A musical score and baton at the ready on the conductor’s stand.
Today I’m changing things up a bit and posting a photograph that is not at all like what I typically share. The photograph comes from a project I worked on over the course of three years, during which time I was “embedded” with a couple of professional classical music groups, a symphony orchestra and a chamber orchestra. It was a special and, I think, unusual experience. Lots of people photograph musicians, but I was able to hang out backstage and photograph the parts of musicians’ work and lives that you don’t see from the stage.
In the photograph is the score to one of composer Kurt Weill’s compositions. Because I had fairly free rein to photograph almost anything I was able to wander onto the stage during breaks and photograph vignettes containing items associated with the work of the musicians. A musical score is a completely remarkable thing. It uses a written language that most do not understand, and it notates not text (for the most part) but instead indicates pitches, dynamics, techniques, rhythm, and more — yet it leaves a lot to the interpretation of the musicians individually and collectively. The conductor’s score contains a remarkable density of information. I used to keep a print of two pages of a score by Ravel on my office wall, and it never ceased to amaze me that those two pages, with hundreds of notes and other indications, contained only a few seconds of sound.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
George Cleve conducts the Symphony Silicon Valley in rehearsal
Bear with me. This may be a long story. I’ll start with some basic facts concerning this photograph. As some of you may know, I have been working on a long-term project to photograph classical musicians. This is related to a sabbatical project at my college, and one goal is to document aspects of the lives and works of classical musicians that might not typically be seen by those who only get to come to see performances. For this purpose, I have been “embedded” with a couple of groups for over a year. It has been a great opportunity, and I’m grateful to the musicians and others who work with them for allowing me a kind of access to their lives and work that they might not afford to just anyone. It helps that I know many of them, that I’m married to one of these musicians, that my academic training is in music, and that I used to perform with people like these. All of that also helps me be sensitive to things that other photographers might not as easily see. (This is a long story in and of itself, and I’ll save that for later.)
The conductor of this concert “set” is George Cleve. His name is not exactly a household word, but his experience and skill and musical sensitivity is of the highest level. My experience with George goes back many years, to a time when he conducted orchestras in which I occasionally played (San Jose Symphony and the Midsummer Mozart Festival Orchestra) and one for which I served as orchestra stage director for a few years. In a surprising coincidence I even took a conducting class from him when I was an under-graduate music major “back in the day.”
Conductors are not always patient people, and there are many reasons that this can be the case. The work they do is unlike almost any other work that I can imagine. Even though I’ve been around music for many years, I still find it difficult to offer a really good description of the complexity of the role—which includes elements of ring-master, leader, coordinator, passionate interpreter, analytical listener and teacher, and much more. Truly watching a skillful conductor—and preferably not while performing, but instead while your full attention can be on the watching—is an illuminating experience. From the visual perspective of a photographer, the appearance of the conductor is in a continuous state of flux. His or her facial expressions change faster than you can follow, and subtle movements—a quick glance, a hint of a smile, a momentary intensity, a curving motion of the hand—convey things in a fluid way.
But I have one more story about George, and it involves that conducting class. His was an intimidating presence for young music students. I recall him at one of the first classes asking, “You do all have the nine symphonies of Beethoven committed to memory, right?” Wrong! Though we quickly set about trying. (That task takes far longer than a college term!) I recall a day when we were to individually conduct the second movement of the 6th symphony for him. As I remember it, we entered the room alone to face him and conduct as a pianist played a reduction of the score. One after another nervous students entered and soon emerged from the room, often seemingly crushed by the realization of how little they understood what they had to do. It was my turn. I entered and faced him and began to conduct. In my recollection, which is probably no longer completely accurate, he quickly stopped me and said something along the lines of, “No, no, no!” But then, for reasons I never quite understood, he gave me a musical gift that I did not expect and which has remained with me since then. Instead of telling me I was done, he said, “Watch me.” Standing a few feet in front of me and conducting as if the full symphony was where I stood, he put on the full show for me, intensity of expression, cues to all, the perfect physical expression of what did and could happen in the music, and I saw what it actually might mean to understand and lead such a performance of such a piece… even if I never learned to do so even close to his level.
This week, at the rehearsals that included a different Beethoven symphony, I finally had the opportunity, decades later, to thank him for that gift.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more. Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email
Many of you are familiar with Charlie Cramer’s beautiful photographs, but this week you have the chance to hear him make beautiful music, too. San Francisco Bay Area residents can join me and quite a few other photographers and musicians for a performance this weekend.
Saturday, January 18
7:30 PM
St. Mark’s Episcopal Church
1957 Pruneridge Ave., Santa Clara
The concert features organists Charles Cramer, Mike Cala, and Darryl Parker… and Charlie will talk about his photography and host an exhibit of prints, and more. See you there!
“A camera trained on the organ console will give us a big-screen view of all the organists in action – and a close-up view of all the buttons they have to push! The program includes Cala performing an improvisation accompanying a short silent film and Cramer’s illustrated presentation, _’How I Became a Photographer and Met Ansel Adams.’_ He’ll talk about the many connections between music and photography. Adams started off as a pianist, and Cramer will present some rarely-heard recordings of Adams playing the piano. Also included will be some of Cramer’s photographs. (http://www.charlescramer.com/) You can see more of Cramer’s prints at the reception following the recital.”
(The photograph seen here is Charlie’s “Bare Trees, Red Leaves” – used by permission of the photographer)
The upper section of a trombone against the background of house lights
This is another photograph from my ongoing project photographing musicians and elements of the world they live and work in that might not be seen so frequently by the general public. For the most part, this project has me photographing people, but I am also interested in the objects in the environment of the performing arts musicians, which include things such as their instruments, the back-stage environment, theater lighting, vignettes of moments when they are not performing, and so on.
At times I have very close access to the stage during rehearsals (and during rehearsal breaks) and before and after concerts. I was able to make this and some similar photographs during one of the times when I could move around the perimeter of the stage and look across it and the objects filling it towards the lights of the “house” – the main audience area of the theater.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more. Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email
