Don’t throw away your artistic license

I recently presented a virtual masterclass for the Aspen Music Festival trumpet studio. Since we weren’t able to meet together in the beautiful mountains of Colorado, we connected from our living rooms via Zoom. I’d like to share one of the thoughts that I presented to the class here:

I’ll begin with a story about a situation that I have experienced in nearly every orchestra in which I have played. It goes something like this: in the middle of rehearsal, just after playing through a section that features a lovely brass chorale, the conductor stops the orchestra. He beckons to the brass (whom he usually ignores), and, in a thick and nearly indecipherable German accent, he requests that the sound of the brass come forth like the first rays of sunshine glancing into the dawn sky, peeking tentatively from behind the tops of the forest. He asks for the sound to have a misty quality imbued with a sparkle of glimmer off the morning dew. He might go on to tell a story about morning walks from his childhood in Bavaria, and how he believes the composer may have spent time in those same mystic woods. This is the sound he wants from the brass. After an awkward silence with sideways glances among the members of the brass section, someone under his breath mutters, “So, do you want it softer or louder?” Chuckles and foot shuffles ensue, and the brass repeat the section more or less just as they did before.

It can be infuriating to try to please a seemingly aloof conductor who has musical ideas that seem so out of touch with the technical realities of playing a brass instrument. However, it is our duty as musicians and artists to try. Otherwise, we hand over our artistic license. We must function as advocates, bridging our unique musical voices and personalities with a conductor’s vision and a composer’s intent. Too often though, we seem content to function on a much lower artistic level, listening only for specific instructions like faster, slower, louder, softer, smoother, shorter, more accented, etc. If our goal as musicians is to transport and affect audience members, we must collectively create musical expression that paints a vivid picture and tells a compelling story. We must be willing to think (and talk) in more imaginative language. A brass section will sound more coalesced and convincing when all members strive toward uniformity of expression. Hans Christian Andersen said, “where words fail, music speaks.” If this is true, then the closest we can come to describing a desired sound is to speak in terms of image, story, and emotion. I don’t fault a conductor for speaking in those terms. I appreciate the trust a conductor places in his or her musicians by allowing us to turn those (sometimes overwrought and convoluted) images into sound. That trust allows us to retain our artistic license.

Do you grant yourself enough trust to use your artistic license in the practice room?