The “all-arounder”. Do you know what I’m talking about? In the world of sportsball – baseball in particular – players are required to play both offense and defense (ok, the designated hitter in the AL notwithstanding). Some of the great players of the game were players that excelled in both roles. Willy Mays, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle, Ken Griffey, Jr. They could produce runs and could defend with the best of them. It’s hard to do both roles well. If it weren’t there would be no need for a Hall of Fame – it would simply be irrelevant. But it is so very difficult.
This train of thought resulted from thinking about conductors. Both music directors, staff conductors, and guest conductors. Each has differing responsibilities, both on and off the podium. The music director may have the most similar balance of responsibilities as a major league ball player. She must be technically proficient in the the art of showing the tempo, dynamics, and colors of a major orchestral score. She must communicate the emotional import of the music that she advocates, inspiring her players to new levels of artistic excellence and increasingly committed performances. She must be a diplomat, treading the lines between the various stakeholders of her organization – players, management, board, and patrons. She must be as good in the front office as on the field, so to speak. Closing big ‘asks’ from major donors, and formulating how the repertoire of multiple seasons comes together. Programming works that are familiar and comforting (and being able to put a new spin on them), while at the same time educating audiences by exposing them to more challenging repertoire that they might not normally seek out on their own.
This is hugely difficult – and I’m glad it’s not my job – but where have the current and upcoming generations of all-arounders gone? Some staff conductors (assistant, associate, resident, etc.) can conduct the standard repertoire commandingly, but fall apart if they have to read a non-classical chart. Others can adapt to changing conditions on stage with non-classical charts, but have no concept of how to convincingly lead a Beethoven symphony.
I’m not unrealistic. I know that I play in an orchestra in a small market, with a small budget, that is of limited interest to conductors and/or their management teams. I don’t expect every conductor that gets up on the podium is going to be the next Furtwangler, Solti, or Boulez. But what I do want is basic competence in the musical styles that he is going to encounter with a modern orchestra. It is demanded of me, isn’t it? I would love to (and have) work with someone who is competent across a wide array of styles and knows how to work an orchestra efficiently.
Where does one place the blame for this situation? It seems that conductors are less well-rounded in their overall outlook on the world. They can read scores like no one’s business – full scores at the keyboard, in many cases – and have frightfully good musicianship (ear training, etc). They have major swaths of the standard repertoire already committed to memory, and are often powerful advocates for new music. All good stuff. But it’s rare to find a conductor who has an in-depth understanding of of non-classical music. The Great American Songbook composers, pop, rock, hip hop, electronica – they often seem to be mysteries to many conductors. I would suspect that they’re not getting much exposure to these forms in the context of their studies, even if they have a passing familiarity through their own personal listening. And that is a shame, because some of the rising stars of the compositional firmament are basing their music on exactly these styles/forms, much as the great composers of the past took popular forms and made them their own (JS Bach and the baroque dance forms, to cite one example). Add to this the fact that most young conductors are going to start their careers as assistants, where they will have to conduct youth, pops, and film music concerts – on very little rehearsal time.
The thing that makes me sad is that there are very capable conductors out there who are so limited because they are set on being the next major, serious conductor. And there are also very capable conductors who never get the chance to do this glorious mixture of repertoire because they didn’t study with the right person, or don’t have ‘beautiful hands’ when they conduct. They are often described as ‘workmanlike’, which is a shame, because they can get orchestras through all kinds of repertoire in the worst possible conditions, adapting on the fly. They can do this because they have that breadth and depth of knowledge across a variety of musical styles, and they can communicate that effectively with both an orchestra and an audience. I hope that this is changing, because it’s getting awfully depressing to watch the array of mis-cast specialists that step up on our podiums in this business. We’ll see…