Discussing the Cliburn with Brad Hill - part 3

 

Van Cliburn presents the gold medal to Nobuyuki Tsujii. Official photo  c 2009 Altre Media.

Brad: The Cliburn requires chamber music performances in the semifinal round. I don't have much chamber experience, so I have trouble evaluating those performances. Have you played much chamber music?

Beth: I've never played chamber music for piano and strings but I've done lots of ensemble work, on flute as a younger person in bands, orchestras, and woodwind quintets, and then for many years singing with other people and various instruments, so I do feel fairly comfortable evaluating that category. However I didn't watch much of it - I need to go back and see more of the performances. I saw Son's semifinal chamber performance, and thought it was good but I just wasn't...captivated. Moved. Her manner at the piano is also too affected for me to really warm up to her. What did you think about this category?

Brad: I fade out a bit during that round. I like the pieces, but don't know them like I know the solo literature. I'd be perfectly content if the Cliburn eliminated the chamber requirement,
though I understand why they don't. They are searching for well rounded musicians. I thought Edouard Kunz looked about as comfortable as I would be during his quintet -- he appeared almost to be sight-reading!

I agree with you about age, and seasoning, and maturity. I was hoping the jury would give Zhang a discretionary award, then bring him back in four years to conquer the world. He hasn't figured out what type of musician he's going to be. Or, if he has, then his spectacular technical ability isn't being put to much purpose.

Beth: We should touch on the question of the future of classical music, and how competitions like the Cliburn fit into that - any comments?

Brad: The whole Cliburn experience dovetails in a peculiar way with the shrinking consumer market for classical music. Even as audiences in many venues get smaller, CD sales are miniscule, and regional orchestras are going out of business -- the Cliburn Foundation seems
to be growing ambitiously. They seem to be assuming that if they put the music out there in new media (internet streaming), the audience will appear. Sort of "If you build it, they will come." And apparently they had hundreds of thousands of people viewing the competition online. I love their approach!

Music contests are hundreds of years old. Mozart competed with his rival Clementi. Liszt was staged in a playoff against Thalberg. In more modern times, the Tschaikovsky Competition (the one Van Cliburn won in 1958), the Chopin Competition (Argerich, Ashkenazy, Ohlsson, Li), and others have trained the classical marketplace to expect superhero pianists, launched every few years. As music education has diminished in the U.S., audiences rely on juries to determine who is good, and provide them with instant careers. Much as I love competitions, that is a disturbing trend.

Beth: I thought the coverage was fantastic. If the arts are going to survive, the web will play a critical role, and I agree completely: this is a brilliant example of what can be done!

We've already established the fact that the Cliburn's web format, generosity, and open accessibility are tailor-made for classical music geeks like you and me, but what about those elusive "new" audience members? Can enough excitement be generated to make non-pianists want to watch piano competitions, the way non-athletes get excited about Olympic figure skating? And can events like this help inspire little Zhangs and Bozhanovs to take up the piano and practice long hours - or just learn enough to enjoy music all their lives?

Brad: Those are great questions, and probably unanswerable. Little Zhangs and Bozhanovs are born all the time, and if they get motivation and support at a young age, the practicing happens naturally.

As to attracting audiences, there are many parts to that puzzle in my opinion. I was exposed to classical music while growing up, which I think is increasingly unusual. Were you? And my school had a pretty big music department with an orchestra, band, and choir. I don't have kids, but I gather that's less common now, too. A piano competition like the Cliburn is a piece of dramatic storytelling like the Olympics, but if you have no background, and no context, and don't know the music, it loses meaning.

But I do think that distribution is key. It's no longer just a question of putting people in the seats; it's about putting the music where people are -- that means in their homes and on their digital
devices. The Cliburn Foundation seems to really get this.

Beth: There was always music in my home, and in my school, there was a big music program like yours: every kid learned to read music in elementary school, and we started on recorders in 3rd grade and could take an instrument in the 4th. Our marching band was one of the best in New York State and we competed all summer, and the town took as much pride in it as in sports. But you're right - there are so many other interests competing for kid's time, so much less funding for art education and appreciation, and so much less exposure as classical music has become expensive and perceived to be elitist. This seems like a huge step in the right direction.

Here in Montreal, the new orchestra conductor, Kent Nagano, is trying all sorts of new initiatives - last season they MSO played a concert above the ice in the Bell Center, in honor of the Montreal Canadiens and hockey! He took the orchestra on a Canada-wide tour, has a lot of family-oriented (and priced) programs - and has become quite a hero in the city. It's possible -- but takes work and creativity and an openness to change and experimentation and the possibility of failure - exactly the qualities you like in Bozhanov!

Brad, we've covered a lot of ground, and I want to thank you so much! It was a pleasure and I hope we'll stay in touch. Enjoy your playing and listening!

Comments

[dale]

Thanks for this series, both of you. As someone just beginning to listen to classical music, gingerly, it's been fascinating.

[Jean]

Same goes for me. Well, I have always listened to classical music, but not very knowledgeably or often very attentively. Your discussion here was much in my mind when I listened this past weekend to much of the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition on BBC Radio 3: http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/cardiffsinger/ (unfortunately, unlike the Cliburn, only clips are available on line) I've always had reservations about the value of 'competition' in any form. But hearing a range of performances one after the other and also the comments and comparisons of knowledgeable commentators is an excellent and involving way of learning to listen more discerningly.