St. Cecilia at the Tower (Part 2)
Master Class and A&S Discussion
In addition to the classes, we had a Master Class before lunch led by Master Robyyan. No other classes were scheduled against it so that way everyone could be there. I’m happy with that format, and will probably keep it that way next year.
Such a good session. Oh my goodness. I learned things from having listened to Court and Country perform their piece. I have so many ideas now for improving the performance of our English pieces, if not all of our pieces.
For our piece, I appreciated the feedback we got. I may have been a bit too articulation happy on it because of how influenced I’ve been by Dr. Parmentier. But I think Robyyan was right, and that scaling back some of the articulation improves things.
Also the advice on how to practice intonation was helpful, namely, go note by note and tune. True, Kasha and I had done that, but we hadn't done it with the Tenor line. Because it was a master class we had a chance to work on that immediately and I noticed right away how that helped things.
Also I was happy that he highlighted the second Kasha and I had. :-D Some people are good at hiding their appreciation of praise; I am not one of them.
Such a good experience, and honestly whenever I think of A&S for performance I think that this is what many of us want: a chance to show off the cool stuff we’re doing and a chance to get feedback on how to improve our performance.
Speaking of which, the A&S discussion. Yeah... it was good but not what I was expecting it to be.
I had it during lunch which was both good and bad. Good because everyone who might have wanted to attend could without missing anything and good because other people not interested in the discussion could go off and just eat lunch. Bad because it meant there was no break, especially for me and Kasha who were leading the session. Hopefully we won’t have to do it next year, but if we do I’m not sure if I’d put it at lunch again.
So, the criteria... it’s hard for me to think about how to improve the A&S criteria without wanting to toss it out the window and start over. That is probably a personal failing. My hope for the session was to get a feel for what people thought about A&S for performance as it is, and what people wanted out of A&S for performance. I also hoped to start brainstorming ideas for how to create something better.
I think the first part I got. ermenrich took notes, and somewhere in there should be what people think of A&S for performance and what people want out of it. I also think no one was arguing that it was fine the way it was.
The brainstorming didn’t happen. It was a somewhat tactical decision because I intended to do it for making new criteria, not for improving what we have, which is what I needed to do. Looking back, I think doing that kind of brainstorming could have been useful, but c’est la vie. I think the discussion was still useful even without it.
The main thing I got from the discussion was I need to have short-term goals as well as long-term goals. In the short-term we can improve the criteria within the current framework. My guess is that would take probably a year or two. I still think it would be better to start over from scratch, but that’s a long term goal. Like when I have friends in the right places.
Also I have ideas for testing out brand new performance criteria independent of official A&S. People have private competitions all the time, right?
And again, whenever I hear talk about A&S for performance I think that master classes are where it’s at. *Sigh* Should I really make improving A&S my crusade? I don’t know...
To be continued...
In addition to the classes, we had a Master Class before lunch led by Master Robyyan. No other classes were scheduled against it so that way everyone could be there. I’m happy with that format, and will probably keep it that way next year.
Such a good session. Oh my goodness. I learned things from having listened to Court and Country perform their piece. I have so many ideas now for improving the performance of our English pieces, if not all of our pieces.
For our piece, I appreciated the feedback we got. I may have been a bit too articulation happy on it because of how influenced I’ve been by Dr. Parmentier. But I think Robyyan was right, and that scaling back some of the articulation improves things.
Also the advice on how to practice intonation was helpful, namely, go note by note and tune. True, Kasha and I had done that, but we hadn't done it with the Tenor line. Because it was a master class we had a chance to work on that immediately and I noticed right away how that helped things.
Also I was happy that he highlighted the second Kasha and I had. :-D Some people are good at hiding their appreciation of praise; I am not one of them.
Such a good experience, and honestly whenever I think of A&S for performance I think that this is what many of us want: a chance to show off the cool stuff we’re doing and a chance to get feedback on how to improve our performance.
Speaking of which, the A&S discussion. Yeah... it was good but not what I was expecting it to be.
I had it during lunch which was both good and bad. Good because everyone who might have wanted to attend could without missing anything and good because other people not interested in the discussion could go off and just eat lunch. Bad because it meant there was no break, especially for me and Kasha who were leading the session. Hopefully we won’t have to do it next year, but if we do I’m not sure if I’d put it at lunch again.
So, the criteria... it’s hard for me to think about how to improve the A&S criteria without wanting to toss it out the window and start over. That is probably a personal failing. My hope for the session was to get a feel for what people thought about A&S for performance as it is, and what people wanted out of A&S for performance. I also hoped to start brainstorming ideas for how to create something better.
I think the first part I got. ermenrich took notes, and somewhere in there should be what people think of A&S for performance and what people want out of it. I also think no one was arguing that it was fine the way it was.
The brainstorming didn’t happen. It was a somewhat tactical decision because I intended to do it for making new criteria, not for improving what we have, which is what I needed to do. Looking back, I think doing that kind of brainstorming could have been useful, but c’est la vie. I think the discussion was still useful even without it.
The main thing I got from the discussion was I need to have short-term goals as well as long-term goals. In the short-term we can improve the criteria within the current framework. My guess is that would take probably a year or two. I still think it would be better to start over from scratch, but that’s a long term goal. Like when I have friends in the right places.
Also I have ideas for testing out brand new performance criteria independent of official A&S. People have private competitions all the time, right?
And again, whenever I hear talk about A&S for performance I think that master classes are where it’s at. *Sigh* Should I really make improving A&S my crusade? I don’t know...
To be continued...