THE WAY OF PIANO • MIND • BODY • SOUL
Written by ANDREW EALES
The acclaimed musician, philosopher and writer Stephen Nachmanovitch writes, in his seminal book Free Play (1990):
“There is something energising and challenging about being one-to-one with the audience and creating a piece of work that has both the freshness of the fleeting moment and, when everything is working, the structural tautness and symmetry of a living organism. It can be a remarkable and often moving experience in direct communication.”
Nachmanovitch‘s comments ring true whether, like him, we improvise in front of an audience, or perform the great masterpieces of the classical repertoire, recreating and interpreting them for a live audience, alert to the singularity of the moment and its potential for connection.
It’s a simple, honest, profound truth that musicians and music-lovers the world over all understand. Live performances can be a remarkable and often moving experience in direct communication.
Practical challenges
In recent years, while live music continues to thrive in some areas, it faces significant threats and challenges in many others. There are a number of reasons for this:
- A decline in the musical health of many schools has led to a reduction in the quantity and quality of performing opportunity.
- Putting on a studio recital now requires added planning, a risk assessment, more staff, communication and marketing.
- It is becoming more expensive and difficult to find and book suitable local venues, especially with a good piano.
- Many venues prefer not to host live music due to concerns about traffic and parking, noise, safeguarding, performing and other licensing laws.
- Even music exam boards are increasingly moving away from a live performance model towards a video recorded assessment, even for professional performing diplomas.
Those pushing through specific changes may not understand their cumulative effect, or realise that their decisions are contributing to a wider decline in live performance and shared music-making.
But those who appreciate the value of live music, and who are struggling with the consequences and mounting impact of these changes in their own community, will share deepening concerns.
I am not unsympathetic to the point that venue and theatre managers, head teachers and exam boards have to juggle numerous competing concerns. Of course we all have bills to pay, and many interests and groups to please. But let’s not forget that live performance is worth supporting for its intrinsic social value, community benefit, and cultural importance.
Learning the art of performing
Experienced performers of all backgrounds and genres recognise, with Nachmanovitch, that the two-way, shared exchange between musician and audience is one of the most thrilling and pivotal elements of our art.
But the confidence to perform to an audience isn’t conjured overnight. We need to provide plenty of occasion for learners to develop the art of performance if we want to ensure that live music continues to prosper.
I believe that the whole music education community has a shared responsibility to support, foster and make space for live music-making at all levels, in a dizzyingly creative multiplicity of forms, and however we can.
Let’s redouble our efforts to organise performance opportunities, creating positive, non-competitive events at which musicians of all ages and ability levels can develop self-assurance, composure, enjoy listening and playing to one another, and share their music with friends and family.
A performance is fundamentally a social experience, a shared emotion, a magical moment in time. Learning the art of performing involves developing our powers of direct communication.
Stephen Nachmanovitch reminds us that when people come together to make, share, and experience live music in this way, powerful things can happen.
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