The board of the competition have made some wise and welcome changes to the requirements, which we all hope will encourage well-rounded and deep-thinking musicians to apply. The finals are now divided into two parts, one with the usual concerto with orchestra, and one in which the finalists play a major work of chamber music with the Brodsky Quartet in a public concert. They hope it will make everyone realise that accomplished pianists should be able to listen to others as well as to themselves. The winner of the previous competition in 2007, Tom Poster, is already a role model in this respect with his dual commitment to solo and chamber music.  Read the Glasgow Herald article here.

Herald article about SIPC is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

After so much bad weather here recently, with autumn seeming ever closer, the wind dropped today and the sun seemed to gather itself for one renewed effort on the last day of August. The bracken in the park has grown very tall, hiding the deer until a moment before you see them. The deer have grown big antlers. I was so pleased to snap this little beauty today.

Last roes of summer is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

This time last year I was in ecstasies about John Wilson’s MGM Musicals Prom, and if I wasn’t quite so bowled over this year it was only because the repertoire was restricted to the music of Rodgers and Hammerstein, which doesn’t strike me as quite so inventive. How can I say that, when their partnership was the most successful in the history of American musical theatre? Their songs are loved and have been effortlessly memorised by half the world. And yet to me the songs which Rodgers wrote with lyricist Lorenz Hart are more delicious and piquant than his work with Oscar Hammerstein. Rodgers and Hammerstein play with a straight bat, I feel. I like them for it, but occasionally I miss a bit of musical topspin.

Something Good is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

The cathedral was full of people quietly moving about, enjoying their opportunity to gaze at the intricately patterned floor. Yet though there was no more than a gentle murmur of appreciation, we were subjected every few minutes to a forceful announcement, ordering us to be silent. It blared out at incredible volume from loudspeakers on high, making everyone jump and destroying the very silence it was demanding.

It reminded me of my visit to the Sistine Chapel in Rome. When I picture that day, I still see us all cringing at the deafening exhortations to keep quiet. I love Italy and would go there every year if I could, but I can’t understand the Italian attitude to making people behave ‘with respect’, especially in places where they are already doing so instinctively.

Yelling for silence is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Searching for old Argentine tangos, I came across the heritage of Carlos Gardel, the  ‘king of tango’ whom I’m ashamed to say I didn’t know about before. On his Wikipedia page (which is fascinating in itself) there’s a sound clip of his 1935 tango ‘Por una Cabeza’. It instantly transports me far from present-day suburban London. It’s from a time and a culture quite different to mine, but through the power of music and Gardel’s enchanting voice I feel completely immersed as I listen.

Por una cabeza is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Seeing many such portraits gave me a slightly sad feeling, as if the artists had set themselves the goal of outdoing digital photography, of showing that the paintbrush is fully the equal of the zoom lens. It felt almost as if this quest had supplanted the wish to explore deeper, hidden aspects of the sitters. Many of the explanatory labels said that the artists ‘wanted to show’ that their subject was this or that, but for me there was a cool, blank feeling about many of the portraits, as though the immaculately painted surface was a barrier.

Art imitating photography is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

At the same time I always feel a surge of jealousy because you rarely see this kind of crowd gathered to listen to classical music. I can’t help feeling that the absence of amplification in classical music has something to do with it. Somehow, when music is quiet and played acoustically, people feel intimidated by having to be quiet themselves in order to hear it. When music is hugely amplified – as the foyer band was – people seem to relax and feel that they can move about and talk without distracting or competing with the musicians. To me there’s something perverse in feeling liberated by very loud music, but I realise I’m in the minority. I have never tried playing amplified classical music and would quite like to have the experience, to see what the effect would be on me and my listeners.

Relaxing into loud music is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Barbara Alex’s book is really a collection of Sebok’s wise sayings, elegantly displayed on the pages with the help of some imaginative typography. It’s rather like reading a collection of Zen proverbs, and indeed there are things in common between the two. ‘Play the contents and not the container’, Sebok said.  ‘Teaching freedom is a self-defeating thing, because one has to become free. That cannot be taught. It is the learner’s job.’ ‘Don’t concentrate, but rather be concentrated by the music.’ ‘To play louder, you must hear more.’ ‘You cannot play now and think later.’ ‘Music is understanding in action.’

Such remarks were great when they arose naturally in the course of a lesson, and were often said with a twinkle in the eye. When I read the isolated comments in the book, I can’t help wondering how they will strike people coming to them ‘cold’.  Will Sebok’s remarks, pinned to the page like rare butterflies, seem enlightening or tantalisingly enigmatic?

Words from a Master is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Anton Stadler’s clarinet is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Without the sound of a genuine Argentinian tango ensemble in my ear, I couldn’t make much sense of the piano part. I was very aware of the amount of information not contained in the printed notes. No instructions are given about the style of ‘attack’ or the type of sound required to conjure up the tango clubs of Buenos Aires. When you’ve heard this music played by experts, you know what’s needed, but what if you haven’t? Just playing what’s on the page, using Western classical technique, keeps you at arm’s length from the right sound. In particular, the amount of ‘oomph’ required, the degree of emphasis in the articulation, is something that you have to hear to believe. The composer doesn’t say a word about it in the score. No doubt he can hardly imagine that anyone wanting to play his tangos will be ignorant of how they’re supposed to go.

The experience has made me wonder about all the music I play from different centuries and different composers who no doubt thought that ‘the right way to do it’ was totally obvious – not realising that there would be times and places when people didn’t know, and wouldn’t be able to retrieve the information from the score alone.

Viva Piazzolla is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Right now I’m re-reading Flaubert’s ‘Madame Bovary’. The translator, Alan Russell, comments in his preface that Flaubert was an inveterate polisher of his prose, working for ages to create the right rhythm for his sentences. As Flaubert neared the end of ‘Madame Bovary’, he commented that he could hear ‘the fall of the phrases’ for pages ahead, before he actually had the words. As a musician, I find this quite haunting to imagine.

The fall of the phrases is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

People often say that kind of thing, and I never really understand the link between ‘I know the roads’ and ‘I whiz along.’ There are plenty of roads that I know well, too, but it doesn’t make any difference to how fast I drive, which is determined by other things, like traffic conditions.

It strikes me as a bit like saying, ‘I know the music well, so I play it faster.’

Knowing the roads is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

In the afternoon I felt suddenly very tired and lay down to listen to Radio 4’s Open Book programme. Tim Parks (author of ‘Teach Us to Sit Still’) was talking about his recovery from a strange illness a few years ago. He spoke about the healing role of meditation, and said that the experience of ‘letting go of words’ in meditation had profoundly changed his approach to writing. As he signed off, he quietly said something like, ‘It made me wonder whether narrative is actually a bit perverse, and somehow sick.’ This fascinating thought chimed mysteriously with what we were talking about in the morning.

Not telling a story is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

After the performance, Bob was talking about ‘the Russian crescendo’, a concept I hadn’t come across before. Stephen Hough, a supreme Rachmaninov interpreter, writes about it on his blog. Apparently the ‘Russian crescendo’ refers to Rachmaninov’s own piano playing style, in which he often eases off as a long crescendo reaches its climax. Bob said that this type of crescendo struck him as psychologically truer than a simple, inflexible ‘getting louder’. He compared it to climbing a mountain where, when you realize that you’re about to reach the top and see a wonderful view, you instinctively slow down, notice your surroundings and step gently onto the summit rather than pressing on relentlessly with no alteration in your pace. An inspiring image!

Russian Crescendo is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

The following night we stayed home and watched the second Prom, this time on television. The marvellous Bryn Terfel was singing the role of Hans Sachs in Wagner’s ‘Meistersinger’. It was far easier to hear and see properly, and because of the BBC’s recording skills we almost forgot that the performance was being relayed from the very same hall whose acoustics we had deprecated the day before. Without television, we would have missed the play of emotions on Terfel’s expressive face and the fascinating detail of his singing. How ironic that a televised performance should be more satisfying than a live one!

The Proms: live v. televised is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Independent review of new music books is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

The draw closes on the 9th August, so if you’re interested, click the link above and have a go.

Win a free copy of Out of Silence is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

another oldie

Richard Osborne devotes a large part of his Music column in ‘The Oldie’ magazine (Summer 2010) to my new book. As I don’t have a picture of the magazine I’ve chosen instead an illustration of an real oldie, one of the 700-year-old oaks in Richmond Park.

Richard Osborne writes in The Oldie: ‘Pianist and five-star essayist Susan Tomes … The twelve months [of Out of Silence] deliver twelve chapters each containing nine or ten short essays. Some are prompted by a concert or an event; others are simply serendipity, such as the delightful ‘In Praise of Idleness’, inspired by a Bertrand Russell volume discovered in a charity shop. For a parent with a musically gifted child the collection is essential reading.’

The Oldie magazine review is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

Britten seemed preoccupied and worried. Dame Fanny asked him, ‘Why are you so worried? The notes of the piano part aren’t particularly difficult.’ Britten answered, ‘My dear, it is because there are so few notes on the page that I’m worried. I have to conjure up a whole world of sound.’ What a wise answer!

So few notes is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog

I cringed through a 1967 BBC clip of Austrian-born musicologist Hans Keller interviewing Roger Waters and Syd Barrett of Pink Floyd. Keller, cigarette in hand, pontificating in his crisp Viennese-flavoured English, pointed out to viewers that Pink Floyd’s music was repetitive, extremely loud, and that he was ‘perhaps too much of a musician to enjoy it’, a damning remark if ever there was one.

If this was hard to watch, so were Waters and Barrett as they smirked through their replies. I disliked both sides yet identified with them both. I remembered how it felt to be a teenager, proud of my generation’s music. But I also agreed with Hans Keller. Though I disliked his superior manner, I suspect I would have agreed with his observations even as a teenager. And I found it admirable that he was willing to make himself unpopular and stand up for his views, unlike today’s media-trained presenters, so desperate to appear non-judgmental.

Aging rockers is a post from the Susan Tomes: Pianist & writer blog