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Bruce Brubaker on all things piano

“Gifted”

June 26, 2023 by Bruce Brubaker

In the world of music conservatories, in the classical music community, exceptional musical talent is usually considered to be the ability to quickly recognize pitches by ear, the possession of reliable musical memory, and the athleticism and dexterity to navigate complex patterns on an instrument. We have not considered imagination, or artistic idea-making. Perhaps these are difficult to recognize? Perhaps it’s assumed that with fine skills will come insight and artistic comprehension?

Conservatories have focused on “how” an instrument is played. Not much attention is given to what this may represent, or to why a person does it at all. Perhaps conservatory training is for practitioners — but not really for artists?

In some institutions, making music and thinking about music are completely separated. Arriving at a distinguished music research institution in Belgium, my requests for a practice room were met with puzzlement. “There are no pianos or keyboards here…,” I was told. 

Then, there was the coy remark of Leonard Bernstein, regarding the music department at Harvard (perhaps not applicable to a very different group of faculty and students at Harvard University today): “Harvard, the place where music is seen, but never heard.”

Without conceptual or cultural education, a musician may drift. 

There are extraordinarily “gifted” musicians who use their abilities intuitively. The results can be wonderful; and yet, these musicians may have difficulty finding a path for development. The language we use is perplexing. After a recital at Alice Tully Hall, a distinguished colleague complimented the 29-year-old me: “You are so gifted.” I thought it was strange praise for a hard-working adult…

Today, I’m troubled listening to some recordings by the piano legend Arthur Rubinstein. By accounts, Rubinstein had the excellent ear and remarkable musical memory that defined a “gifted” musician. There can be a fantastic ebullience in his playing.

Listen to the recording of Albeniz’ Triana made in 1931, or Rubinstein’s fanciful, flawed (?), levitational playing of Chopin’s Barcarolle in 1928. But Rubinstein’s own remarks echo in my mind. In recounting his search for a teacher in Berlin, decades later Rubinstein wrote: “To my misfortune, the great Busoni was away on a concert tour, a fact I still deeply regret.” And writing of Ferruccio Busoni in his published memoirs, Rubinstein said: “He was the one person who might have oriented my talent in a better direction — a man with a broad view, both artistically and culturally, a genuinely great human being.”

And what might Busoni have done? Would he have encouraged a student in critical thinking? Would he have guided a student away from the standard repertoire of the time? Would Busoni have helped Rubinstein to understand his own talent? Would Rubinstein have become a composer?

Of course, there are other views. Cornelius Cardew’s Scratch Orchestra tried to tap the music that’s inside the musically untrained, even the “untalented.” The conventional acquisition of virtuosity on an instrument can’t be dissociated from privilege. And let’s admit that evaluations of musical talent can be culturally biased, or exclusionary. 

As music-making entered higher education, various attempts have been made to combine musical doing and thinking. Doctor of Musical Arts degree programs in American conservatories and universities admit accomplished performers and aim to strengthen their analytical, critical, and artistic apparatus. It can work. 

Strangely the teaching of one-on-one music lessons in elite institutions of higher learning continues to rely on approximation: bromides, platitudes, recipes. For how much longer? Can’t we do more to help the “gifted”?

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Arthur, Arthur Rubinstein, Artur, Busoni, Doctor of Musical Arts, doctoral programs, doctorate, Ferruccio, Ferruccio Busoni, Harvard, Harvard University, memory, music education, music teaching, musical performance, musical talent, New England Conservatory, perfect pitch, piano teaching, Rubinstein, talent, teaching, technique, virtuosity

Comments

  1. Steve says

    July 9, 2023 at 8:11 pm

    I think of Yale — and you are right. Can it not be better?

Bruce Brubaker

Recordings like the new American piano music albums I make for ECM, InFiné, Bedroom Community, and Arabesque reach millions of listeners, and break through some old divisions of high culture/pop, or art/entertainment. My fans are listening to Billie Eilish, The Weeknd — even the occasional Mozart track! Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube are allowing music lovers to discover music they could not have found so easily before. Live performances begin to reflect what’s happening online. My performances occur in classical venues like the Philharmonie in Paris, the Barbican in London, at La Roque d’Anthéron, at festivals such as Barcelona’s Sónar and Nuits Sonores in Brussels, and such nightclubs as New York’s (le) Poisson Rouge. Read More…

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PianoMorphosis

Music is changing. Society's changing. Pianists, and piano music, and piano playing are changing too. That's PianoMorphosis. But we're not only reacting... From the piano -- at the piano, around the piano -- we are agents of change. We affect … [Read More...]

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“Glassforms” with Max Cooper at Sónar

“Glass Etude” on YouTube

demi-cadratin review of Brubaker solo concert at La Roque d’Anthéron

“Classical music dead? Nico Muhly proves it isn’t” — The Telegraph‘s Lucy Jones on my Drones & Piano EP

Bachtrack review of Brubaker all-Glass concert

“Brubaker recital proves eclectic, hypnotic, and timeless” — Harlow Robinson’s Boston Globe review of my Jordan Hall recital

“Simulcast” with Francesco Tristano on Arte

Bruce Brubaker hosts 4 weeks of “Hammered!” on WQXR — “Something Borrowed,” “Drone,” “Portal,” “The Raw and the Cooked”

“Onstage, a grand piano and an iPod” — David Weininger’s story with video by Dina Rudick

“Bruce Brubaker on Breaking Down Boundaries” — extensive audio interview at PittsburghNewMusicNet.com

“Heavy on the Ivories” — Andrea Shea’s story for WBUR about Bruce Brubaker’s performances and recording of “The Time Curve Preludes” by William Duckworth

“Feeding Those Young and Curious Listeners” — Anthony Tommasini in The New York Times on the first anniversary of the Poisson Rouge

“The Jewel in the Fish” — Harry Rolnick on Bruce Brubaker at the Poisson Rouge

“The Post-Postmodern Pianist” — Damian Da Costa profiles Bruce Brubaker in The New York Observer

Bruce Brubaker questioned at NewYorkPianist.net

“Finding the keys to the heart of Jordan Hall” — Joan Anderman in the Boston Globe on the search for a new concert grand piano

“Hearing and Seeing” — Philip Glass speaks with Bruce Brubaker and Jon Magnussen, Princeton, Institute for Advanced Study

Bruce Brubaker about Messiaen’s bird music, NPR, “Here and Now”

“I Hear America: Gunther Schuller at 80” — notes and programs for concert series, New England Conservatory, Harvard University, Boston Symphony Orchestra

“A Conversation That Never Occurred About the Irene Diamond Concert,” Juilliard Journal

Bruce Brubaker plays music by Alvin Curran at (le) Poisson Rouge

Bruce Brubaker

Recordings such the new American piano music albums I make for ECM, InFiné, and Arabesque reach many listeners, and seem to break through some old divisions of high culture/pop, or art/entertainment. My fans are listening to Cardi B, Childish Gambino, Ariana Grande — even the occasional Mozart track! Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube are allowing music lovers to discover music they could not have encountered so easily in the past. Live performances begin to reflect what’s happening online: this year I play at the International Piano Festival at La Roque d’Anthéron, traditional concert venues in Los Angeles, and Boston — as well as nightclubs in Berlin, Hamburg, Paris, Lyon, Geneva, and New York’s (le) Poisson Rouge.

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