PERFECTION VERSUS PARTICIPATION

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Written by Lee Reynolds:

“ It seems that with the rise of the recorded music industry and home audio having driven live performance standards up over the last three-quarters of a century, the premium placed on immaculate performance quality means that audiences today are used to a higher standard of technical brilliance from their musicians than ever before. However, the unobtainable illusion of perfection can be harmful for performers and audiences alike: the stifling, inhibiting pressure — which I know many colleagues feel constantly — can lead to immaculate but safe and unadventurous performances, and more importantly, flawlessness also brings with it a hidden and largely unaddressed problem: almost all audience members who enjoy attending classical performances also feel personally overawed by the perfection that is expected of musicians, and therefore entirely intimidated about ever expressing themselves musically. This is not a problem which is shared by sport: those who love to watch the finest sportspeople at Wimbledon or Wembley rarely feel too intimidated to try it themselves because of the impressive achievements of elite sportspeople; indeed many feel positively inspired to pick up a racket or a ball themselves. If this lockdown period has taught us anything, it’s that the ubiquity of beautiful artisan sourdough loaves in our shops has not inhibited people one bit from trying their hand at making imperfect loaves themselves. Yet the amazing heights reached by musicians seem to have the opposite effect on audience members; there is a gulf between those who create and those who consume. Performers of classical music are afforded a kind of mythical, otherworldly genius by their audiences (and some, especially conductors, are all too happy play along with the idea), and participation drops away.

I am, naturally, not arguing for a drop in performance standards in our world class ensembles - simply that we must find new and better and more proliferate ways of interacting and including absolutely everyone in the making of music, in an environment where playfulness and imperfection and un-seriousness are prized. In floating this manifesto with colleagues, some have asked: in the service of accommodating as many people as possible, to what extent one can compromise the music a composer wrote? Once that line is crossed, how does one usefully navigate beyond it with integrity? My answer is: this model is not intended to replace high quality, faithful performances of Mahler symphonies by the world’s great orchestras, but to take up a much more prized role alongside them. There must be far more space and resources provided for — and much higher cultural value attached to — this model of sharing music with everybody.