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History of Performance

3K views 11 replies 8 participants last post by  Jobe 
#1 ·
I'm not sure which forum this fits into, so apologies if I've b@11sed it up, but I have a question that I'm hoping all you well-educated people can answer...

I would like to know how and when the conventions of classical concerts evolved - the musicians in evening dress, the ritual, the applause in the right places, the implied distance between performers and audience, etc. I assume this evolved in the 19C... but can anyone elaborate?

A side question is also what you all feel about these conventions. Do you like or indeed cherish them, and if so why? Or do you think they drive a wedge between classical music and the public? Also interested to know if and how performance conventions are changing now?
 
#2 ·
Late 19th century is probably right, but I don't think it became standard practice not to clap between movements till the 20th Century. I read somewhere that Mahler had to specify in advance that the audience was not to clap between sections of his "Kindertotenlieder".

Personally, I kind of hate the convention. There are places that just seem to call out for an audience response (like the end of the first movement of the Brahms Piano Concerto #1). Also, it makes new people attending their first concerts experience tremendous embarrassment on occasion. ;)
 
#5 ·
I remember hearing it was Toscanini, or someone from that time period, who insisted on the stuffy no clapping ritual. I always thought this was pretty silly for new or unknown pieces. What if the composer runs two movements together, as many of them do? I want to enjoy the music, not count movements in mortal fear.

I also hate the ubiquitous black and white tuxedo ritual. I would love to see an orchestra wear -- I don't know, all blue for a change. I enjoyed Jordi Savall's L'Orfeo when everyone dressed in period outfits.
 
#6 ·
Back to Mahler for a second - he did, indeed establish most rules of concert etiquette while he was the Viennese court's Kappelmeister, including preventing tardy concertgoers from getting to their seats mid-way through a performance. Story goes that, at one such occasion, he stopped the orchestra midstream, and stared at the tardy patron as he made his way down to his seat. That must've been pretty embarrassing!
 
#8 ·
A side question is also what you all feel about these conventions. Do you like or indeed cherish them, and if so why? Or do you think they drive a wedge between classical music and the public? Also interested to know if and how performance conventions are changing now?
There should be at least one left-handed violinist in every orchestra.;)

I checked out Gabriel Prokofiev's Concerto for Turntable and Orchestra the other day. The soloist (the DJ) was wearing a 't-shirt'. I was so disgusted I almost choked on my vol-au-vents.
 
#12 ·
And I think it's for reasons like this that we don't need to clap. It means I have some ardent concert-goer applauding like a performing seal when I'm trying to record and rip off people's music from the radio... err... Forget that.

I get enough people clapping when playing Irish Music. Instead, they clap throughout. F%%K OFF, I CAN KEEP TIME WITHOUT YOUR HELP.

I think the big-long-clap at the end of the concert is fine because it means that strange-crazy-fastidious performers are kept happy, the miserable sods. oO
 
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