Interpretation as a stretching.

Music is hard thing to be analyzed. I can give some mathematical explanation to it, compute the number of dotted notes etc, but that can still leave me with empty hands. Still - music can be taken as a structure. It can be destructive to play music as a rigid structure, without inspiration or emotion in it.

Being aware of such danger's I still like to explain music to myself as a structure. This can be the characteristic feature of capicorn-people, which I am, person, who just loves structures.

There is problem in classical music - mathematically exact interpretation is dead. There must be done some changes to it, some additional pauses between sections, phrases or even notes themselves and some tenutos, adjustings of note-durations here and there.

Stretching  the notes

Here is representation of notes in sheet music at first line. This is rigid structure. This kind of music sounds at popular radio-stations. Notes are glued to ruthless grid. For classical music It's unsuitable for sure.

In classical music we have to "strech" the notes somehow.

On the second line there is one way of doing it. Giving extra time to hole between sections. It's like the sport's commentator, who has swallowed gum and gives unexpected pause, which can be taken as mistake. It is mistake, because it sounds like mistake, it sounds, like something is not right.

If you are playing in a manner which is not suitable for extra pauses, those pauses sound like mistakes.

In third line there has be done some effort to fix this problem. by destroying the rigid order in smaller units. But It's done unsystematically. Result is something that resembles the classical guitar interpretation nowadays. It's like a drunken sailor's speech. with unexpected pauses and augmentations in It. It can be described as "giving the importance to notes". But when there is no system behind it, It is infertile task.

Fourth line is something adorable. Notes are is divided into two categories - those, which are modified and those which are not. In such way player can form a convincing character.

It's important to understand and clarify those tights in music which must stay intact and those, which can and must be modified. For example -  the length of the third beat in valse gives characteristic "weightless feeling", this is something essential. Such things must be taken into account if someone wants to play "real classical music" instead of "toy-music".

Andres Segovia's effort

After the horrible war, WWII people were yearning for something human. Warm, human sound of classical guitar started to be needed by masses. It was the Segovia's time. He wanted to bring the classical guitar from toy-corner into real stage beside the violin and piano. But He failed. Those weird pieces which main virtue was not sounding like guitar music (and therefore giving bringing guitar onto "new level"?) do not automatically rise the quality of interpretation.
The main reason is the lack of interpretation skill among classical guitar players. I can hardly find any classical music structure in CG recordings. I do not remember listening to someone playing valse as valse, not the strange sequence of tricky notes.

Muusika kui pool-kristalliseerunud aine

Muusika kui pool-kristalliseerunud aine

Aidaku mind Jumal eristada seda, mida ma võin muuta sellest, mida ma muuta ei tohiks

Kuulates viimasel ajal oma lindistusi, olen jõudnud äratundmiseni, et muusikas on asju, millega "ei mängita” ja asju, mida võib muuta.

„Kristalne” muusika

Teatavasti ei tohiks muusikat kunagi mängida „nii nagu noodis kirjas on” e mehhaaniliselt.
Noodis olevat nooti võib võrrelda kristalse, piinlikult täpse struktuuriga.

Kristalli struktuur

Pildil on näha erinevad kristalli-struktuurid. Sellist rangust ei kannata inimene paraku kaua välja, siin puuduvad mõtte- ja hingamise pausid. Sellist muusikat on paraku täis kogu kaasaegne tehiskeskkond. Arvuti ei oska teatavasti hingata ega mõttepause pidada, ta ei vaja neid.

 

 

 

“Amorfne” muusika

Klassikalise muusika esitaja peab kristalsesse struktuuri lisama teatud muudatusi. Ta peab lisama mõttepause, asendama mehaanilise jäikuse orgaanilise voolamisega. Ta peab “sulatama” kristalli struktuuri. See protsess lõhub kindlad struktuurid ja tekitab nn “vabaduse”. Iga asjaga on aga teatavasti võimalik liialdada. Kui muusikast eemaldada KÕIK struktuurid, on tulemuseks ebamäärane soga. Siinkohal täpsustan: selline ebamäärane soga on tihti klassikalise kitarri peal esitatav muusika. Kujundlikult on amorfne muusika nagu mõni joobunud madruse jorisemine. See tundub huvitav ehk esimesed kaks minutit.

Muusika kui pool-kristalliseerunud aine

Seega tuleb leida kuldne kesktee - säilitada teatud kindlad, kristalsed seosed, kuid lõhkuda liigset rangust põhjustavad seosed. Teemat võib käsitleda ka võrdsuse (kindel, täpne seos) ja ebavõrdsuse (lõtv seos) vaheldumist. Ajalooliselt on seda käsiteletud ka kui égalité ja inégalité.

Praktilised järeldused

Et jutt liiga teoreetiliseks ei jääks, lisan siia mõned praktilised näpunäited:

1. Alati tuleks eelistada ühe-noodi venitamist e tenutot “laiu masse haaravale” aeglustusele e ritenutole. Ritenuto tõmbab endaga kaasa pikema lõigu, muutes sellega suure tüki muusikat ühetaoliselt amorfseks. Selge ja piiritletud muusika võib ebakohase ritenuto kasutamise mõjul muutuda laialivalguvaks jorisemiseks. Ühe noodi venitamine on kui ühe aatomi liigutamine kristallis - muusika jälgitavus, tema suur struktuur selle muutuse all ei kannata.
2. Muusika interpreteerimisel tuleks selgitada taktiosad, mida sobib venitada. Näiteks valsis on see kolmas löök. Tähtis on teada, et venitamine e tenuto ei tähenda automaatselt dünaamilist rõhutamist, tenuto ei tingi fortet. Valsi viimase löögi venitus on rõhutu. Vastandina näiteks tango viimase löögi raskusele.

Vasaku käe tehnika

Vasaku käe tehnika

Toon järgnevalt ära momendid, mida tuleb vasaku käe juures tähele panna

Vasak õlg ei tohi olla tõstetud

Õlg võib liikuda pigem alla poole. Siis, kui mäng toimub basskeeltel või 9st kõrgemas positsioonis. Kuid liikudes neist äärmusist tagasi ei tohi seda teha õla tõstmise abil. Õlg peab lihtsalt rahulikult naasema oma lõtva asendisse.

Randme nurk ei tohi olla suur

Käsi peab rippuma kitarri kaela küljes. Selleks peab ta olema randmest suhteliselt sirge. näpud peavad tundma käe, lõdva küünarvarre raskust

Esimene ja neljas sõrm ei tohi mängida oma välimise küljega

Mängimine jätab sõrme otsale jälje, vao. See vagu peaks asetsema otse sõrme keskel, mitte tema välimisel serval (pealtpoolt vaadates). Kui esimest sõrme pisut keerata, muutub randme nurk iseenesest nürimaks. See on omakorda seotud õla asendiga. Eriti tähtis on vaadata väikese barre ajal, et esimene sõrm ei pööraks ennast liigselt pöidlapoolsele küljele. Sedamoodi raskendab ta teiste sõrmede liikuvust.

Jevgeni Finkelstein

Nice online concert

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pYftVp__QI

To be honest, I'm not the fan of flamenco-type of guitar music, the shapeless over-romantic type of music known as solo classical guitar performance in west. Those odd tenutos and passionate outbursts on fast notes - this is not making any sense for me. This is finger-driven, brainless type of music. Every note in It is so "meaningful", that at the end it looses any meaning.

There must be other way of musicianship. More solid, more strictly shaped, more "simple" or "meaningless" as you like. I have started to from the basis of another approach to classical guitar. Fancy trick's of Segovia, which are still adorable among players, are not convincing for me.

As far as I can not move my fingers in decent way yet (I was away from guitar for awhile and my fingers have lost grip), I'm looking for examples which can describe my ideas from the Internet.

Picture is not too encouraging. But yesterday I found nice exception -  person, who refuses to copy classical guitar's mainstream tradition, who is going in separate way. Russian professor Jevgeni Finkelstein has taken his musical ideas obviously from tradition of fortepiano and viola da gamba. This really sounds like music to my ears, not a exercise for fingers played twice as fast as it would be reasonable.

Listen to the shape of phrases, the inner movement on them - this is something every piano-player knows but rare guitar-players have heared of. Not just the annoying (but oh so convenient) tenuto on accented notes, but the anticipation- tenutos one note before - this is not result of natural movement of fingers. This is from hearing the sounds and making decisions from this very output. Using fingers as humble slaves, not as masters. Fingers are not able to think about music by themselves. Letting them be free, giving them freedom is resulting mediocre crap.

Finkelstein is playing simple pieces and is giving to them life. This is nice. There is no need to struggle with over-complicated stuff, which places technique into first place and produces nervous struggle-atmosphere rather the atmosphere of love, which is the music's main purpose. This is the ultimate test of musical craftmanship - to put life into very simple music, playing it with high tension. Problem is, that in simple music the tension can be only musical. That task - producing musical tension - is much harder than playing  ultrafast progressions. When It's understood, It's simple, but It needs time and dedication.

There can be the main reason of decline - lack of time and dedication. Consumer has no time and he is not willing to dedicate himself into something, He is not able to sacrifice, His idea is consuming (i e "living").

At the end I'ld like to give some suggestions to Finkestein.
1. Though phrases are well-shaped, pauses between them are occasionally too short  Thoughts are given in too fast pace. I feel some need for more time for digesting it Long pauses are giving freshness into sounds, because after long pause, the sound is suprising happening - after short pause this magic vanishes.

2. And secondly - while I enjoyed the accents and the clear singing sound, I felt some lack of character-looking. Technically speaking -  if there is played music half of hour in flowing legato-manner, there appears unhibitited hunger for the sharp staccato-notes.

I recommend this concert to every serious guitar-player. this is something which has some basic things set rightly.


Allar

3 levels of guitar playing

I have found another way of describing the skills of guitar player. It can be understood as a PC-game with levels.

1st level

First level is completed, when fingers are moving in a decent way, there are no obvious problems in this area.

2nd level

In this level one has nice finger-movements with nice sound quality. Most guitar players have stopped here. There is no need to go further - just play smoothly with nice tone and it's all right. It's a bit boring, but isn't this the essence of classical music - to be boring, "serious", fulfilled with things which are not for human being but for "übermench", the high standard yet to be understood, but not reachable for average Jack. Those high standards are so high that even the player himself barely understands them, though.

3rd level

This is for those who have some doubts about the boring seriousness of classical idiom. This can be described as introducing the musical ideas into playing. There must be done revolution - musical meaning must take the power over fingers. I'll not say that this be some kind of intellectual analysis of music, making excel-table or reading fat books. Not at all - it's about listening to the very sound, the output of your activity and making decisions in that soil. Not for the sake of finger-comfort or tone but for the sake of captivity or "meaning"* of musical content.

The reason

The reason, why I described those levels is mainly in the obstacle between levels 2 and 3. One can play smoothly with nice tone, but this can still be boring. there must be done some effort for reaching 3rd level. There is risk to loose the nice tone at the beginning. It can be taken as moving backwards. In India there is even special practice - making deliberately false, bad sound to make progress in over-all process. One can make living with playing just nice tone, so jumping to next level is risky business. But It pays back in joy of doing It, the divine thing, the Music itself not the crap to played daily in elevator loudspeakers.

*meaning is in parentheses because it has nothing to do with intellect

Muscular trap

When guitar-player needs to play music, He must "translate" musical language to language of finger movements, "language of fingers". I made schema about relations between brain, hand and "holy spirit" or musical meaning.

When I listen to guitar player, It's quit obvious whether musician is just moving his fingers, makes just nice sounds or is related to the musical idea.

There are three degrees:

1. It's just successful finger-movement. Everything happens in "language of fingers". The movements are smooth and fingers are happy. It's must-be in guitar playing. But it's not all.
2. It's producing nice sound. Here the ear is involved. Ear listens to separate sounds, but not to the music itself. It's like a dog, who can listen to separate notes, but is not capable of forming music on those sounds. It can be called the trap of nice sound.
3. It's upon the previous two - It's listening to musical content produced by smooth finger movements and nice sound.

Signs of evil

When musician thinks, that "musical development" is giving to the main vote of decision to finger-comfort, destroying musical persuasiveness, then He is in muscular trap. Other obvious sign is, that musician tries just play such pieces, where there are technical difficulties, ie musician thinks that making music is just moving fingers and being successful in it. He is not able to play easy pieces in decent manner, He feels boredom, tries to accelerate and find some extra-work to His itchy fingers. Making music from rare notes is hard task, but this goal does not bother the one trapped in "language of fingers". Unfortunately contemporary schools are trying to produce "finger-geniuses", leaving music on second place.

Other sign is random, schizophrenic use of tricks - It's just making things deliberately harder to follow. It's like convincing the listener: "I can play such a hard thing, I'm a true master!". It's like nowadays politicians, who are trying to be on picture, making fool things just for being admitted. One of trademarks of such unneeded activity is use of 'metallico' sound in random places by Julian Bream. It's weird and confusing, making things just for the sake of the things himself, forgetting about musical content.

Way out

One must be capable of thinking music without fingers in it. There is such technique as visualization - It's going through music and thinking about fingerings. Musical thinking is more like "audioalization", forgetting about fingers, thinking about musical character, the accents, the tempo, pauses between sessions, overall "feel" of the music. Recording is an invaluable tool for finding the musical shortcomings.

The goal of music

In modern world there are two kinds of people - the ones who have no time at all ("successful" ones) and those who have it too much ("losers", jobless ones). The guitar playing being rather hard and time-consuming thing is not for the first class of people. For those, who have lot of time, the guitar can be nice vehicle for relaxation and feeling the love of God. With guitar one forgets about excess-time for sure. The main issue of music is loving it, showing your love to others and enlighten them with it. Fingers are important, but they are just the side-issue of the whole mystery.

Kitarrimuusikast peale Jordi Savalli kuulamist

Suur osa klassikalise kitarri interpretatsioonist on seosetu, karakterivaba mula. Iseasi, kuivõrd mul õnnestub oma mõtteid kunagi teoks teha, kuid üldjoontes võib sihtideks võtta järgmisi ideid:

1. Teravad punkteeringud. Siin ei ole piiri ees. Savalli teravus on muljet avaldav. Selles on jõudu ja karakterit
2. Lühikesed noodid. Staccato. Isegi laulvates ballaadides ei pea kogu aeg pidevat liini joristama. Paar teravamat strihhi teevad asjale ainult head.
3. Konkreetsed rõhud. Rõhk annab kõnele mõtte. Lausest tuuakse välja rõhuline sõna. Klassikalise kitarriga aga tehakse tihti nii nagu mõni halb poliitik - toodetakse ühtlast ja seosetut loba.
4. Dünaamiline sügavus. Kitarri unikaalne omadus on ülivaiksete nootide tekitamine. Miskipärast on seda väga vähe kuulda olnud. Saatehääli annab alati maha keerata ja üldiselt ei tee see halba.