# That "one" thing...



## Fan66 (Jan 22, 2017)

You're contemplating purchasing a CD. You are able to find a complete track on the internet to help you decide whether to purchase or not. The piece of music is going fine when all of the sudden, something happens. Not a wrong note or anything, but, you realize the pace is too fast or too slow. He/she played legato when you feel it should be staccato. He/she played the piece with too much passion or not enough, etc. In other words, that one little thing, (or more) takes place and then you begin to question whether you should purchase or not. What percentage of these "things" are you willing to put up with, knowing you will probably never find a "perfect" piece that satisfies all of your tastes, etc.

For me, for example, for Chopin nocturnes, if the pace is too fast, I automatically discard that CD as a potential purchase. 

Thanks..


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Happens to me a lot. I "audition" a minute of a piece on Amazon and it is either too fast, too slow or just right in tempo. Emotionally involving or not. Stimulates me to hear more or not. All it takes is 40 seconds to a minute for my thumb up or thumb down.

Nothing's perfect. True. But I have so many CDs at this time, that the performance must be close to extraordinary for me to purchase it.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

Fan66 said:


> You're contemplating purchasing a CD. You are able to find a complete track on the internet to help you decide whether to purchase or not. The piece of music is going fine when all of the sudden, something happens. Not a wrong note or anything, but, you realize the pace is too fast or too slow. He/she played legato when you feel it should be staccato. He/she played the piece with too much passion or not enough, etc. In other words, that one little thing, (or more) takes place and then you begin to question whether you should purchase or not. What percentage of these "things" are you willing to put up with, knowing you will probably never find a "perfect" piece that satisfies all of your tastes, etc.
> 
> For me, for example, for Chopin nocturnes, if the pace is too fast, I automatically discard that CD as a potential purchase.
> 
> Thanks..


Welcome to TC, by the way. Nice post!


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

Fidelity to the written score is very important to me. When I sample a clip of a recording, that's my main focus. I often listen with a score in front of me, and I evaluate whether the performers follow the composer's specifications (tempo, dynamics, accents, slurs, and so on). If the performers deviate too much from the indications notated in the score, then I definitely won't purchase the recording.

This approach works best for music composed between 1750-1950 or thereabouts. It's harder to evaluate fidelity when it comes to Baroque music, because those composers didn't provide many performance indications. Therefore, for recordings of Baroque music, I listen to whether the performers' choices make musical sense with regard to the harmonies and melodic patterns in the score.


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

Thirty years ago, when I was first getting interested in classical music, I was on the hunt for the one "perfect" performance of each piece. If I found something I thought might qualify because someone gave it a rosette or five stars, I would pattern myself on it like a duckling on its mother. As my collection grew, I grew tired of particular works from overexposure.

Then I started buying used CDs... I wasn't always able to target specific recordings or works I didn't have a "definitive" copy of yet. I bought a Stokowski Russian CD and it blew my mind. It didn't follow my predetermined formula at all, but it uncovered totally new aspects of the work I had never heard before. So I started investigating interpretive technique... conductors, instrumentalists, even transcriptions and re-arrangements. I realized that by demanding some defined standard, I was cheating myself out of exploring a work from all sides. You see, a great composition is like a diamond. It looks different from one angle than another... and illuminating it in different ways reveals different aspects of its greatness.

Now I am just as familiar with interpretive style as I am composers and their works. I can hear a symphony and without looking at the liner notes, I can offer a pretty good guess as to who the conductor is. Now I don't judge interpretations by how closely they adhere to an ideal tempo or phrasing, I judge them by their unique expressiveness. The worst performances to me are the ones that tread the safe path. Generic is a bigger sin to me than idiosyncratic. I don't want the same dinner every night of my life. Why would I want the same musical interpretation? Viva la difference!

I do admit though. Until I had 20 years of serious listening under my belt, I didn't have much of a clue about interpretation. I only knew what seemed right and wrong. I found out *I* was wrong.


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

bigshot said:


> Thirty years ago, when I was first getting interested in classical music, I was on the hunt for the one "perfect" performance of each piece. If I found something I thought might qualify because someone gave it a rosette or five stars, I would pattern myself on it like a duckling on its mother. As my collection grew, I grew tired of particular works from overexposure.
> 
> Then I started buying used CDs... I wasn't always able to target specific recordings or works I didn't have a "definitive" copy of yet. I bought a Stokowski Russian CD and it blew my mind. It didn't follow my predetermined formula at all, but it uncovered totally new aspects of the work I had never heard before. So I started investigating interpretive technique... conductors, instrumentalists, even transcriptions and re-arrangements. I realized that by demanding some defined standard, I was cheating myself out of exploring a work from all sides. You see, a great composition is like a diamond. It looks different from one angle than another... and illuminating it in different ways reveals different aspects of its greatness.
> 
> ...


Of course interpretation is good. But some performers take too much licence and ignore the actual markings in the score. I dislike that type of "interpretation."


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## pcnog11 (Nov 14, 2016)

It happens sometimes. Soloists, musicians and conductors interpret music very different from one to another. I have learned to listen to a piece objectively. A musician played a certain way should have their reasons. These interpretation do not happen in random for no reason at all. I think if you want a 'perfect' interpretation, you need to go back to the composer who wrote it and play the piece himself/herself. Subjective expectation to have a piece of music played certain could lead to disappointment. Listening objectively, one could learn new meaning of music. In other words, having an open mind could expand one's musical horizon.

Many time we made judgement on a certain interpretation, there is nothing wrong with it. We judge subjectively based on educated knowledge acquired by our experience after objective listening. 

My 2 cents.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

> Many time we made judgement on a certain interpretation, there is nothing wrong with it. We judge subjectively based on educated knowledge acquired by our experience after objective listening.


Very well said +1


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## premont (May 7, 2015)

hpowders said:


> ....I have so many CDs at this time, that the performance must be close to extraordinary for me to purchase it.


Just the opposite with me. I am kind of completist within my areas of interest, and small details usually do not discourage me from acquiring a recording. But there may be more important issues of interpretation which make me conclude, that I serve myself at best by staying away from the recording in question. This is most often when it is about very excentrical and idiosyncratic interpretations, e.g. Glen Gould and Jean Guillou.


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## Vaneyes (May 11, 2010)

Tempi and amounts of mustard applied are huge. I find liberties taken are most prominent in orchestral readings. 

Similarly, with the OPie and HP, a purchase must be "just right" porridge. And more oft than not, include exemplary playing and sound.:tiphat:


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

What I am looking for is that it does not have "that one thing " but has the je ne sais quoi.


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## realdealblues (Mar 3, 2010)

I don't care about following the score to the letter. You might as well have a computer play it for you instead of a person. 

My one thing is a very personal and subjective thing. More than anything else I seek a pulse/flow through the work. Does it have a natural flow or pulse? Does that pulse continue from movement to movement? Does everything feel as though it is a natural progression?

This is also the reason why people such as Glenn Gould work for me. I understand what he was trying to do and accomplish so I am able to enjoy and love it. 

I also believe that if a piece of music is very well written it can often be played at vastly different tempos or on different instruments and still work and be equally valid.

So my "one thing" is pulse or flow. I can overlook numerous other details if something has a pulse or flow that works for me. 

From there I will move on to other things such as phrasing, intensity, dynamics, etc. before deciding if a recording deserves repeated listens from myself.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

realdealblues said:


> I don't care about following the score to the letter. You might as well have a computer play it for you instead of a person.
> 
> My one thing is a very personal and subjective thing. More than anything else I seek a pulse/flow through the work. Does it have a natural flow or pulse? Does that pulse continue from movement to movement? Does everything feel as though it is a natural progression?
> 
> ...


This deserves post of the day award! :cheers:


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## realdealblues (Mar 3, 2010)

Pugg said:


> This deserves post of the day award! :cheers:


Thanks Pugg, glad someone can sympathize with my process


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

When I was a teenager back in the 40s, Leopold Stokowski shared for some years the podium of the New York Philharmonic. His co-director was the late Dimitri Mitropoulis and together they contributed to that memorable Sunday afternoon series on CBS radio, which was one of the few redeeming features of American broadcasting in the years after World War II. Running opposite the Stokowski/Metropoulis programs on CBS was NBC’s entry in the symphonic sweepstakes, a series featuring the orchestra which bore the network’s name, which was created for and conducted by Arturo Toscanini.

The attitude of the young people of my generation toward these weekend music specials was rather interesting. It was generally bandied about by my conservatory friends that you were either a Stokowski fan or a Toscanini devotee. There was apparently no middle ground, except perhaps that which was occasionally occupied by Bruno Walter. According to the academic banter of that time, Toscanini embodied most progressive musical virtues. His performances were direct, straightforward and emotionally objective. Whichever notes, dynamic marks or tempo indications appeared before him in the score were, to the best of his and the NBC Orchestra’s ability, what you heard. For Toscanini, the composer’s notational suggestions were gospel.

Not so with Stokowski. He was and is, for want of a better word, an ecstatic. Stokowski is involved with the notes, the tempo marks, the dynamic indications in the score to the same extent that a filmmaker is involved with the original book or source which supplies the impetus- the idea of his film. So, Stokowski’s performances either stand or fall depending on the degree he can infuse them with a sense of his own commitment to the project. And happily for those who became addicted to his way of making music, there’s rarely been a more committed, more imaginative, more resourceful artist than Leopold Stokowski. ---Glenn Gould


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## bigshot (Nov 22, 2011)

The score is only half a performance... the half that is dead and buried. It takes an interpreter to bring it back to life and make it sing again.


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## pcnog11 (Nov 14, 2016)

The more I think about this topic, the more I want to write. Many of us discuss interpretations. I think different artists, soloist, musicians and composers have their own interpretations and I am fine with it. As long as the interpretation do not become interruptions of listening to the piece. For examples, Lang Lang has a show off style that could be an interruption or Andre Rieu has a "look at me" type of attitude that could also be interruptions. 

In simple terms, over interpretations that become an interruption is the 'one thing' that bugs me.


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