I got the chance to play principal horn on Beethoven's 7th Symphony with the UWM Symphony Orchestra a couple weeks ago. I learned a lot from the experience, and had a lot of fun, especially because of the fact that I had a good second horn. I wish I could've played it better, but I know it wasn't terrible, by any means. Now the orchestra is working on Tchaikovsky's 5th Symphony, and again I'm principal. I've got a lot to say about that piece, but I'll save it for another blog.
What I wanted to talk about with this entry is my philosophies in music. What do I mean by that? Well, basically how I go about the whole "music business", and what I do and what I believe that help guide me along. Now, believe me, these philosophies of mine aren't the "right" way to do things, and I'm not trying to convince anyone of anything. I just want to share my philosophies on performing, teaching & composing...partly because it's my blog and I'll write whatever I want, darn it! But also because I've known a few professors who have presented their philosophies to students, and as someone who would like to be a college professor someday, I feel it would be a good thing to have written down. Of course, some of this may change over time, as it has thus far.
I'm basing these philosophies off of my experiences as well as from my teachers' teachings, most notably Greg Flint and Jeff Snedeker. Again, I'm not trying to convince people with this. One thing I've learned is that there's not one right way to do things (accept for what's on the sheet music). So, my philosophies may not be technically "right". You may not even agree with them. No problem. People disagree. It's what we do.
Performance Philosophy
When it comes to performance, which is my most favorite thing to do in music, I stick by two mottos that have served me well.
Be ready for anything. Like I said, there's no one way to do things, short of playing what's on the page (and, of course, you have to be ready for anything in the sense of what could potentially be on the page). The way one horn player plays the Tchaik 5 solo is different from how another does. There are so many different ways to play music that when you're in an ensemble, you have to be ready to play it in any sort of way. You may be playing under a principal player who doesn't play this passage as loud as you did when you played it last, or you may be in a brass quintet that tunes a little differently than the wind ensemble does. Or, you may have a conductor that takes the tempo of something way faster that you've ever played something. That's why I try to be ready for anything and everything. I try to be ready for anything that falls onto the music stand in front of me, and I try to be ready for how things are played around me. It's not an easy task, and I'm not the best at it. But, being ready for anything to happen has made performing a lot less stressful.
It's not about what you say, but rather how you play. This mainly applies to prinicpal horn playing, since I've done quite a lot of it. I am a firm believer in the saying, "The best principal players never speak to their section". Whenever I play principal, I usually don't say anything to them (short of small talk) unless it's absolutely necessary. Instead, I convey all my thoughts through the bell of my horn. Leading by example is definitely my preferred way to go. I could say stuff all I want to them, but aside from irritating them by giving constant orders (with resulting arguments and contempt), I could still fail to make things clear to my section by speaking to them. Since performance is all about playing your instrument rather than talking, doesn't it just make sense to communicate less verbally and more with the horn? Aside from principal playing, I try to refrain from talking about my abilities to play horn, since it doesn't usually matter what I say about my playing. It's the playing that matters, and no matter if I'm on the concert stage or in the rehearsal room, I aim to "walk the walk" rather than "talk the talk".
Aside from these mottos, I always just try to remember why I went into the field of music as a career. It's because I just love to do it. I just love to play horn, and to hear music. I don't care what I'm playing, as long as I'm playing my horn. I try not to let disagreements with other people get in the way of my enjoyment to playing music. I truly love my job, and nothing is going to change that.
Teaching Philosophy
The single most important thought that I have in my mind whenever I teach is to be patient with my students. I've taught mostly middle school students in my career, but I believe that patience applies to all ages. I never want to give my students the impression that they're direly falling behind. If I feel they're not progressing as well as they should be, I tell them that if they want to improve quicker, they gotta put more effort into this. Keyword: quicker. They'll always be improving, no matter what, and I always remind them that they are. But students take lessons so that they can improve quicker than they normally would without regular individual instruction. So when I feel they're behind, I remind myself to be patient, and try to highlight the improvement that is happening.
The most effective teaching method, in my opinion, relates to my performance philosophy, and that teaching method is modeling. What better way to get your students to play the music the way you're trying to get them to play it than to play it for them? I'm so lousy with words, anyways. It so much easier for me just to show them with my horn how do things, such as how the melody goes, which articulations to use, and which dynamics to use. The most important thing about modeling is that it give them a tone quality to strive to. Now, I'm not saying that my tone quality is the best (because it definitely isn't), but it is good, or good enough, to demonstrate. The younger students, in particular, need to hear the tone of an experienced player for their sounds to develop.
Relating to that, I encourage my students, young and old, to listen to recordings of great horn players. I encourage them not only to listen to horn solos, but chamber music with horns in it, as well as orchestra music. A lot of my growth as a musician has come from listening to recordings.
I know that my teaching philosophy will grow and expand as I do it more, but I haven't done as much teaching as I have performing or composing, so I'll leave it at that right now.
Composition Philosophy
My philosophy on composition is to write music that people enjoy listening to. There are so many composers out there that are trying to create music that sounds totally different from anything else, and focusing mainly on writing music that they like to hear. Of course, a composer has to like what they write (or should) to a certain degree. But realistically, to be successful as a composer, a composer's music has to be liked by other people. I compose more in the traditional style than most other composers nowadays, but I do that not only because I like that kind of music, but because the general public likes it to. I haven't heard atonal music being played on the radio often or at professional symphony orchestra concerts.
Remember, I'm not trying to be "right" here. I'm just stating what I've observed.
I believe that composers nowadays should be focused on writing music that is not only interesting to themselves and the musicians that play it (and fun to play for them, too), but especially to the audiences that listen to it. A composer can write whatever they want and still be successful, but only if they do it in a way that captivates the audience. If audiences like what one does, then they want to hear more, and thus ensembles will program it more. Look at John Mackey. He's created a really interesting voice with his wind band literature that he's written, not only making it fun for the musicians to play but also fun to listen to for the general public. Because of that, his music is programmed a lot. I've already played 5 pieces of his in the last several years. There ya go.
So I strive to make my music liked by more than just myself or a few musician friends. The cool thing is that through this I still have developed my compositional voice (or so I'm told), at the same time paying homage to some of my favorite composers by writing passages of a similar style. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. In history, that's been repeated countless times.
So there ya go. My philosophies as of now. Thanks for reading through them. Now you have more of an idea of how my mind works as a musician (not that you really care). I just wanted to share that, and that's fine if you don't agree or think I'm wrong. You wouldn't be the first one!
Ah, the joys of being human...
Take care, and as always, value music.