoroughly is part of the education of any serious musician. It is actually not at all that difficult to paste together some pieces once you have learnt some theory and composition techniques. It is not any more difficult than writing a text. The question is, how relevant or interesting or "original" those compositions then are. In other words, what it takes to write good music may or may not be some measure of "genius", whatever that is, but most importantly, what it takes is self-criticism. Lacking self-criticism, it is very easy to write a lot of music. All the more so in the field of "contemporary" music because you can concoct whatever you like and call it "new".

That people like Mahler and Strauss were also very good conductors shouldn't be a surprise at all. Conducting is not a musical discipline as such. It takes some specific talents, like the ability to communicate and express musical parameters in gestures, but basically, conducting is something which comes out of being a good musician with a deeper understanding of musical context. It is not a discipline in itself, like playing an instrument or singing. In Mahler's time, there weren't even classes for conductors. They just studied music, playing the piano, theory, composition, arranging, being a "Kapellmeister" was simply something they then did to pay the rent, if they didn't work as performing musicians playing an instrument, or teaching or working in some other capacity.

The negatively laden term "Kapellmeistermusik" which has been used by contemporary critics against composers like Mahler refers to the fact that the Kapellmeister was supposed to be able to arrange music and maybe compose small pieces for given occasions, such as to accompany a play, or arrange music for ballets or write arrangements of pieces for the reduced forces of provincial theaters. Some critics thought that Mahler's musc was just such a copy and paste job, not really original music. Obviously, time has proven them wrong.

There isn't really much to being a composer if you just copy and paste stuff together or write shallow pieces following whatever set of composition rules. Just like there isn't much to being a conductor when you just pose in front of an orchestra which can autopilot through most pieces anyway. So the fact alone that somebody "composes" or "conducts" means next to nothing. What counts is the quality of he composing and conducting, and that is far more elusive and hard to evaluate than other musical disciplines, like playing an instrument or singing.

That said, I think that people who study composition seriously and at least try to write some music, however "great" it is or not, can gain very important insights into the inner structures of the music otherpeople wrote, and they can be more insightful interpreters. The same goes for performing musicians who play an instrument really well, the experience they gain from actually playing other peoples' compositions and playing together with other musicians is invaluable for becoming a good conductor.

[The new erato]

Martinon's second symphony has been available on a long defunct LP :
"Hymne à la vie" (it has a prominent part for ondes Martenot). Possibly it is available now in a "Chicago Symphony archives" box ?

I've got this LP:, and it is a superb piece IIRC that ought to be available on CD.

[jochanaan]

In addition to the symphonies, Eugene Goossens also wrote a very fine oboe concerto.

Benjamin Britten was also a very fine conductor who led recordings of all his major works for orchestra and an exemplary (for the time) one of Bach's Brandenburg Concertos.  I'm not sure his own recording of the War Requiem has ever been surpassed.

Stravinsky led recordings of most of his major works, but their sound and playing are less than ideal; I don't think he was a good an orchestra leader as Britten.

But Howard Hanson was, and his recordings of his own music are just wonderful--especially since most of them were recorded on Mercury "Living Presence."

[Greta]

Actually, I think we're getting off on the opposite of what the topic is here, but yes, there is certainly something interesting that is added when a composer can conduct his own works well, and there are many composers that can, and do so without much fanfare, so aren't talked about that much.

My absolute favorite recording of John Adams' Harmonielehre is his own performance from the 2006 Proms, there is so much in there that I wanted to hear brought out before, but just wasn't quite - it's also a good deal slower than some of the well-known recordings. It opened up a lot more in that piece for me. And Adams conducts other music capably as well as his own, he even did a disc of Takemitsu music. Thomas Ades is a younger example that seems to do nicely with other rep besides his own. 

Penderecki I know conducts his own music often, and of course, most of the earlier composers conducted their own music, I know I would have loved to have heard Sibelius' own interpretations of his symphonies! For some reason, composers' own interpretations can tend to be quick though, or at least in the past have been, one notable example being Holst's incredibly fast 1920s Planets recordings.

Why is it more rare though these days, the conductor/composer? That's what we should ask. Why have these become two separate tasks, when they used to be so synonymous? More and more conductors have become micro-managed, 9in some cases out of what would have been a more active composing career, and seized upon by management, the limelight position quickly takes over the more sedate one that involves so much work being done in solitude. They are two extremely different animals. And once this happens, it can be hard to ever strike a balance again. Bernstein certainly struggled with this.

Also, there has become some suspicion of the compositions of those who do become well known as conductors. Whiffs of derision such as "Kapellmeistermusik" are bandied about, and it can be hard for this group to be taken seriously on both sides of the coin. This is unfortunate, because obviously conducting an orchestra day in and out can be an enormous boon to a composer, and you can see evidence of this orchestrationally in some conductors' compositions.

Composers, likewise however, would do well to be sure they have had ensemble playing experience, and should try to conduct their own pieces sometimes, what great practice to work out the technical problems on a firsthand basis - the removal of the composer off to the ivory-tower and his piano (ahem, or computer), away from the orchestra, can become a problem in modern music. I'm sure those who are musicians around here have encountered before new music that just doesn't make sense on the instrument, and is fundamentally not well-written, that's never a fun situation.

The question of how derivative the compositions of composers who were principally engaged in conducting the music of other composers is one which others might care to make comment.

This definitely pops up. Maybe not necessarily derivative per se, but influences worn very much on the sleeve. No composer, conductor or no, exists in a vacuum though, and influences are certainly not a bad thing! What the composer does with these influences is the important thing, if it is just cut-and-paste, that does not a strong composition make - but if (s)he synthesizes these influences to create a distinctive voice, then we may have something interesting.

It can be fascinating to look into the compositions of this crowd named above, and I would like to do so even more, but some of those recordings can be difficult to find. And I must say, with with a catalog like Leif Segerstam's....where do you start? 

Looking at that list, it's striking what eminent names are up there, evidence the two activities fuel each other? Perhaps! A very interesting subject Dundonnell...thanks for bringing it up.

[Dundonnell]

As Greta says, we do seem to be moving away from the subject of the thread. I did intend a second thread on "the composer as conductor" focusing on those composers who were supreme interpreters of their own music or-in a few rare cases-other composers' music.

This thread was intended to focus on those musicians who achieved a reputation primarily as conductors but who composed music throughout their lives, sought to have that music performed in public and (in a number of cases) wished to recognised as composers just as much, if not more so, than as conductors.

Many of the extremely interesting points about composer/conductors will re-surface in the second thread.

[Greta]

Let's steer back to the original subject of the thread - conductors, who primarily consider(ed) themselves as composers right? Are we discussing the general topic, or particular works?

The further back in history ones that you mentioned I would like to know more about myself, I do know Furtwangler very much wished to be recognized as a composer though...

Previn and Bernstein have a similarity in that they were both very noted young pianists and compositionally made it big with the films/musicals they worked on, and the conducting happened along with that. (Obviously to a more stunning degree in Bernstein's case.) I would like to get to know Previn's concert work more, what I have heard I liked a lot, and his musicals are very good.

Bernstein, I know from reading the Burton biography that he always felt guilty about not composing more and letting that fall by the wayside because of the conducting, it was really on his mind a lot apparently. Some of his works I really like, I love West Side Story, Chichester Psalms, I like the Violin Concerto, the Symphonies less so, but I think he did have a distinctive voice. He had an interesting arc to Mahler there, Bernstein of course identified with him on many levels, and the shared influence that their Jewish heritage had was a certainly a big part of that. I would say Bernstein's music did show influence by American composers of the same generation, who he did conduct and promote a lot.

A similarity also exists in the cases of Boulez, Sinopoli, and Salonen. All composers first, whose conducting careers seem to have grown out of the composing, each being early in their careers a founder and resident conductor of avant-garde ensembles in their respective home countries. Boulez has always been equally active in both sides, though also found it necessary to cut down on conducting at some point, which Salonen is trying to do now, hence the uptake in recent compositions. It is a real shame Sinopoli died so young as he would have continued I'm sure to be very active on both sides - I have never heard any of his compositions, but I have read that his opera Lou Salome is somehow in the vein of Berg's Lulu. (BTW, you forgot to mention Bruno Maderna, who Sinopoli studied with and who made some interesting recordings as a conductor I have often heard read about, ie, Mahler)

I really would like to hear the Martinon, Kubelik and Dorati works, and was curious about Maazel's opera. (Is it called 1984?) I know it is supposed to be a stinker, and I'm curious what that sounded like. (Here is a review.)

[M forever]

The two suites from Sinopoli's opera "Lou Salomé" (which include orchestral and vocal excerpts) can be downloaded here:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/yuq7m7
This is the DG recording with the composer himself conducting the RSO Stuttgart. Dunno if it's OK to post that here, it is out of print, if not, then the moderators can simply remove the link.

Evgeny Svetlanov, one of the best known Soviet conductors, was also a rather prolific composer who wrote orchestral music, piano and chamber works and songs. His style was decidely conservative, some of the pieces sound a lot like the kind of "musical realism" Soviet authorities preferred to the more modernist compositions of other musicians, or the tormented and sarcastic musical language of Shostakovich. But Svetlanov's symphony is quite nice, rather Russian in character, I guess, with some nice melodic ideas and a solid grip on composition techniques. The first movement can be downloaded here, in a live recording with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France conducted by Svetlanov himself:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/yp2gyg 

[Drasko]

The two suites from Sinopoli's opera "Lou Salomé"......

Thank you.

[Cato]

I recall an RCA record from the late '60's or early '70's with Jean Martinon's symphonies and they were great!  Yes, why are they in the underground vault when a mediocrity like Grofe has his hackwork everywhere?!!

Maazel's opera on 1984 was recently mentioned in the Wall Street Journal in a criticism of his North Korea concert, i.e. the irony of someone composing an opera on a work which criticizes the system of that country, yet he seemingly is kowtowing to that system. 

Whether the opera is a turkey was not mentioned!        

[Dundonnell]

There was an RCA CD of Maazel conducting the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in his three compositions rather uninvitingly entitled Music for Cello and Orchestra, Op.10, Music for Flute and Orchestra, Op.11 and Music for Violin and Orchestra, Op.12.
Maazel himself was the violin soloist but the other works featured Mstislav Rostropovich and James Galway respectively.

I haven't heard the CD so cannot comment on the quality of these works. He certainly got two stellar soloists for the disc!

[M forever]

There are actually some very cheap used copies of that on amazon, so I ordered one. Might be interesting.

[some guy]

Why is it more rare though these days, the conductor/composer?

Depends on where you're standin', I guess. It looks to me like the conductor/composer or composer/conductor thing is going along very nicely, in fact, maybe even more frequently than in the past. Certainly not more rare, except maybe in the "classical music as big business" arena.

Any road, Dumitrescu conducts his own works, and those of others. (I heard him direct an ensemble in a performance of Cage's Fontana Mix that was incredibly exciting.)

Ana-Maria Avram
Tim Hodgkinson
Gerard Pape
Hans Zender
Michael Gielen
Harvey Sollberger
Jose Serebrier
Gerhard Mueller-Hornbach
Beat Furrer
Udo Zimmerman
Lucky Mosko

Some are better known as conductors, some as composers. Some of the composer/conductors do only their own works. Some do other people's works as well.

I'd say that the whole conductor/composer area is pretty well covered, and pretty well as it's always been.

[M forever]

I'd say that the whole conductor/composer area is pretty well covered, and pretty well as it's always been.

Probably true. After all, not every conductor in the old days was a Richard Strauss or Gustav Mahler either. Most were "just" conductors, just like today. Some of them maybe composed a little, too, but we don't remember their works anymore. Just like it will be with a lot of today's composers, conductors or not.

Harvey Sollberger

Harvey used to be MD of the orchestra I play in, the La Jolla Symphony at UCSD. Are you floating around somewhere there as well? Your pic looks a little like the Sun God on the uCSD campus, but not quite.

[some guy]

M, floating is not something one does much in Southern California. Except in swimming pools. And the ocean. And maybe some lakes.

OK, floating IS something one can do in Southern California, a lot. But no, I'm doing all my floating in Portland, OR right now.

Oh, it's fun!!

And the picture is from somewhere else than San Diego. It's been guessed before, on another forum, so I won't spoil anyone's fun. If anyone finds guessing to be fun, that is.

Most of the people on my list, by the way, are pretty memorable! I remembered them, anyway. (I didn't have to look them up. Well, maybe one of them....)

[M forever]

And the picture is from somewhere else than San Diego. It's been guessed before, on another forum, so I won't spoil anyone's fun. If anyone finds guessing to be fun, that is.

Paris?

[some guy]

Paris it is. That's one of the sculptures in the Stravinsky fountain at the Pompidou Centre.

(Part of a long story: I moved back to the U.S. after a short stay in Paris--hope to get back, soon--and was showing pictures to my kids. When I got to the shots of the Stravinsky fountain, my youngest, then 19, said "Why would you ever move away from a place that has stuff like this?" When we all visited there in November 2006, I took them to the fountain via a circuitous route. When we turned the corner and there it was, Joe said "Hey, dad! That's that place in your pictures!!!" Tee hee.)

[M forever]

I didn't really guess though, I googled  0:)

[Drasko]

Nikolai Golovanov is another russian conductor who composed. He supposedly wrote two operas and some symphonies but I never heard any, don't know whether anything has been recorded. Only thing I have are some religious hymns for unaccompanied chorus, it's his op.1 so can't be sure how representative it is of his later works but here is one:

http://www.mediafire.com/?1lsuuekdxcm

[Guido]

There was an RCA CD of Maazel conducting the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra in his three compositions rather uninvitingly entitled Music for Cello and Orchestra, Op.10, Music for Flute and Orchestra, Op.11 and Music for Violin and Orchestra, Op.12.
Maazel himself was the violin soloist but the other works featured Mstislav Rostropovich and James Galway respectively.

I haven't heard the CD so cannot comment on the quality of these works. He certainly got two stellar soloists for the disc!

Dundonell - I really enjoy the cello work on this CD - a tad diffuse perhaps but there's lots of very engaging and original ideas, not least the brilliant "limbo" movement - just one single chord held for several music with tiny spots of light from single instruments in the Orchestra and the soloist. I haven't listened to the other pieces for ages. He also more recently composed a piece called The Giving Tree for cello obligato, speaker and orchestra which I am less keen on, but is still a nice work.

[M forever]

I bought that Maazel disc really cheap but I actually don't remember if I listened to it or not  That was around the time I moved, so I may not have had time for that. Or maybe I did - I do remember getting it in the mail - and totally forgot the music!!!