Rotterdam Conservatory Interview ---> click here
Interview with Laura Hartenberger ---> click here
Interview with Susan Conkling ---> click here
Subject: A request from Rotterdam Conservatory Percussion Dept. Students
Dear Ozgu Bulut & Martijn Krijnen,
In October 2000, I had the pleasure of visiting your beautiful Conservatory in Rotterdam with my friend, Peter Prommel. I was a jurist in Eindhoven for the Tromp Muziek Biënnale Percussion Competition. I also enjoyed meeting and working with Willem Vos (from Rotterdam). So, I feel some sense of connection with you and your colleagues at the Conservatory. I will do my best to answer your questions.
Dear NEXUS,
We, students of the Rotterdam Conservatory Percussion Department in Holland, are preparing a presentation about "The Percussion Ensembles Worldwide" on request of our teachers, Mr.Richard Jansen(Amsterdam Percussion Ensemble); Mr.Hans Leenders (Rotterdam Philharmony Orchestra) and Mr.Chris Leenders (Residential Orchestra - The Hague), as a thesis so as to improve our knowledge. We have already collected some information about your ensemble, however we also need your personal opinion(s) on some questions listed below. This mail will be sent also to some other percussion ensembles.
Q: What are the aspects that make you "an ensemble"?
A: Our sense of ensemble is derived from: 1) our friendship in the beginning (and now too), and our shared experiences over 30-years of NEXUS concerts around the world; 2) our common love of classical music (especially orchestral music), world music and percussion music;
Q: The common belief(s) that keep you together?
A: 1) Three of us shared the same teachers from the Philadelphia Orchestra in the1960s - Fred (Dan) Hinger and Alan Abel.
2) Three of us shared the same teacher at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY - William G. Street, (who was also the teacher of Hinger and Abel).
3) All of us performed in various orchestras together BEFORE NEXUS was formed.
4) We shared similar ideas about what was "beautiful" in music.
5) We shared similar ideas about what sounds we like to hear from percussion instruments.
Q: The main aspects that make you different from others?
A: 1) Our repertoire - We have a balanced repertoire:
* improvised music,
* composed pieces in a "contemporary" classical style,
* composed pieces by NEXUS members,
* novelty ragtime xylophone music from the 1920s and 1930s,
* West African music which we have learned from our African teacher(s),
* Orchestral music featuring percussion, including our own compositions.
Q: How do you make decisions concerning your ensemble?
A: Decisions are made by voting after we have discussed the issue; the majority usually decides.
Q: To play at at concert or not?
A: Majority vote, but only if there are no personal schedule conflicts.
Q: To play a piece or not?
A: Majority vote, but we have come to realize that if only one person is not completely committed to a piece, the quality will ultimately suffer.
Q: Who will be the extra player (if needed) for the coming project,etc.?
A: We have a small group of very close friends and students in the percussion world. Usually, it will be from this group.
Q: What kind of pieces do you usually choose for your repertoire and why?
A: Our repertoire is made up of music that we like. Generally, we don't play pieces we don't like. We do not feel an obligation to play music that doesn't touch us in some way, because if the music doesn't touch us, it becomes almost impossible for us to touch audiences. Also, NEXUS does not survive solely because of government support; we must make positive connections with paying audiences, who make it possible for us to do what we love. Many, if not most, of the people at NEXUS concerts have never heard a percussion ensemble before in their lives. While not every piece in our repertoire is easy for unsophisticated audiences to appreciate, we have tried to make our programs balanced, so that audiences can find something in almost every NEXUS concert to appreciate.
Q: Do you also make transcriptions for playing at a concert?
A: Generally, NEXUS does not perform transcriptions of pieces for other kinds of instruments and ensembles. One exception would be the arrangements of novelty ragtime xylophone music, much of which was originally composed for xylophone and piano.
Q: How often do you prepare new pieces?
A: NEXUS prepares one or two new pieces each year. The concert repertoire gradually evolves over time, with new pieces gradually replacing old ones in the repertoire. Because of the difficulty of finding rehearsal time, and because of the problems associated with making percussion set-ups (especially big set-ups), and because our instruments are frequently not available due to touring, or other use by individual members of NEXUS, it is very hard to prepare new pieces. NEXUS is different from many other ensembles in that we usually want to know a composer personally, before we commit to learning a piece by that composer. Also, because of the uniqueness of our instrument collection, we want the composer to know our instruments as much as possible. I do not remember even one instance where NEXUS has prepared a piece that was sent to us unsolicited by a composer.
Q: What were your greatest highlights - the peakpoints you have reached until now?
A: Some of the high points were:
1) performance of the Takemitsu piece, "From me flows what you call Time" with the Boston Symphony and Seiji Ozawa in 1990 at Carnegie Hall in New York City. The piece was composed for NEXUS by Takemitsu, who was a good friend of NEXUS over many years.
2) the world tour in 1984 - China, Korea, Japan, United States, Canada, England, France, The Netherlands, Denmark, Germany.
3) performances with some of the world's greatest orchestras: New York Philharmonic, Japan Philharmonic, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Hannover Radio Philharmonic, National Symphony Orchestra (Washington, D.C.).
Q: What is your opinion about today's percussion world and ensembles?
A: In general, the technical abilities of percussion performers have greatly increased worldwide. My observation is that there is much more attention being given to technical thinking about music than is being given to individual expression. I think that many musicians are in danger of thinking about music as some kind of competition - the goal being to be faster or more complex than everyone else. For me, music performance is about being whoever you uniquely are. I agree with Bela Bartok, the great Hungarian composer, who said, "Competition is for horses, not artists."
Q: What are your plans for the future?
A: I hope NEXUS will be able to help young percussionists by becoming more involved in residencies, workshops, and masterclasses at music schools and colleges. NEXUS is also planning to commission more pieces for percussion ensemble and orchestra.
Q: Your advise(s) to young percussionists?
A: 1) find a good teacher - one who motivates you and with whom you enjoy being;
2) find the time to go to concerts, especially by performers who play the kind of music to which you aspire;
3) as soon as possible, go where the kind of music you aspire to is being performed regularly, and insert yourself into that network so that you know the network and the network knows you;
4) every time you perform, consider it to be the most important thing in your life. Do your best to make it as good as you can make it for the listeners;
5) try to keep music-making fun - always remember what it was about music that you liked when you first started to play;
6) listen to your colleagues, to audiences, to managers, to students, to everyone until you clearly understand what they are saying; then decide what is best for you to do.
Bill Cahn / NEXUS back to Top of Page--->
Interview with Laura Hartenberger
(10th Grade Student at the Oakwood Collegiate School in Toronto - November 2000)
Q. What is a regular day like in your life? What sort of daily activities does your job involve?
A. My daily activities have changed quite a bit over the years. Every day is unique and different in some way. Today, November 28, 2000 is a typical day, for example. After waking at 7:00 AM, and after an hour of the usual morning personal hygiene, my work day begins with an hour (or more) on the computer responding to emails. This morning there are two orders for NEXUS CDs in the email pile, so each will take about 15 to 20 minutes to prepare - gather the CDs, prepare invoices and mailing labels, package the CDs for mailing, take them to the post office, and lastly, enter the information in my computer for accounting.
Other email responses have to do with a combination of personal projects (I am planning for a residence at the Banff Centre for Management in June 2001), NEXUS projects (NEXUS is working on several new commissions with important composers to create new pieces of music), and projects involving my work on the Board of Directors of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra (mostly having to do with the Orchestra's significant educational activities in Rochester - 58 concerts and over 360 other related community education events each season).
At 10:00 today, I will drive to the Rochester Philharmonic Office where I will prepare materials to be mailed to the 24 members of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra's Education and Outreach Council, of which I am the Council Chair, which means I help to organize the Council's activities in overseeing all of the Orchestra's education programs.. The materials need to be copied, stuffed in envelopes, and mailed to the Council members before the monthly meeting next week.
At noon I will be having a business lunch with the Orchestra's Education Director, during which we will be discussing various topics related to the education programs.
After lunch I will return to the Orchestra's office to plan for the Rochester Philharmonic League's Young Artist Awards Auditions, which will be held in March 2001. These are cash awards to high school instrumentalists, and vocalists, who audition before a panel of judges. Some award recipients will have a chance to perform a concerto with the Rochester Philharmonic. I was asked to be the Chair this year, and the responsibilities will include preparing announcement forms, organizing volunteers, selecting judges, and generally overseeing the entire process.
In the afternoon I will return to my home computer to work on various commitments I have under way (for example, writing articles on music, preparing materials for the Banff residency, or sending correspondence to colleagues in the music field). On the way home I will take care of some daily errands (mailing at the post office, grocery shopping, banking, etc.). Also, when I get home, I use this time to respond to telephone messages and faxes I have received during the day.
The mail usually arrives in the mid-afternoon, and it usually involves an hour (or more) to sort through and file, so that I can respond later. For example, there may be various requests regarding NEXUS CDs or my publishing business which need attention - forms from the American Federation of Musicians (the musician's union), the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, or the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada. There may also be orders for CDs or music which I publish.
At 5:00 PM I usually try to take about an hour to read the newspapers, local and national, before dinner.
After dinner, I usually finish up on the day's activities, involving an hour (or more) on the computer. Then with personal time remaining I will work on my own projects, usually involving composing or arranging music. Today I will spend time on revising a piece for marimba, percussion and orchestra called ROSEWOOD DREAMING; I will be revising some of the orchestra parts - making deletions from the score to make the piece shorter. This is work that has been ongoing for about 2 months and will continue for another month or so. I am also working on arranging piano pieces by the American composer Edward MacDowell for solo marimba, to be published sometime soon. All of this work is done on my computer.
At 9:30 or 10:00 PM I usually wrap-up my day's work-related activities and spend time with my spouse, Ruth, in conversation, or reading (I'm now reading a book about globalization called "The Lexus and the Olive Tree" by Thomas Friedman), or maybe just watching TV if there is something on of interest.
Even though I am a musician, I will not even touch a musical instrument today. If a NEXUS concert or rehearsal is approaching I will use my personal evening time for practice/preparation. Usually though, most of my daily time is spent processing information on a computer. In a very real sense, I am an information processor or computer operator for most of the day. This is the biggest change to occur for me over the years in my work.
Q. What made you decide to be a musician?
A. I decided to become a musician in high school, only after realizing that I wasn't good enough to become a baseball player. The things that influenced me most were:
a) I had the good fortune to be surrounded by good teachers who loved music and drumming, and who served as perfect role models;
b) I had the good fortune to be in an educational environment in my schools that provided many opportunities for me to pursue the study of music:
c) I had the good fortune to be able to go to weekly concerts of the Philadelphia Orchestra using free tickets provided to my high school;
d) I had the good fortune to be surrounded by peers who also were inspired by music and music-making (including your father);
e) I had the good fortune to have supportive parents.
Q. What personal characteristics are helpful to have to be a successful musician?
A. I think the most important things to have are:
a) a positive attitude;
b) a love of music (as opposed to a love of playing an instrument, which is not enough);
c) a willingness to be committed to acquiring necessary performance skills;
d) an ability to share one's love of music with others, not only through performance, but also through speaking and writing;
e) an ability to listen (to receive information from others and to put one's self in their shoes)
Q. What are some of your favorite parts of your job?
A. My most favorite thing of all is to perform, especially with NEXUS. I especially enjoy performing with orchestras. It's also fun to perform my own music. My second favorite thing now is to help young people - performers and non-performers - to develop a love of music. Lately, I have been doing this more and more through teaching residencies and through my work with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra's Education and Outreach Council.
Q. What are some of your least favorite parts of your job?
A. It is a reality that usually in order to get something done, there is a certain amount of tedious work that goes along with it as part of the process. In this category are tasks like practicing on an instrument, photocopying information, addressing mail labels, stuffing envelops, etc. I have come to accept these less favorite tasks because without them, I wouldn't be able to do my favorite things.
Q. What kind of general skills do you use in your job that could be transferred to different fields other than music?
A. a) processing and organizing information (operations/accounting);
b) working with others to accomplish something (managing/facilitating);
c) speaking and writing (promotion/advertising/advocacy);
d) project planning and execution (producing CDs, publishing, concerts);
e) strategic decision-making (seeing my tasks in relation to the tasks of others).
Q. What are the biggest challenges in your job? What are some of the benefits?
A. The biggest challenge today is keeping up with the rapid changes that are happening everywhere. It's necessary to be concerned with a lot of things that used to be the respon-sibility of others. For example, instead of just calling a travel agent to plan a trip, today it's almost essential to make most arrangements on one's own, because there are so many more options available. This is true in almost every area of life, from selecting a flavor of coffee, to planning a concert. Responsibilty for decision making is flowing to users and away from providers. For the provider (performer of music) this means that it is critical to listen to the users (audiences) more attentively in order to better discern how they are choosing to be involved. In addition, in the music world there is ever-increasing competition to better reach the users; there are more performers, more highly technical performances, and a world-wide market with which to keep up. The biggest challenge for NEXUS is to try to keep one step ahead of the competition. It's getting harder and harder to do so.
Q. Do you have a lot of job security? Are there lots of opportunities for people in this field? Looking into the future, is there anything that concerns you about your job?
A. I don't think there is much job security in any line of work today. Most people change jobs every 3 to 5 years. However, opportunities are everywhere. Having the skills to be flexible, having the ability to listen to what one's market (the other people one serves) is saying, and having the creativity to make changes to serve one's market better - these are the best forms of job security a person in any field or work can have today.
Q. What advice would you give to an aspiring musician?
A. a) find a good teacher - one who motivates you and with whom you enjoy being;
b) find the time to go to concerts, especially by performers who play the kind of music to which you aspire;
c) as soon as possible, go where the kind of music you aspire to is being performed regularly, and insert yourself into that network so that you know the network and the network knows you;
d) every time you perform, consider it to be the most important thing in your life - do your best to make it as good as you can make it for the listeners;
e) try to keep music-making fun - always remember what it was about music that you liked when you first started to play;
f) listen to your colleagues, to audiences, to managers, to students, to everyone until you clearly understand what they are saying; then decide what is best for you to do.
Q. Do you find your job rewarding? Are you glad you decided to go into music?
A. Never in a million years would I ever have decided to do anything else. back to Top of Page--->
by Susan W. Conkling, Associate Professor of Music Education
Eastman School of Music
Conkling: Describe your musical career:
Cahn: It's important to know that I grew up in Philadelphia, which, at the time (1960s) had the most comprehensive public school music program in the U.S.
There were free lessons, and a weekly city-wide music radio broadcast. We were all given a music aptitude test. In third grade, I began the trumpet, which ultimately didn't work out for a variety of reasons. I played in city-wide bands and orchestras, received free private instruction and free tickets to Philadelphia Orchestra concerts. In high school, I formed a percussion ensemble that performed widely in the city and drew attention to the efforts of the schools and the Philadelphia Orchestra. It was generally thought, at the time, that students got the equivalent of a Curtis education through the city schools and the Philadelphia Orchestra.
I came to the Eastman School of Music at the end of the famous Rochester City Schools era. As a freshman, I taught over at Monroe High School, giving lessons to younger students. Many of us did that kind of teaching then. I was a music education major with a minor in percussion performance. It was good advice then, and it is good advice now to get a music education degree so that if things don't work out with symphony auditions, you'll have something to fall back on.
I've come to believe that education is a primary function of ALL musicians. If you're a good educator, you teach good things. If you're a bad educator, you teach bad things, but musicians are always educators.
At the time I was at ESM, we had easier access to recital space, and so Ruth and I frequently put together student ensembles for recitals. We once did a performance of the Bartok Music for Strings Percussion and Celeste in which we put a full orchestra together. This distracted students from their studio work and from Philharmonia, so that concert put an end to the formation of large ensembles for student recitals at Eastman.
I student-taught in Rush-Henrietta (NY) Schools.
I was the Principal Percussionist in the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra from 1968 to 1995, and I have always worked with the orchestra's education program. Now, as a Board Member, I chair the Education & Outreach Council. It used to be called the Women's League Education Committee.
Nexus was formed in 1971 with percussionists who were good friends and who had performed together in the past. At the time, I was performing in Nexus, teaching in the Eastman School of Music's community department, and performing in the RPO. There simply wasn't enough time to do all those things well, so something had to go. I gave up private teaching, even though I really enjoyed it. Education programs have not always been a part of what Nexus does, but I think I have influenced things in that direction.
I've recently taken on a teaching role again, not as a private studio teacher, but as a visiting lecturer at schools and universities. Percussionists are becoming more connected through e-net, CDs and certain publications. We're making a world community. The rapid flow of information is changing the model of the private studio.
Conkling: How so?
Cahn: The studio teacher is becoming more of a mentor and home base. The studio may still be the primary means of disseminating musical information, but others - visiting artists and professors -have input. Percussionists are encountering a greater diversity of music styles and instruments. They may receive a great classical training at a place like Eastman, but as soon as they have an orchestra gig, they will have to play Indonesian percussion or Irish hand drum -in Pops or Classical concerts. No percussionist will master all of these instruments and playing techniques, but every percussionist has to have exposure - a working knowledge. This is a phenomenon happening worldwide.
Conkling: I hear you saying that you have taken on the role of performer and educator. What other roles have you taken on in your musical career?
Cahn: I've been a composer/arranger for Nexus, but at some point in a career every musician will probably also become:
a record producer
an accountant
a businessman
a publicist
a computer operator
a facilitator for others' dreams
And, you still have to be a great performer to be successful.
Conkling: I read the other day about high-tech jobs and the article says that an education has a half-life of about 18 months before the technology processes and systems change. Do you think that music education is similar?
Cahn: I've read lots of articles that say a person's average tenure in any position is about 5 years. Yes, I would say that the skills and knowledge a musician needs to have are being re-defined about every 9 months.
Conkling: How did your education prepare you for everything you have to do?
Cahn: I would say that the Eastman School prepared me well to be a performer. I also received from my education the ability to confront problems and to solve them. I don't have any statistics to back that up, but I would say that I got that ability somewhere, and it was probably from my education at the Eastman School.
Conkling: Do you have any suggestions for ways in which the curriculum needs to change to help prepare tomorrow's professional musician?
Cahn: The core curriculum has evolved over 300 years or so, and there are some things that are very good about it. I wouldn't rush to throw the baby out with the bath water. However, I do I think that some aspects of the curriculum need re-tweaking.
For example, I always say to my students, "tell me about what you're playing. Treat me like your mother or uncle, as if I know nothing about music, and explain it to me." I have heard students who were playing a Bach Chaconne on the marimba and didn't know that it was a violin piece. If you can't explain it in your lesson, how will you ever explain it to an audience?
As another example, nobody came to the members of Nexus and said, "we need a percussion ensemble." We formed it on our own. The existing ensemble model says to students: Here's the music; here are the rehearsal times; here's the performance date. A newer model would give students the freedom and the responsibility to put ensembles together by themselves and to perform. The New Eastman Symphony is an example of that.
It hasn't quite hit the professional world yet, but musicians have to take more responsibility for the success of their ensembles. (Birmingham Symphony and Colorado Symphony are examples.) Orchestra members now have contracts to play in smaller ensembles, to give community concerts. They also give pre-concert lectures and speak to government officials and public service organizations. Those are all ways of taking more responsibility for the ensemble and for its connection with the community.
Chamber groups are like small businesses. You have to have all the personnel involved. Virtually no one can say, "I'm the second violinist. Tell me what to play and when to be there." Maybe 1 or 2 groups every 10 years have that luxury. You have to decide as a group what you need to live and what are potential income sources. Once you have identified the income side, then you re-think the expense side. Then you have to decide where to most efficiently spend your money on publicity, marketing, and name recognition. Then you have to deliver a performance that lives up to the publicity.
For music schools it's not a matter of just adding a course. Any changes will have to be systemic over time, and that can be painful. Old model school teachers say "why do I have to change? It's worked for me for 20 years. Why change now?" The answer is simply that the system of conservatory training that worked well 20 or 30 years ago simply will not provide most of the current students with the flexibility they will need to work in today's musical environment. And, any systemic change will need to go beyond any one particular institution - into the educational culture, which is a big ship that turns very slowly.
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Ray Dillard - NEXUS