MTAC Convention 2011 - Day 3

I am attending the annual Music Teachers Association of CA (MTAC) convention at the Marriott hotel in downtown Oakland this weekend.

Here's a summary of the events I attended today:

"Practicing Performing" lecture by Fred Karpoff:

- Mr. Karpoff's whirlwind presentation this morning focused on wisdom he's gained from two prominent performance coaches: Don Greene, Ph.D. and Robert Caldwell. I say that the presentation was "whirlwind" because Karpoff was allotted a mere 45-minutes to deliver a bushel full of material. He was speaking so fast at times that I thought steam would begin surging from his ears. Unfortunate that he was forced to rush, because he had much vital material to share.

Upon reflection, the most striking thing he said this morning was that we spend too much time practicing the wrong things. We should seek to stimulate performance scenarios more frequently in order to become more comfortable with the tense sensations inherent in that endeavor. It's a fact that too many seasoned (and unseasoned) musicians have developed an unhealthy relationship with the act of performing music for an audience. So how to combat this malady? Read on.

*Don Greene insists (as do many other teachers and coaches I've heard speak) that a performer needs to channel their nervous energy into exciting performances. Nerves are normal. It's up to the performer to decide what to do with them.

*A Greene quote: "Risk is essential to success."

*The greatest threat to a successful performance: muscle tension. We must learn to relax!

Thus, here is Karpoff's/Greene's suggestion for how to prepare for a performance. This is essentially a meditation exercise:

1. Pick a focal point below eye level (this is proven to reduce left brain activity, which is a great distraction)
2. Think about a slow, full breath. Inhale through nose, exhale through mouth.
3. Scan key muscle groups: allow head and neck, shoulder, arms, torso, hips, legs and feet to be very loose.
4. Define your "center" (somewhere on your person - your body). Direct your energy downward.
5. On final exhalation, open eyes, find your focal point from step #1 and then begin to focus energy outward.

The Drill: Practicing Performing

• Leave the practice room and turn on your recording device.
• Elevate your heart rate to approximately 100 bpm (simulating the nerves inherent in a real performance).
• Center yourself (see above meditation steps).
• Finally, re-enter the practice room, play your best.
• Evaluate your recorded performance afterward with positive feedback. Don't fall into the trap of continually beating yourself up!

Two Vital Skills of Great Performers

1. How well they begin a piece
2. How they handle a mistake

*More miscellany:  Two days before a performance: "Carbo load" (i.e. big pasta dinner) and go to bed early. This is your energy base for the upcoming performance.

*Robert Caldwell is the author of the book The Performer Prepares. This book examines the many factors that elevate powerful performers to their lofty heights of achievement.

Caldwell's 4 Stages of Performance

• Planning
• Rehearsing
• Performing
• Afterwards (this stage is too often overlooked; how will you greet people afterward? will you rest peacefully that night?, etc. Prepare!)

"Silent Film for Composers Workshop" by Donald Sosin:

- After the lunch break (today I ate my bag lunch on a bench I found across the street from  Ogawa Plaza; Ogawa was too depressing for me yesterday and I wasn't ready to go back there) I returned to the Marriott to take in the first of three sessions on accompanying silent films. The presenter Donald Sosin is remarkably talented. Throughout the presentation, he demonstrated ideas at the piano. He is a wellspring of pianistic styles and a brilliant improviser. No wonder he often tours Europe as an accompanist at silent film festivals. I will be unable to attend the second and third sessions of the workshop tomorrow, so I was glad to catch this one.

*When accompanying a silent film, the music has to tell us what sort of a day it is, since there is no audible dialogue. The action onscreen can be completely neutral, but the music tells you what's going on emotionally.

A (brief) silent film timeline:

• Circa 1895:  Silent films at this time were not always accompanied by music. Often there would be a musician on hand to perform interludes between screenings of unaccompanied silent films. This musical performance would fill the time while the projector changed the reels. The music would also help to draw more customers from the street into the theater.
• Circa 1905:  Theatres begin to see the immense valued in adding live music to all film screenings. Musical accompaniment becomes standard.
• From there, things developed quickly and accompaniments became more elaborate. In 1907, for example, Camille Saint-Saens wrote a full silent film score for a 7-piece ensemble.
• 1927-28:  Massive theatre organs become fixtures in fine cinema establishments, but this development occurred just as the popularity of silent films began to wane.

Considerations for a Silent Film Accompanist

• First there is silence and a blank screen
• Once an image appears, the musical parameters begin to emerge
• Sometime the musical choices are obvious
• Decisions about music are crucial to one's response to a film (this statement is true for silent films as well as modern motion pictures)

Further considerations for the performer:

- Tempo

- Pulse

- Rhythm

- Melody vs. Accompaniment

- Style

- Library music vs. Original music

- The regular division of the phrase vs. Unpredictable phrase length

- Repetition and Memory

- Quoting other material

- Tone color, orchestration texture

- Improvising and live performance with regard to audience 

- The space of the performance

etc. . . . .

Mr. Sosin had 8 piano students at his disposal. Several of the students volunteered to try live demonstrations, accompanying fragments of scenes from projected films. Each was remarkably talented and not one student floundered - it was cool! Tomorrow evening each student will be present their own live accompaniment to a (very old) Disney short cartoon selected by Mr. Sosin: "The 4 Musicians of Bremen".

The predominant piano styles of silent film accompaniment are styles from the period the films were made: ragtime, stride piano, foxtrot, and early jazz. I don't have a love affair with any of these styles, so I don't know if the road to further silent film music exploration will be long for me. I feel spread so thin in my work and family life already that it's difficult to imagine having the time or energy to dig deeper into this musical realm. Still, the future is unwritten, so who knows?

Not sure whether I'll be attending the final day of the convention tomorrow, but if I do I'll post about it.

Jesse