Your fav/least fav things in a performance!

Hey YC citizens

I'm wondering...what makes a performance great to you? And what things bug you the most in performing?

To me, I like when the piece is interesting and has enough changes, I like when the sound is crystal clear, and when there aren't many EE PTH mistakes in there

I HATE it when there are scratchy strings...when oboes sound like dying ducks or when someone calls out in a performance, or when..well, I just don't like many mistakes in it! lol

What 'bout you?

Simple for me.. I like it when the musicians put SOME thought into what they are performing. I wanna leave convinced that THEY were feeling something even if I didn't (cause let's face it, emotions are subjective, something can make ME feel one way and somebody else another).

But, I think it's more of a empathy thing. If THEY are feeling something and passion for the music they are creating, then I will HEAR that in the expressive nature of the piece.

All that is very general, but it's true for me. I don't know HOW it is in the orchestral world, but in the choral world, we try to make our pieces as "human" as possible. We want to connect with our audience and make some kind of impact and be MORE than just sound producers. And, when you hear that kind of choir, you KNOW it's different. To be honest, I don't even mind some mistakes, (although I always expect perfection in music... and by my definition, perfection in music is the accuracy of notes to the notation on the page MATCHED by the emotional input by the performer. So, if the performer got 98% of the notes right and 100% of the passion, I am not so mad... but if he gets 100% of the notes right and only 50% of the passion, I have a problem. On the same token, if he is 14 and has 50% of the passion and 79% of the notes... I am just fine. lol)

All that said... I am also a performer, and when I sing, I try to study the text, I try to connect with it.. I wanna interpret it so that the audience becomes a PART of the story I am trying to tell. That is why I like Choral Music so much, is because you can FEEL the words being set. The music is just a vehicle to convey the text's meaning to the composer. However, on the same token, I am also a pianist (and not a shabby one either). I played Felix Blumenfeld's Concert Etude in F# minor for my last Spring recital and I came up with all sorts of emotional annotation to go with it... So, I don't know how that works for other people...

:)

But, what works for me is most important. :D

I want it to be musical and powerful. It's all about the energy one gets from/puts into a performance.

I cannot stand it when singers punch the air on the ends of their phrases - and I hate it even more when they mirror the action with their heads... it looks like a sort of nod. I've seen three stars at the Lyric Opera of Chicago do this. I don't like it.

I agree with Morivou about the empathy/passion in a performance.

I love good acoustics. I hate messy or out of tune strings.

Showmanship doesn't bother me. In fact, I like it when I see a performer getting into their music; it helps sell the emotion they're putting into it. Classical pianist Lang Lang gets extremely expressive when he plays and it gets me even more engaged. For some, this is a distraction and an annoyance. But the showmanship doesn't change the sound you hear so It doesn't matter to me.

Other quick things I like: virtuosity, expression, encores.

Quick thing I don't like: applause that goes on for too long. When the conductor is walking onto the stage again for the 5th time, I'm jumping over people to get to the exit.

I hate the fact that our home stage is set up so that when we walk onto the stage,

we have look at the lights directly. Thats when our band director remembers to turn them on.

I hate the fact that our home stage is set up so that when we walk onto the stage,

we have look at the lights directly. Thats when our band director remembers to turn them on.

LOL. Sounds great :ermm:

Simple for me.. I like it when the musicians put SOME thought into what they are performing. I wanna leave convinced that THEY were feeling something even if I didn't (cause let's face it, emotions are subjective, something can make ME feel one way and somebody else another).

But, I think it's more of a empathy thing. If THEY are feeling something and passion for the music they are creating, then I will HEAR that in the expressive nature of the piece.

All that is very general, but it's true for me. I don't know HOW it is in the orchestral world, but in the choral world, we try to make our pieces as "human" as possible. We want to connect with our audience and make some kind of impact and be MORE than just sound producers. And, when you hear that kind of choir, you KNOW it's different. To be honest, I don't even mind some mistakes, (although I always expect perfection in music... and by my definition, perfection in music is the accuracy of notes to the notation on the page MATCHED by the emotional input by the performer. So, if the performer got 98% of the notes right and 100% of the passion, I am not so mad... but if he gets 100% of the notes right and only 50% of the passion, I have a problem. On the same token, if he is 14 and has 50% of the passion and 79% of the notes... I am just fine. lol)

All that said... I am also a performer, and when I sing, I try to study the text, I try to connect with it.. I wanna interpret it so that the audience becomes a PART of the story I am trying to tell. That is why I like Choral Music so much, is because you can FEEL the words being set. The music is just a vehicle to convey the text's meaning to the composer. However, on the same token, I am also a pianist (and not a shabby one either). I played Felix Blumenfeld's Concert Etude in F# minor for my last Spring recital and I came up with all sorts of emotional annotation to go with it... So, I don't know how that works for other people...

:)

But, what works for me is most important. :D

Dude...98% of the notes is terrible performance.

A local school in our area (Bakersfield) did an experiment. They directory let his students miss 95% of all the notes in the score. He did the math, told them how many notes to play wrong (not drastically, like a small interval off).

They recorded it and sent it to all the other band directors in the area. The performance was TERRIBLE.

You see, music is the hardest subject one will learn.

You need 100% Accuracy

100% Enthusiasm

100% Emotion

100% Attention

100% Willingness

I cannot stand it when singers punch the air on the ends of their phrases - and I hate it even more when they mirror the action with their heads... it looks like a sort of nod. I've seen three stars at the Lyric Opera of Chicago do this. I don't like it.

Monkey hear monkey do?

I guess they correlate the rise and fall with motion.

Dude...98% of the notes is terrible performance

....

You need 100% Accuracy

100% Enthusiasm

100% Emotion

100% Attention

100% Willingness

I disagree. Morivou is on the right track. It's MUCH more satisfying to hear a powerful, empassioned performance with a few clams, than to hear a sterile and clinical regurgitation with 100% accuracy.

Accuracy is boring.

Computers and robots are accurate.

I definitely agree. David Vogan does have a point though that even 2% wrong notes are generally very noticeable (especially in, say, a piano piece where you have a large density of notes) and can detract from listening to other aspects of the music. When talking about normal performances of music, we're usually in much smaller ranges of "wrong" notes.

But I'm sure Morivou wasn't talking about mathematically exact figures there :P

P.S. I have a very hard time imagining what "100% emotion/passion" might be. You can be more or less moved by something and in entirely different ways, but there's no such thing as being "completely" moved, or "half" moved, nor any way to draw direct lines between the strongness of emotions and the quality of your output.

For me, the point is rather to make a honest, personal investment to the piece, to find a subjective approach, without neglecting all the possible natures of the object you are dealing with. How much, and what kind of emotions are involved in that is a highly personal question and not really quantifyable.

Well, wrong notes can be pretty annoying.

I was watching a YouTube video of Vladimir Ashkenazy conducting Ravel's Daphnis et Chloe, and while the orchestra was technically phenomenal (the clarinets left my head spinning), there was almost no emotion. There was no story, no feeling...Ravel might be a brilliant orchestrator, but that can only go so far. It's up to the performer to add the human quality to the music. Without that, pretty much every performance sucks.

A great performance for me has most, if not all, of the right notes and a high level of energy from the performer(s). When a performer is engaged in a piece of music (or emotionally involved, if you want to say that) it usually shines through and makes a more nuanced performance. I like character. When I get my own music performed I'm really looking for the performers to have fun. I try to write parts with that in mind.