Emilie Mayer on period instruments

[Tartini]

Harmonia Mundi is releasing an album by Emilie Mayer on September 18, which appears to be the first in a series featuring her orchestral music, performed on period instruments. First up are her First Symphony, Piano Concerto, and two overtures.  https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/9879500--emilie-mayer-piano-concerto-symphony-no-1-overtures-symphonic-works-vol-1   

[Ilja]

Listening to the excerpts, it does sound as though they've taken a baseball bat to Mayer's music and beaten every last bit of romanticism out of it. To each their own, of course, and I genuinely think period performances have their place, but on first hearing this plays rather fast and loose with the HI in HIP.

[Mark Thomas]

All the works on this new recording are already available in the cpo Mayer series.

[Ilja]

... and the comparison between the two versions is an interesting one - Forck's approach seems to be to remove any hint of expression; it all becomes very flat. It's the oddest in the Piano Concerto, which ends up as something akin to early Hummel. Not that Mayer was a particularly forward-looking composer, but she also wasn't this conservative.

[Tartini]

What are your general thoughts on using period instruments in the Romantic repertoire? Do you have any good examples of successful recordings featuring historically informed performances?

[Ilja]

The problem already starts with the term "historically informed" since much of the time it's not all that informed aside from ideology. The idea that romantic orchestras eschewed vibrato has by now been pretty comprehensively disproven, for instance, but HIP ensembles still persist in pursuing it. The gist is that whenever innovations presented themselves, instrumentalists typically grabbed on to them pretty quickly. The whole idea that 19th century musicians in major ensembles might have held on to previous practices for reasons of principle is - in practice - ludicrous. That's not to say that some ensemble in southern Laibach might not have played Mayer in a fashion more reminiscent of the classical era, but it was certainly not the norm.

To answer your question: no. That's not because HIP performances don't make a difference, but rather because by the time romanticism rolled around, orchestral practices were already not too far removed to what they are today. Of course, there were - for example - some horns that couldn't do the things modern horns can, but for me as a listener (and NOT a musician) those things are barely noticeable. Perhaps that explains the problematic reputation of HIP performances; people don't actually notice it until it sounds worse than what they were used to.*

* On the other hand, they might appeal to listeners enamoured of the modern austerity aesthetic of, say, Arvo Pärt. But that's a modern sensibility, not a historical one.

[Tartini]

Thank you so much for your reply! Yes, ultimately, what matters in a good performance is musicality and engagement. Regardless of ideology.

[eschiss1]

Which tells me that they -aren't- historically informed. Disappointing. Unless one believes HIP means using the practices of the pre-Medieval era to play Mahler but doing it accurate to that former era, for gosh sake. (Gads, I sound just like Bartolo*, but - seriously.)

*Il Nozze, not Cecilia.

[Jonathan]

Oh dear, I was interested in this recording until reading this thread!  I shall have to get different ones instead.

[Ilja]

From the blurb:

The musicians of the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin have resolved to do her justice with this revelatory symphonic triptych of recordings. They begin with two of her most remarkable works played on period instruments, including a wondrous Blüthner piano handpicked by the soloist here, Alexander Melnikov.

The issue isn't the period instruments themselves, it seems to me. As so often, it is that their use appears to have been monopolized by advocates of a certain way of playing - in this case the Akademie für Alte Musik performing romantic music closer to the way they would Alte Musik. The use of period instruments does not present enough "historically informed practice" to then just do whatever tickles your ideological and aesthetic (I'm convinced the two are intimately connected in this case) fancy.

[Wheesht]

The discussion here has prompted me to look for and then re-read Lynn René Bayley's entry The HIP Movement in Classical Music: Reality and Myth in her The Art Music Lounge, from 2016: Lots of interesting points – and strong views (in the comments too).

[Ilja]

Thank you, Thomas, that was an interesting read. One comment by Jonathan O'Brien is in my opinion worth replicating:

Music is an aural art and not a thing that can be learned purely from what has been written. The words of history can help us, carefully used, but can also lead us into a trap of untruth if we are selective in what we take note of. Frankly, as many who've done their time in universities know, academia can be an ass.

Truly, HIP is a newly-invented 'academic' performance style or world of taste in music – an attempt at re-invention of the wheel. It is a result of post-modernism. It's how a certain type likes to see the world and life. That's fine; and if people want it, let them pay for it. But let us acknowledge, like the article above admirably points out, that it isn't a true historical style of performance at all. It is a modern contemporary style that is being forced onto music by dryly academic, career-advancing motivations. If you want an honest, 'early' sound of music you will simply have to go back to our earliest recordings. There is no other way to attain a concept of an early sound.

Also, specifically regarding string playing, there is so much garbage written and said in lectures about instruments of the Baroque era. How the violin was played delicately with a thin, light bow and was tuned to A415. The truth is there is an enormous amount that is simply not known, and a lot of guessing and currently-fashionable supposition made out to be canonical truth. If you want to learn from the written words then take careful note of the main point on tone made by early writers like Quantz and Leopold Mozart: they are basically saying "Make the biggest, thickest, warmest sound on your instrument as you possibly can." And look at the etchings in Leopold Mozart's book on the violin. The bow is huge in comparison to the violin. It is not a spindly, anemic-looking little thing like today's so-called, rigidly-defined, 'academy standard' "Baroque bow." What a joke.



And vibrato was used in the earlier days. Read Geminiani. The writers back then warned against overdoing it, and that is still common advice today. Vibrato was simply termed 'in a vocal style'. No vibrato at all on violin can lead to a tight left hand. Vibrato also serves to help project the sound and play with a louder tone – the same reason a singer uses it, and also to beautify or sweeten the sound. Sure, if you're a bowed string player and don't want to use it at all, that's fine. Good for you. But don't dictate to others how they should sound in order to be legitimate and 'real' in playing early music. That is not true. Same goes for conductors, and even 'historically informed' audiences. Don't imagine you are more virtuous or historical for preferring no vibrato. If you feel that way, you're deceiving yourself. Truth is important.

The point of HIP as a contemporary aesthetic has perhaps been emphasized enough by now (sorry), but I want to remind everyone of how the "father of art history", Johann Winckelmann, advocated removing polychrome from ancient sculpture and architecture despite being fully aware of their historical authenticity - simply because it conformed more to his ideal of how classical culture should have looked. This is a perfect parallel to the excesses of HIP.