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Dan Coren
Certain classical music critics like to use the word “honest” in their reviews, as in “This was an honest performance of the ‘Moonlight’ Sonata.” It’s a word I usually despise in this context. What the hell does it mean? What is an honest performance of a classical piece? Or a dishonest one, for that matter?
In jazz, honesty really counts for something. In fact, you could say that jazz improvisation is one of life’s acid tests of honesty: Either you can reach inside yourself and pull out your own music or you can’t. If all you can do is regurgitate riffs you’ve heard elsewhere, your colleagues and your audience will quickly hear that you’re a fraud.
In classical music, though, the score is all there before you. You may or may not be up to its technical demands. You may be a dull and tasteless performer or an exciting and sensitive one– but, short of hiding a stereo system inside the piano and finger-synching along with Horowitz, it’s hard for me to see how mendacity or truthfulness apply.
Having said that, the end of Susan Babini’s cello recital on October 19th represented, indeed, some of the most honestly self-revealing playing I’ve ever heard.
As I’d expected, Babini’s concert was beautifully played from beginning to end. Babini played the opening Elliott Carter “Enigma”– a piece that was astonishingly approachable and (dare I say it) tonal – with fiery conviction. She and accompanist Anna Polonsky made the Beethoven Op. 69 everything one might have hoped.
Alas, it was not one of my most successful days as a listener. I found myself distracted by a sore throat, by one of the most sadistically designed chairs I’ve ever sat in, by the designs in the church’s stained glass (what are those icons? Holy owls?), by Colin Powell’s endorsement of Obama, by Mendelssohn’s relentlessly pleasant lyricism… what, I wonder, do professional music critics do when they have days like this?
And then Ms. Babini played an encore. In fact, she didn’t have to be coaxed much. At the second curtain call, she took her seat as if she’d really been waiting all afternoon to play what followed. Her voice wasn’t entirely audible, but I think she said something like, “There’s not a person in this room who won’t recognize this piece.” And, with her eyes closed, she unfolded the long line of one of the world’s most perfect melodies: Camille Saint-Saens’s The Swan.
I think all musicians have certain pieces that are rooted in their souls, pieces that will always bring out their truest musical selves. No matter that this piece is as hoary a chestnut as you’ll find in the cello repertory. I’m betting that The Swan is Susan Babini’s oldest musical friend, that nothing makes her happier than playing it as ecstatically as she did Sunday afternoon.
In jazz, honesty really counts for something. In fact, you could say that jazz improvisation is one of life’s acid tests of honesty: Either you can reach inside yourself and pull out your own music or you can’t. If all you can do is regurgitate riffs you’ve heard elsewhere, your colleagues and your audience will quickly hear that you’re a fraud.
In classical music, though, the score is all there before you. You may or may not be up to its technical demands. You may be a dull and tasteless performer or an exciting and sensitive one– but, short of hiding a stereo system inside the piano and finger-synching along with Horowitz, it’s hard for me to see how mendacity or truthfulness apply.
Having said that, the end of Susan Babini’s cello recital on October 19th represented, indeed, some of the most honestly self-revealing playing I’ve ever heard.
As I’d expected, Babini’s concert was beautifully played from beginning to end. Babini played the opening Elliott Carter “Enigma”– a piece that was astonishingly approachable and (dare I say it) tonal – with fiery conviction. She and accompanist Anna Polonsky made the Beethoven Op. 69 everything one might have hoped.
Alas, it was not one of my most successful days as a listener. I found myself distracted by a sore throat, by one of the most sadistically designed chairs I’ve ever sat in, by the designs in the church’s stained glass (what are those icons? Holy owls?), by Colin Powell’s endorsement of Obama, by Mendelssohn’s relentlessly pleasant lyricism… what, I wonder, do professional music critics do when they have days like this?
And then Ms. Babini played an encore. In fact, she didn’t have to be coaxed much. At the second curtain call, she took her seat as if she’d really been waiting all afternoon to play what followed. Her voice wasn’t entirely audible, but I think she said something like, “There’s not a person in this room who won’t recognize this piece.” And, with her eyes closed, she unfolded the long line of one of the world’s most perfect melodies: Camille Saint-Saens’s The Swan.
I think all musicians have certain pieces that are rooted in their souls, pieces that will always bring out their truest musical selves. No matter that this piece is as hoary a chestnut as you’ll find in the cello repertory. I’m betting that The Swan is Susan Babini’s oldest musical friend, that nothing makes her happier than playing it as ecstatically as she did Sunday afternoon.
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