It seems so simple. Push a button and hear an hour or so of lovely music. Put a microphone in front of a group of musicians and just push “record”.
Not so simple. I have just attended the birth of a compact disc of Boccherini music. It took three days of hard work. I had no task but to listen and observe. It has made me appreciate all of the time and effort – energy, skill and luck – for a professional performance to emerge. I can’t wait to hear the finished product.
The setting was a storybook monastery, a monumental former residence for monks vowed to silence, near Vienna. The recording studio was the huge, resonant, white-walled refectory, at one time their dining hall. The musicians had added large sheets of absorbent cloth to the walls and had hung woolly bolts over groupings of chairs. Without that it would have been too “live” with echoes. The recording equipment was set up in an anteroom connected to the players by intercom.
The group known as Piccolo Concerto included two violins, viola, transverse flute, violone (double bass) and two cellos. Their group formed a semi-circle enabling the players to see each other. Clearly, as they were rehearsing and performing, this was important. For example, the flutist would eye the first violinist at a transitional point as if telling him, “Over to you, pal, pick up the tune and go with it!”
Watching the players play was a study in visual accompaniment to the sounds they produced so gloriously. The leader of the group with his huge bass fiddle (with five strings) would reveal his intense concentration by his facial expressions, mostly grimaces and frowns, not from displeasure but from the musical burdens he carried. His wife was second violin and I noticed that he was often in visual communication with her. The two cellists were also a married couple. Their unity was reflected in their playing, mostly the supporting foundation for the Boccherini Divertimenti, a kind of blend between a sonata and a symphony. They and the bass provided most of the rhythmic flow for the work. As a cellist himself, the composer gave the cellos challenging assignments. The Boccherini score, however, was demanding for all the players. I marvelled at their flowing virtuosity.
The ensemble was a good illustration of how effective and necessary teamwork is when making music. After each take there were seconds of silence. And then came the reactions. Several conversations began. Once I counted three separate huddles of talk plus another by intercom. Suddenly there was quiet, as the musicians knew they would take it again.
I was there to experience this musical treat because it was on my visit to my daughter Sigrid in Italy where, with her partner Roberto, they operate Symphonia, a label for their work in recording, editing and producing early music. Symphonia markets internationally compact discs of Baroque and classical music. I had been present several years earlier when they recorded in an old rural church high on a mountain where they had found the acoustics ideal.
Roberto was the sound engineer and set up the equipment and the microphones. Sigrid was the artistic director. She would follow every take, note by note, for the entire ensemble. And she would most often come into the hall to explain to the players together, and sometimes individually, what was problematic about what they had just recorded and why. Sometimes it was a wrong note, sometimes the tuning or intonation was off, and sometimes the tempo dragged or was ahead of the beat. Fine tuning, as I heard it.
Of course I missed much of the dialogue as it was rarely in English. The players included Germans, Italians and even Chinese. But most of them understood several languages and I could hear Sigrid explaining in German, in Italian and in English – but never Chinese and it wasn’t needed.
During the breaks and at mealtime, I was privileged to get acquainted with the musicians and to learn about their fascinating careers. Several had studied in the United States. The cellists had two children with them and during some breaks they would run through the hall and provide “entertainment” of a different sort. Once their four-year-old son sat perfectly still through a whole movement. With both parents as professional musicians, obviously he had been trained well.
The CD will contain three separate divertimenti from Boccherini. It gave me the opportunity to discover the genius of the composer in depth, as each movement had to be played over and over until almost perfect. He has been underrated, I feel, and often when I hear his name or some of his music my thoughts go back to my college broadcasting days when the only piece of his then-known was his minuet. It had become almost a cliché. Later, visiting Italy, I learned that his birthplace is in Lucca, near where Sigrid lives. I have seen the plaque on the house where he was born.
Many music lovers might be amazed at the time, effort and artistry that are often required to produce what brings them the many lovely sounds and moods from the music. Of course there are “live” recordings captured during actual public performances and then the only finessing possible comes through the secrets and miracles of editing. I learned that a sour note might be replaced electronically with a copy of the same tone used elsewhere in the work. Music usually contains many repeats of entire phrases.
As a retired and quite senior veteran of many technical forms of recorded sound, from wire recording and acetate platters through tape to digital processes, I stand in awe of what aural delights are ours these days. Still, the mechanics have no value at all if the human input lacks integrity. The latest noise concoctions passing for music sadden and sometimes disgust me. Blame it on my age, I guess. Nevertheless, some brilliant opera voice from the past is still revered even though it may have come from an Edison era megaphone style input to a waxed cylinder, somehow miraculously restored for modern ears.
We’ve come a long way, baby, from the old RCA label of the hound sitting passively listening to “His Master’s Voice.”
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Page last modified by Richard Lee on 15 July 2007 |
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