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WOSNER:I think that harmony is generally the single most trustworthy guide for interpreting tonal music. Since the form in tonal music is inseparably tied to the harmonic structure of each piece, following the harmonic progression can really tell you a lot about ‘where the piece is going’, because that would determine other elements, such as rhythm and melody.

Pianist Shai Wosner

In other words, I personally try to look for ways to, so to speak, let the piece tell me what to do. Usually, with a great piece, the inner workings of the music are all in sync with the markings that the composer put in (such as the placement of a crescendo or a ritardando), and so, guided by the harmonic rhythm of the piece and the markings that punctuate it, you try to internalize the structure of the music and become as comfortable with it as you can.

Of course, it’s easier said than done, but it can have great rewards because the more you are comfortable with the structure of the piece, the more it ‘becomes a part of you’, the more you are free to explore various interpretative ideas. In a funny way, many times it tells you what NOT to do, that might interrupt the structural flow of the music, or highlight something that’s perhaps not as significant as something else.

The combination of harmonic events such as modulations with the markings of the composer help you to determine what’s most important in the music and what’s less important. And in great music, that applies to all levels of the piece, whether in a short phrase of a Haydn sonata, or in a large structure of a 30-minute Mahler movement.

” I often feel that what makes a lot of the great pieces really great is the sense of inevitability between one idea and the next. As if it simply had to be this way ” – Shai Wosner

In other words, it’s like a physical place that has its own fixed attributes, such as turns and slopes, and your job is to show how interesting and unique the place is. The way you experience a piece of music shouldn’t always be the same, but can change based on the nature of the instrument at hand, or the acoustics of the hall, etc. just like the way you experience a certain place can change depending on weather or mode of transportation, for example.

Ideally, you try to have a clear grasp of the form of the piece that would allow you play with it at the spur of the moment, and still keep it intelligible. I often feel that what makes a lot of the great pieces really great, is the sense of inevitability between one idea and the next. As if it simply had to be this way. In a way, you try to attain that ideal when playing them, too – to make each turn of phrase come out of the previous one in a way that would seem inevitable, as if you are composing it at that very moment.

“Wosner, the elegant Israeli pianist and Daniel Barenboim protege who first came to local attention in 1999, delivered a vivid, perceptive account of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 20 in D Minor. His clearly structured opening movement, complete with rippling passage work, mirrored the restless harmonic pull of the orchestral introduction. The Romanza’s serenity, broken by a stormy G-Minor interlude, was beautifully judged as well. Completing a winning performance, Wosner played Beethoven’s cadenza to the first movement and his own stylish cadenza to the Rondo finale.” – Chicago Tribune

MANOFF: How does the legacy of recorded performances affect your interpretations, if at all ?

WOSNER: I used to listen to a lot of music when I was growing up, and do less now, although not necessarily by choice. I listened to a lot of non-piano music, especially opera and symphonic repertoire. But I feel that I’ve learned a lot from recordings of great pianists.

Of course, when you listen to a recording that you love over and over again, it is likely to influence the way you would play the same piece. That’s not always a bad thing, not unlike the way painters used to copy paintings by others in order to become better at a certain theme or technique.

I think that if your reasons to play a certain piece in a certain way come from the score and not just the record, as long as the performance is convincing and inspired, it shouldn’t matter so much if it resembles certain aspects of another performance.

MANOFF: You have a very refined and sturdy sense of counterpoint within harmonic structure. While I assume a good deal of that is part of your talent, I wonder how much you studied counterpoint or possible figured bass and fugue as a student. And what can you recommend to aspiring artists along these matters ?

WOSNER: Thanks for the compliment! I think I have a very long way to go in the study of counterpoint and fugues in particular, but I am grateful for having studied composition when I was growing up. It was an opportunity to look at things from the composer’s point of view, a chance to feel how different musical elements ‘behave’. Perhaps having to face an empty page helps you appreciate ever more the greatness of a Mozart concerto.

But I do believe that music theory is really not theoretical at all. Harmony and counterpoint play vital roles in what excites us about music and they shouldn’t be regarded as dry sets of rules. For example, Brahms’ music can sometimes exhibit this incredible power (take the beginning of his D Minor Piano Concerto, for example) because Brahms was a such master in building up the greatest tension while delaying harmonic resolution. So studying the way he works doesn’t take from the experience, it makes you admire it even more.

MANOFF: Considering the relationship between technically difficult music and interpretation: Should one have a musical interpretation before allowing the hands to “learn” notes ?

WOSNER:I generally tend to think that in great pieces, particularly by composers who were also pianists, what we call ‘technical’ and ‘musical’ is really part of the same expressive content and the music. In other words, when a passage is awkward, it’s usually meant to convey a certain kind of tension in the music. Perhaps the best example for that is in Brahms, with the famous octave trills in the D Minor Concerto that are notoriously awkward. Brahms himself talks about “the particular appeal that is always connected with difficulty”, referring in a letter to Clara Schumann to Op. 116 No. 5, where is deliberately distributes the chords in a manner that forces to stretch your hands.

But there are certainly examples to the contrary and Schubert first comes to mind. In many of his piano works, even (in fact, especially!) in passages that sound simple the writing is often extremely awkward, especially with regards to the voicing of chords in chordal passages. It can be very hard to control the balance of each chord in a way that would create the effect of an ensemble of voices with a very smooth legato. Passages like these (like the beginning of the B-flat Sonata D. 960) shouldn’t sound difficult but they are.

So the trick is to judge when the music should sound difficult and when it shouldn’t. Perhaps the conclusion is the technical should dictate the interpretation only when it dictates the music itself.

“Ideally, you try to have a clear grasp of the form of the piece that would allow you play with it at the spur of the moment, and still keep it intelligible. I often feel that what makes a lot of the great pieces really great, is the sense of inevitability between one idea and the next.” – Shai Wosner

MANOFF: You write on your website about returning to Mozart Operas for “musical vitamins. ” Do you listen to opera on recordings as well as play from the score ? Which other operas or opera composers offer such vitamins for your health ?

WOSNER:I listened to quite a lot of opera when I was growing up and I wish I had more time to listen more these days. I would state the obvious by saying that there are plenty of ‘musical vitamins’ to be found in Wagner and Verdi and Strauss, etc. I think Verdi really comes close to the great Mozart operas in Otello and Falstaff, in their purity and economy of means. I know that it may sound contradictory to call an Opera like Otello economical, with its grand choral scenes, but musically speaking it really is. Verdi many times achieves maximum dramatic effect with minimum of means, like the inimitable orchestration for the Willow Song in act IV which uses very few instruments, or the austere musical material when Otello creeps in at night to kill Desdemona. Verdi develops those few barren motives into the shocking climax so organically that it’s just amazing every time.

MANOFF: I have seen and heard a number of life-changing musical events, after which my sense of music and my participation in music was changed at a deep level, often a level I can’t describe. One was Richter playing the Brahms Bb Concerto with Leinsdorf conducting the Chicago Orchestra. They recorded the performance in the next days, so the experience was and remains deepened. Have you had such experiences? If so, can you mention some of them and why they were important ?

WOSNER:Yes. I have a very vivid memory of a Radu Lupu recital in Tel-Aviv. I think I must have been 15 or 16. I will never forget the end of the first movement of Schubert’s A Minor Sonata D. 845. It was like an earth-shattering event and I felt like I had just experienced levels in music deeper than I had ever imagined until then. It made me more aware of what playing the piano can mean.

” I guess there are two basic questions for a musician – what the music means and how to go about conveying it to others.” – Shai Wosner

MANOFF: I understand that you will performing a Tchaikovsky Concerto in the next season. Can you mention other concertos on your radar– so to speak –works which you are already considering?

WOSNER:There are so many that I still hope to play. Brahms 2nd, for example is perhaps at the top of the list right now. Others include the Ravel Left Hand Concerto, as well as the Ligeti Concerto, a real masterpiece which I’ve played years ago but hope to go back to soon.

MANOFF: Might you discuss how you practice and how you balance immediate needs with future tasks. You are a musician with wide interests. Does that mindset ever interfere with your practice schedule ? What’s the balance ?

Shai Wosner

WOSNER:That’s the hardest part. I guess there are two basic questions for a musician – what the music means and how to go about conveying it to others. The latter basically means finding how to practice certain things which is a lifelong process.

One of the things I try to do in order to balance between immediate needs and long term goals is make sure that I work on the pieces I can learn from the most, pieces that are substantial in a way that when I have to practice them for the near future I also gain something for the long run.

You always learn something about music and the piano when you work on a Beethoven Sonata, for example. But there is a flip side to it as well, which is knowing how not to commit to too many different things at once. In other words, it can be tempting to use different opportunities to learn more repertoire, but it is important to know how to not overextend yourself at any given moment. There’s so much good repertoire that sometimes it’s hard to say no.

MANOFF: Let me ask a crazy question. Suppose that you had to build your musical world (starting now) from music composed after 1900. What would you make that world from — as a performer and listener ?

WOSNER:The cornerstones would be pretty obvious: Mahler, Debussy, Schoenberg, Bartok, Janacek, Ravel, Stravinsky certain Strauss, certain Prokofiev. I feel a strong personal attachment to Mahler’s music, which I grew up listening to a lot. From Debussy’s music I think one can learn infinitely about nuances, whether it is of sound, of agogics, of the interpretation of a composer’s markings, and so on. Later on, Ligeti, as well as music by the Canadian composer Claude Vivier. Improvisation also plays a part.

I don’t mean to count my own improvisation in the august company of these composers, but simply as an component of my own musical education that I feel has been very important to me. I used to improvise very often in certain styles and in free form with my teacher Andre Hajdu when I was growing up in Israel and still love doing it.

“[Wosner] chose an ambitious and well-conceived program. The Bach was delivered crisply, and with a brisk propulsive energy. The Schoenberg also had an impressive sweep as well as a vivid vocabulary of gestures…” The New York Times

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DOE: I’ve spent most of my working life in offices rather than recording studios, so when I’m involved in a recording project, it’s usually as executive producer. That means agreeing the repertoire with the artists, getting hold of a producer they trust, making sure the venue is suitable, getting the right piano there on time, and keeping the whole thing within budget. One of my first projects at iTunes an exclusive EP with John Williams and Yo-Yo Ma. I did a series of concerts and live recordings in retail stores around New York with a whole bunch of artists including Phillip Glass and Leif Ove Andsnes. I also organised a series of live recordings with the New York Phil and the LA Phil. One of them was nominated for a Grammy.

MANOFF: What is your musical background ?

Doe at Cabrillo Festival

DOE:I really loved music as a child, so I did a degree in performance. I got a scholarship and won a prize or two, but I don’t think I was born to be a performer. It’s tough to make a living as a French horn player. In the end, I decided to look for another way I could introduce people to the music I find so exciting. That’s what led me here. I still try to play in one really good thing a year. Last summer it was John Adams’ City Noir with the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra conducted by Marin Alsop. That was a blast.

MANOFF: Naxos leads the pack in recording American Composers –many who would never be heard were it not for your company. What are the future plans ? Not only for American Composers, but living composers around the world. Will you be looking for “break-out” composers –”unknowns” whose names have not reached the music culture as yet.

DOE:This commitment to new music is one of the things that most excited me about working at Naxos. There are hundreds of recordings in the American Classics series, and quite a few more in the pipeline, both from well-established composers and some less-well known. We’re always on the lookout for exciting new projects, but I don’t think it’s fair to describe any of the composers as “unknown”. They might not be very famous yet, and their music might not have been recorded before, but they all have a following. We just hope we can help to increase the audience for their music.

” [The] commitment to new music is one of the things that most excited me about working at Naxos” – Andy Doe

MANOFF: With the great market share of downloads, what is the future of the CD

DOE: I really wish I knew, because people keep asking me this question. The only sensible answer I can give is that I don’t know.

People are still pressing (and buying) vinyl so there’s a good chance that CDs will be around for at least another decade or two. Every physical format represents a compromise of playing time, sound quality, versatility, convenience, compatibility, portability and cost. The compact disc represents a pretty good compromise for most people.

“Every physical format represents a compromise of playing time, sound quality, versatility, convenience, compatibility, portability and cost. The compact disc represents a pretty good compromise for most people” —Andy Doe

MANOFF: Concerning downloads, what formats will be offered by Naxos ?

DOE: The difference between downloads and shellac, vinyl, tape, CD, SACD or Blu-Ray is that the download isn’t a medium – it’s a method of delivery that exists independently of the various formats for storing music.

This is great because it gives us the flexibility to deliver music in almost any format the consumer wants. Right now, you can get our music in lossless FLAC and AIFF formats from HDTracks.com, as 256kbps AAC files from iTunes, or as 320kbps MP3 files from Amazon and our own store, classicsonline.com. We’ll probably add FLAC support to classicsonline.com in the near future.

MANOFF: What are the possibilities at this point with surround sound in any format ? Aside from the SACD, is there a download future for home theater and computer playback, among others ?

DOE: Surround sound has been around for more than half a century, but it is still a developing technology. The home theater market is driving most of the development, and this is helping costs to fall as the quality goes up.

As far as we’re concerned, the best physical surround format on the market today is Blu-Ray, so that’s the format we used for John Corigliano’s Circus Maximus, a piece that places the audience very much in the middle of the action.

Right now, it’s difficult to download multichannel audio, not so much because it’s complicated to deliver, but because it’s complicated to play back, out of your computer, into six or more speakers. Some people have the hardware to do it, but most people are still figuring out how get two channels out of their PC in a way that sounds good.

We’ll get there, but the hardware isn’t widely accessible at present.

MANOFF: Will the growing interest in high-resolution downloads and audiophile equipment to play downloads beyond CD quality be important for Classical Music’s future markets ?

DOE: For us, it’s important not to overestimate the size of the high-resolution and surround sound markets. People didn’t stop buying CDs because they didn’t sound good enough, and SACD didn’t catch on, in part because not enough people wanted to buy them.

If CDs don’t sound good enough to you, it’s because you’re an outlier, at the very top end of the audiophile market. It’s a necessary feature of outliers that there aren’t very many of them.

Blu-Ray offers wonderful quality, but they cost more to manufacture than ordinary CDs.

In this context, high resolution downloads should be great for us, because they allow us to serve an important segment of the market without increasing the cost of pressing every copy. That, in turn, makes it economical for us to offer a greater range of products in high resolution.

Once the hardware is more widely available, I think we’ll see some serious growth in this sector.

” As far as we’re concerned, the best physical surround format on the market today is Blu-Ray” – Andy Doe

MANOFF: I have to admit that I have “CD fatigue.” I see so many, except for certain kinds of packages, it’s hard to even crack them open, much less find space for them in my house. I can’t imagine I’m the only one. How much will this perception become a market force ?

DOE: I used to be the same way. I worked in music retail for a really long time, and people would just send me CDs, hundreds of them every month. There was no way I could possibly listen to them all. Now I have to pay for music again, I see CDs as quite precious objects.

With sound recordings, the question of “value” is an interesting one. You can pay $50 – $150 to hear concert once in person, or you can have it delivered to your house, to keep forever, with all the mistakes edited out, for less than $10. The experience isn’t the same, of course, but is a concert really worth five to fifteen times as much?

The limiting factor here is supply, not demand. Concerts have to be expensive because the hall has a limited capacity. You can fit 2,804 people in Carnegie Hall. If we could only sell 2,804 copies of each album, we’d have to charge more for them, especially if we had to sell them all in one night.

“What I hear from composers …. is the hope that the digital marketplace will give them greater flexibility, not additional pressure ” — Andy Doe

MANOFF: One of the most culture-changing trends for Classical Music (in my mind) is the ability to download separate tracks. As one example : What will be the impact in the long run upon composers ? If you know that movements of a longer form may be detached from the whole, will composers offer shorter works ? A play list is an act of artistic creation by the consumer. But it may also present a completely new cultural mechanism for how recordings will be conceived. How will you handle this question for downloading ?

DOE: The track-at-a-time thing isn’t completely new. Until the long-playing record was introduced in 1948, classical recordings had only ever been sold as individual tracks because the 78rpm record and the pianola have such a limited playing time and dynamic range. Hindemith, Stravinsky and Milhaud all wrote music to fit these these constraints.

What I hear from composers, though, is the hope that the digital marketplace will give them greater flexibility, not additional pressure.

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God Shall Be Praised: Music From the Lüne Convent

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Reviewed on 5/13 by Tom Manoff on All Things Considered, Music from the Lüne Convent, an independent recording from Germany, reached the #1 position at Amazon.com overnight and remained there for several days.

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CLASSICAL MUSIC needed an injection of energy. Enter Gustavo Dudamel. Some critics see the Venezuelan Wunderkind as merely an over-hyped rookie. I see him as a ready-to-go, extraordinary talent. And a game-changer.

In April 2010, I saw the 29-year-old conductor lead a concert called Dudamel Conducts Bernstein and Lieberson, part of his America and Americans series.

Even before the sold -out concert, Disney Hall was whirring. Half the audience ranged from children to 40-somethings. Many spoke Spanish. As they gathered inside, people met for drinks or coffee, wandering the levels of the hall looking down at moving bodies, faces and outfits. And the mode of dress wasn’t Oscar Carpet—more edgy and artsy meets “I’m-a-musician -so- my -pants- aren’t -pressed. ” It was more like a theater audience than classical. Dudamel’s reputation as an audience- magnet is true. Listen up, folks. There were young people in the seats. They were cheering.

Mexican composer Carlos Chávez’s Toccatas for Percussion opened. Sometimes percussion pieces fail through lack of interesting interpretation beyond the score. But Dudamel brought this piece alive with something more than precision. Rhythmic gestures were imbued with character. The conductor and the players had a clear intent with each motive, pattern and timbre. Dudamel’s stick technique was precise. The rapport with his players was obvious. At the bows, I got my first taste of Dudamel’s onstage demeanor. Exciting, yes. Arrogant, no. He points to his players with genuine admiration and respect. He’s no phony, folks.

Peter Lieberson’s well-crafted and lovely Neruda Songs was well played if not well sung. While it’s unfair to expect a singer to match the original ( the work was dedicated to and sung by Lieberson’s wife, Lorrane Hunt Lieberson, who died a few years back), mezzo -soprano Kelley O-Connor’s interpretation was somewhat forced, an effort at lyricism rather than a genuine uprising from the soul.

The emerging message at this concert: Not only can Dudamel conduct contemporary music, its language and significance is a vital part of his musical life.

Leonard Bernstein’s Symphony No.2, The Age of Anxiety was the second half. Pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet played the part Bernstein wrote for himself. Like many of Lennie’s compositions, the vision isn’t completely matched by the result, especially the form. Even so, the music was ravishing and fresh-sounding. Thibaudet seemed outside his stylistic range. The sparsely voiced sections seemed plunky, the jazzy rhythms didn’t swing. At some points he was out-of-sync with the orchestra. No disaster. Dudamel and his players covered it and kept going. This orchestra has the Bernstein soul and sound. Even with problems from the soloist, the work was powerfully imagined and delivered. It was Lennie in all his magic and issues. It was American Music.

Adams and Dudamel

When I see long program notes from a composer, I don’t read them. I want to hear the music first, then the explanation. The title City Noir spoke plenty to me, hinting at film. The well- crafted work was raw and sweet, jazzy, energetic and wonderfully American. Obvious references to film music often hit my “cliche” button. But was that his intent ?

The orchestra writing is virtuosic. The L.A. players brought it off, working hard, but never out of breath. And Dudamel had it in his head, hands and soul. Audience response was wild, but not some pro forma ritual for a new work. The connection to the music was genuine. Adams is both complex and populist, which speaks to his talent and success.

The concerts offered something about composing these days. The Adams seemed substantial and powerful, the Lieberson well-crafted and emotionally nuanced, but it was the Bernstein that pierced through the historical crust and contemporary efforts that still vie for legitimacy in the steady shadows. Even a living genius is hard put to find pure light.

I’ve heard the Mahler too many times these past years. I may be in the minority, but I don’t think it’s the composer’s finest symphony. Hearing it countless times isn’t changing my mind.

Also on the Americas series that weekend was Osvaldo Golijov’s La Pasión según San Marcos, conducted by Maria Guinand.

Three days of concerts with only one work composed before 1900! And audience response throughout was thunderous delight. Demographics: Half at each concert ranged from children to 50-somethings. Any talk about contemporary music keeping audiences away is out the window. Gustavo Dudamel is showing what classical music must bring to the 21st century. Orchestras throughout the world are taking notice.

Dudamel in Venezuelan Colors

Critics everywhere are taking on Dudamel and L.A. with knives out. They’ve got their traditional ears looking for any kind of misstep. Fine. But there’s jealousy and resentment about this kid, especially in towns other than L.A..

Dudamel brings a new kind of conductor’s soul to the century. His natural affinity for contemporary music and much-needed cultural understanding of all the Americas will open and excite audiences. It’s no mistake that he conducts Bernstein and Adams so well.

He can be flashy. So what? Dudamel’s appeal is not just charisma; it’s that he’s not arrogant in it. He’s not some Messiah come to save classical music, but a game-changer and a populist who can stroll through classical music’s shrines with skill, affection and new energies. The diversity and youth of his audience, alone, has revved up my soul. Let’s go.

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