JAVS Fall 1996

19

new observation that pieces learned slowly and thoroughly are better performed and far longer retained than those learned quickly.

hear performers speak (as long as the com mentary is not too long), because a spoken introduction creates an instant personal bond. This is especially true if you are about to per form unfamiliar music. Your listeners will want to know why you have chosen such and vm. such a piece, what you enjoy about the piece, and what it is you think they ought to listen for. Even seemingly insurmountable barriers can be overcome through this simple tech nique. Experience has shown that a new piece, when performed well and listened to by an audience that has been prepared for the event, is almost always successful. My experiences in this arena are not a few, but I will relate just one to illustrate this point. In 1992 I was collaborating with a composer at the Banff Centre on an experi mental piece for MIDI viola. As the date for our performance drew near, everything that could go wrong did. We worked twenty-four hours around the clock before the perfor mance, trying to iron out technical problems (broken cables, computer program glitches, sporadic difficulty with the electronic instru ment). The Banff Centre is an intimate place; most of our colleagues who would attend the concert were conversant with the technology involved and familiar with our woes. I was hoping this would moderate levels of expecta tion and give us some slack at performance time. I was also counting on their knowledge to provide the aforementioned common ground. We had prepared some written program notes but were too exhausted to con sider preparing a speech; our goal was to simply get through the performance without a major mechanical failure. Imagine our dismay when, five minutes before curtain time, I observed two tour buses full of "blue-haired ladies" disembarking at the theater doors! I spent those five frantic minutes jotting down key words to help me navigate a layman's explanation of MIDI, computers, and synthesizers. When we took the stage I could hear the muttering of people who were not expecting to like what they were about to hear, based on

Performing NewWorks

The greatest secret about performing new music is that there is no secret to performing new music. The requisite assets one must bring to the conscientious performance of new pieces are an open mind, a willingness to spend the necessary time to explore a work thoroughly, and a commitment to the com poser's vision. Musical compositions are a form of communication, and the performer's job is to transmit the composer's ideas to the audience. When one performs an older work-music familiar to the audience through its genre, or the music of a familiar composer, or even a well-known work-performer and audience come to the performance with a shared base of knowledge. Common ground has been established before you set foot on the stage, and all a performer need do is play well. Audiences enjoy hearing music they already know something about, and performers enjoy the responses of an informed audience. For reasons already given, audience members do not come to the concert hall having already familiarized themselves with the works of many living composers. Thus, if you wish to be successful in the performance of works entirely new to your audience, you must find common ground before you perform. Many performers rely on written program notes to educate audiences and familiarize them with a composer's intended communi cations. On occasion, composers' notes are published along with their works for inclu sion in the concert program. These are some times so full of jargon that they can mystifY an audience that may not know "serial" from "cereal." Instead of hoping that your audience is musically literate and that the house lights stay bright long enough for program notes to be read, give verbal "program notes"- speak to your audience. Audiences love to