(Originally posted in February 2010)<\/p>\n
Sometimes people ask me if I like any Bach performances on the modern instruments.\u00a0 Somehow they expect me to say \u2018no,\u2019 but my answer is actually \u2018yes,\u2019 with an asterisk.<\/p>\n
Those people who expected me to say \u2018no\u2019 might have heard me lightly criticize modern performances on some occasions.. I don\u2019t deny I do that sometimes.\u00a0 But when I did that, I must have had no expectation as to what I was going to hear.\u00a0 When I hear the metal string sound from the high-tension turbo-charged modern violin with a continuous vibrato playing Bach, out of the blue, I may get a bit displeased.\u00a0 But certainly that doesn\u2019t mean that I don\u2019t appreciate Bach performances on the modern instruments.<\/p>\n
I like the sound of gut strings, indeed I do.\u00a0 And I know many modern players admit that they too like the gut sound; just that they think gut strings are often less practical.\u00a0 You have to keep metal-wound gut strings in a long tube (some new instrument cases don\u2019t even accommodate gut tubes anymore).\u00a0 They are too unstable when you don\u2019t have the time to let your strings acclimate to the humidity.\u00a0 Some say they can\u2019t play as loud on gut as metal strings.\u00a0 But the consequence of using metal strings is the lack of warmth when played without vibrato (I think I can prove this by using the audio spectrum analyzing software like Audio Xplorer; it shows that a gut string produces more overtones and distributes them more richly) \u2014\u2014 we all are told to avoid playing on open strings, and to let the vibrato dictate the intensity and character of the tone.\u00a0 But when you let the gut-strung instrument speak honestly with less tone-tampering from your left fingers (here the concept is \u2018allowing\u2019 the instrument to speak, not \u2018forcing\u2019 it to speak), the sound is heartwarmingly rich and sweet to me.\u00a0 And in this case, the \u2018shape\u2019 of a note, executed naturally with your bow hand, would dictate the intensity and character of the tone.<\/p>\n
The winds\u2019 cases are simpler.\u00a0 The sounds of baroque oboes, flutes and bassoons are just undeniably different from their modern counterparts\u2019.\u00a0 Also the baroque wind players are typically and hopefully more mindful of the shapes of the notes, and they are (thankfully) out of the curse of the constant vibrato, as we period string instrumentalists are.\u00a0 I really like the way baroque winds sound in Bach.<\/p>\n
So far I sound like I don\u2019t appreciate Bach on the modern instruments… Now let me get to my point.<\/p>\n
I do prefer the sound of the period instruments and stylistic execution of their players, but what makes you enjoy a performance does not necessarily depend on the sound itself.\u00a0 I love it when my modern instrumentalist friends play Bach.\u00a0 I love it when I hear kids play Bach.\u00a0 I love it when a modern player comes to me and asks my thoughts on playing Bach.\u00a0 I absolutely respect those modern players who give a lot of thoughts into playing Bach.\u00a0 And when I hear the players\u2019 respect for the composer in their performances, I\u2019m smiling.\u00a0 When I sense that they bring the right kind of hearts to the music, I\u2019m ecstatic.\u00a0 : )<\/p>\n
…Sadly I have little patience with the professional modern players who don\u2019t respect Bach\u2019s works and their context and, also with period instrumentalists who rely too much on their musical intuitions.\u00a0 Bach deserves more than that.<\/p>\n
A quick postscript: I did say I like the sounds of the baroque instruments, but that isn\u2019t the main reason why I study the baroque instruments and why I am going to organize my own professional period instrument ensemble to do Bach.\u00a0 When I direct a Bach cantata, I want it to serve its purpose, and in order to make it work, we need the right tools for the job \u2014 and I think the baroque instruments are the right (and easier) tools to make it work.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
(Originally posted in February 2010) Sometimes people ask me if I like any Bach performances on the modern instruments.\u00a0 Somehow they expect me to say \u2018no,\u2019 but my answer is actually \u2018yes,\u2019 with an asterisk. Those people who expected me to say \u2018no\u2019 might have heard me lightly criticize modern performances on some occasions.. I don\u2019t deny I do that sometimes.\u00a0 But when I did that, I must have had no expectation as to what I was going to hear.\u00a0 When I hear the metal string sound from the high-tension turbo-charged modern violin with a continuous vibrato playing Bach, out of the blue, I may get a bit displeased.\u00a0 But […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,15,5],"tags":[55,83,112],"class_list":["post-74","post","type-post","status-publish","format-gallery","hentry","category-bach","category-early-music","category-essays","tag-gut-strings","tag-period-instruments","tag-vibrato","post_format-post-format-gallery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bachpeople.com\/jp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}