Gonzalo in the Wall Street Journal

One of the volunteers who is helping us with our season ticket mailing mentioned this morning that Gonzalo Ruiz is featured in today's Wall Street Journal. He talks about transcribing Bach's "Orchestral Suite No. 2," with it's famous flute solos, for oboe. We played this back in October 2008 to rave reviews.


Hear for yourself: 

Meet Goldilocks

Today, in the San Francisco Chronicle's "Props" column, Joshua Kosman profiled the harpsichord with a stage presence that can only rival its owner – our Music Director Nic! Here "Goldilocks" is in a photo taken shortly after she was built in 1996:

Size matters: About the length of natural horns

Recently, we've been asked more than once about our natural horns. So we have asked David Wilson to answer the below. (He adds the caveat: "I will answer the question as best I can, but I'm a violinist, not a brass player"):

My wife and I greatly enjoyed the early French-Handel-Telemann concert last night. We were intrigued by the two-foot-long trumpets and the extra curly horns. I opined that maybe the extra pipe functioned much as today's brass mutes do, softening the sound and helping it to combine with other instruments. (But I'm willing to be proven wrong.) Your explication, please?

Ensembles like Philharmonia Baroque, which play early music on period instruments (i.e. instruments like the ones used in the period in question, the 17th and 18th centuries in our case), use trumpets and horns without valves. For these "natural" instruments, the length of the instrument (that is, the length of brass tubing) determines the fundamental pitch of the instrument and, by adjusting the tension of the lips, the player can produce the notes in the harmonic overtone series of that fundamental pitch.

For example, if a horn is tuned in D, that means it's a long tube of brass coiled up that's the right length to sound with the note D at a given pitch (like A-415). It's the same principle on which organ pipes are made – the pitch is determined by the length of the pipe. So if a horn is in D, it can play the notes in the harmonic series of D: D, A, D, F-sharp, A, C, D, E, F-sharp, G-sharp, A--that's probably about it. Those notes are great if you're playing in a key that uses those notes, but, if you're playing in a key that uses other notes, you need to start with a length of tube that produces a fundamental note whose harmonic series that contains the notes you need.

One way of having a different length of tube (that is, a different length of horn) is to keep lots of differently-sized horns around, which is expensive and inefficient. What players do is use interchangable "crooks" or removable inner sections on the horn. If you need a horn in C, for example, you need a longer tube than you would for a horn in D (since C is a whole-step lower), so you put in a crook that's exactly that much longer, and voila! your horn is in C. The notes of the C harmonic series are now available to you. You can even change keys by changing crooks in the middle of a piece (as long as the composer writes enough rests for you to remove one crook and put in another).

In the 19th century, instrument makers started experimenting with keys and valves which would allow the player to have an instrument that was the maximum length he would ever need, but would allow him to artificially shorten the length of tubing by diverting the airflow by means of opening or closing valves. Bernard D. Sherman writes in the recent article in Early Music America Magazine:

Inventors first applied valves to the horn in 1814, yet the results still sounded “intolerable” in the 1820s to the foremost composer for the instrument, Carl Maria von Weber. In the 1830s, when Brahms was born, a Viennese inventor patented an essentially modern valve, and the Parisian composer Jacques Halévy published the first orchestral parts conceived purely for valved horns. They were to be played alongside the old and tellingly named natural horns. Such hybrid scoring continued in the 1840s, with examples from Robert Schumann and Richard Wagner.

So the curlicues of tubing you saw on Philharmonia's brass instruments aren't intended to mellow the sound. You're right, in the sense, that the older, non-valved horns had a more pleasant and mellow sound than their valved descendants – that's why there was so much resistance to valves by some players and composers in the 19th century. Brahms is a prime example of a composer who much preferred the sound of natural brass to valved brass.

Like the human voice...

Though Toronto indie rocker Charles Spearin's Happiness Project is one the most touching explorations of humanity through sound in recent memory, he is not exploring a new idea – musicians and composers have long tried to replicate the beauty of the human voice and patterns of speech instrumentally. In particular, bowed stringed instruments have always been admired for their ability to mimic the human voice.

In anticipation of our concerts this weekend and next, Philharmonia Baroque players David Wilson and Maria Caswell, as well as guest artist Jordi Savall, talk about the voice of early stringed orchestral instruments: Listen to our audio concert prelude.

Nic on performing Brahms: Pt. 3

So we now know about how Nic researched contemporary performances of Brahms' work and we also know a little about the instruments that were likely used to play his works around the time they were composed. Let's find out about some of the smaller details about the style that Philharmonia Baroque musicians might be playing in in February:

Here are the first of a few thoughts I have about we may play Brahms in February:

Vibrato –

We have the evidence of Joachim’s recordings that he perhaps used relatively little vibrato (the oscillation of pitch which instruments can produce to imitate the sound of human singing – learn more about wrist vibrato and arm vibrato). However, Fanny Davies, who heard him play the Third Piano Trio in 1887, noted that in one passage at least (marked espressivo) he used vibrato to great effect. On the other hand, as early as 1863, cellist David Popper was both praised and lampooned for his continuous vibrato. He played frequently with Brahms after 1886. Mühlfled also used vibrato on the clarinet. However, it is important to remember that these players were soloists and that orchestral players used much less, if any, vibrato. Indeed, the Vienna Philharmonic preserved an almost vibrato-less style until the Second World War. The orchestra will try to copy this with the exception of notes marked <>.

Portamento –

Already in 1811, composer Antonio Salieri complained of Viennese orchestral string players using portamenti (sliding from one pitch to another). One can hear in Joachim’s recordings that he employed portamento as a soloist. His own editions and his treatise on violin playing (Violinschule) contain many examples of this practice. Of special interest for our concert is his edition of the Brahms Violin Concerto, in which he provided fingerings throughout and indicated plenty of portamenti. Early orchestral recordings offer clear evidence of the widespread use of this embellishment. Be prepared for lots of them in our concert!

Flute treatises for the pre-Boehm flute have fingering charts for portamenti. The increasing amount of keywork on later instruments made it harder to glide from note to note, but John Clinton’s Flute Treatise (A Code of Instructions for the Fingering of the Equisonant Flute by the Inventor and Patentee, 1860) shows that the practice did continue into the second half of the 19th century. As he wrote himself: "This ornament is effected by gradually drawing or sliding the fingers off the holes, instead of raising them in the usual manner; by this means is obtained all the shades of sound between the notes, so that the performer may pass from one note to another, as it were, imperceptibly; it produces a pleasing effect, when sparingly used. It is denoted by the mark [shown above the notes above]. The fingers must be drawn off the holes in a line towards the palm of the hand; the employment of the crescendo with the glide heightens the effect."

Bowing –

Studies of the old orchestral material used by the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonics show that more notes were played in one bow stroke than now. This means that the overall volume must have been less. The orchestra will try this. British audiences in the early part of the 20th century were astonished by the unanimity of bowing when they heard the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic Orchestras for the first time.

Nic on performing Brahms: Pt. 2

We don't know if you saw it, but Jonathan Rhodes Lee wrote a great preview of February's concert on San Francisco Classical Voice. In the article, he posed the question: "Will we hear the concerto as Joachim played it? As Brahms would have wanted it heard? As we want him to have wanted it heard? Or as we want it heard following our own standards?" Well, here is Nic's second post to answer that very question:

Here are a few thoughts on the instruments the orchestra will be playing in February:

Strings –

By Brahms’ time the violin, viola and cello had an essentially modern set up, with an angled-back neck and correspondingly higher bridge.

On the violin, gut D, A and E strings were the norm at least until about 1920. A silver or copper-wound G string was usual. Louis Spohr claimed to have invented the chin rest around 1820 to make large shifts in the position of the left hand easier; Spohr’s centrally placed chin rest was widely but by no means universally used. By 1850, the chin rest had migrated to its present position to the left of the tailpiece.

For cellists, the spike or endpin came into use in the 1860’s but many players, including Alfredo Piatti, the cellist of Joseph Joachim’s “London” quartet preferred not to use one.

Double basses usually had four strings, though Domenico Dragonetti, Beethoven’s favourite bassist, used only three. Hans von Bülow was one of the first to use a five string basses in the orchestra at Meiningen (a town in central Germany; Wagner and Brahms were both associated with this orchestra), but he did so some years after Brahms had written his Second Symphony of 1877, where in Bar 13 of the opening movement he writes a rest rather than a low D#; most basses could not yet play that note.

Dragonetti, Robert Linley and John Loder. Edinburgh before 1846.

Winds and brass –

The cylindrical bore flute with the Boehm key system was introduced in 1847, but was slow to gain acceptance. Brahms’ favourite flautist, Franz Doppler, did not play one in the Vienna Philharmonic. Indeed they were banned from certain orchestras until 1914.

Brahms considered that the level of clarinet playing had generally gone down during his lifetime with the notable exception of Richard Mühlfeld of the Meiningen Orchestra. He played Baermann system instruments made of boxwood.

Mühlfeld's clarinets

Brahms wrote his Trio for horn, violin and piano (Opus 40) for the old Waldhorn (a valveless natural horn) but he would have been hard pressed to find one in an orchestra. The Vienna Philharmonic used the Pumpenhorn (a Viennese horn with three valves), which came in after about 1850.

Nic on performing Brahms: Part 1

We are excited to post Music Director Nic McGegan's first blog entry for A415 today! This is the first of a series of posts about our February concerts.

As we all know, Philharmonia Baroque is starting the New Year with a voyage into what, for our orchestra, will be uncharted waters: performing the music of Johannes Brahms (pictured left). It promises to be a fascinating and thrilling adventure both for the orchestra and, we hope, for you the listener.

The performance of later Romantic music on period instruments is becoming relatively commonplace in Europe, but, here in the U.S.A., it is much more of a rara avis, at least in the concert hall. I thought that it might be fun for me, as a kind of New Year’s resolution, to jot down some thoughts about how the orchestra might approach the performance of Brahms on period instruments.

Historically-informed performance consists of two basic elements: using period instruments and playing them in what we, perhaps fondly, hope is an appropriate style. For the performance of music before about 1830, both elements have to be combined. After that watershed date, the instruments start to resemble modern ones, but the style of performance differed in many important ways to what one might hear at a modern symphony concert. Our sources on the performance of earlier music are treatises, descriptions and pictures. For music from Brahms onwards, a new source comes into play, namely sound recordings. There is even one of Brahms himself, though, apart from his spoken introduction in a remarkably high, almost squeaky voice, it is impossible to hear much through the miasma of scratches.

For Brahms’ music, we are lucky to have five recordings by his friend, violinist Joseph Joachim, from 1903, plus recorded performances by players and conductors who knew or studied with him. Anyone who wants to delve into this more deeply can read an excellent book called Performing Brahms, edited by Michael Musgrave and Bernard Sherman. There is even a CD with the book with all the Joachim recordings, the one of Brahms himself, piano students of his and Clara Schumann and much more besides.

Stay tuned for more posts in the coming weeks...

The Story of "A:" More about Baroque pitch

Since the title of our blog is A-415, we felt that one of our first blog posts of the new year should again address the issue of pitch, especially since this will be a major part of Nic's upcoming posts about our February concerts. David Wilson joins us once more to explain (he also warns that your geek alarms may sound...):

Baroque oboe legend Bruce Haynes has researched the issue of historical pitches in detail. I suggest reading his book The Story of “A” if this post interests you. Bruce points out that we talk about pitch levels by means of two coordinates, a pitch name and a frequency in hertz, e.g. “A-415.” For about the last century, the standard pitch level has been A-440, meaning that, wherever you go in the world, Western classical music is likely to be played at a pitch level in which the note A in the middle of the treble staff is tuned to 440 hz. (Editors note: a hertz is a unit of frequency – one cycle per second – that measures, in this case, the traveling wave or oscillation of pressure caused by vibrations that we discern as sound). Having a pitch standard is a convenience for musicians, nothing more.

Prior to the late 19th century, however, there were no universally recognized pitch standards. One could travel from one part of Europe or, in some cases, from one city to another and find music being made at different pitches. For a string player, this in no problem – the string can be tuned to any pitch (within reason) – but for a fixed-pitch instrument, like a flute or an oboe, this can be a huge problem. It might mean that if you were an oboist, you could play in tune with a violin band but not with the church organ, or you could form your own band with your friend with a recorder made in your village but not with your friend with a recorder from the next town over.

In the Baroque Era, pitch levels as high as A-465 (17th century Venice) and as low as A-392 (18th century France) are known to have existed. A few generalizations can be made:

• pitch was high in North Germany and lower in South Germany
• pitch was low in Rome but high in Venice
• pitch in France depended on whether you were playing chamber music, opera or something else.

Pitch levels in the Renaissance and Middle Ages were similarly varied according to location and historical period. By the Classical period there was more interest in standardized pitch levels, again as a matter of convenience for traveling musicians.

One of the pitches used during the baroque period was A-415. Since 415 hz. is about a half-step below the modern standard of A-440, the pitch of A-415 was seized on as a convenient modern “baroque pitch” standard, because in the early days of the historical performance movement a harpsichord would sometimes play with groups at A-440 and sometimes at a lower pitch, and if the difference in pitch is a half-step, the keyboard could be made so that it slides over one string so that the A key played a string tuned to 440 hz. in one position and a string tuned to 415 hz. in the other position.

“So when you play baroque music, you tune to a G-sharp,” some people say at this point. Not so! We tune to an A, but we define the A differently depending on what kind of music we’re going to play. A baroque violinist may carry 4 different tuning forks (or one handy iPhone app), and a baroque flutist probably owns two or three different flutes at different pitches.

Learning French... Baroque String Techniques

Remember when David Wilson wrote about a how baroque violins were different from modern violins generally. Well, one of the fascinating things about Baroque music (to us anyways) is not just how different instrument construction, playing technique and musical styles were from then to now (or even just when compared to the Classical era), but also the variations from region to region during the Baroque era. In the most recent issue of All Things Strings (based in Marin County!), the article "Master Class: 5 Tips on Approaching French Baroque Music" gives strings players tips about how to approach French Baroque music in a historically informed way. Now, we won't be playing French-style Baroque music until March, but you can read the article here. The more you know...

Formerly a hunting shack, Louis XIV's Palace of Versailles (a non-musical masterpiece of the Baroque era in France)

Learn more about our November concerts

"The Passion of Dido," Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra's third concert of its 2009-10 "Season of the Stars," is THIS WEEK! Music Director Nic McGegan (pictured left) leads our orchestra and chorale in a program that honors the life of the English composer and songwriter Henry Purcell. Featured on the second half of the program is Dido and Aeneas with renowned mezzo-soprano Susan Graham singing the role of Dido and also William Berger, Cyndia Sieden, Celine Ricci, Jill Grove and Brian Thorsett. In it's last issue, Early Music America Magazine wrote about our recording of Dido and Aeneas:

What is, to my mind, the finest Dido and Aeneas recording currently available features an American cast and orchestra. The 1993 Harmonia Mundi recording with the late mezzo-soprano Lorranie Hunt Lieberson in the title role has it all. For sheer gorgeous vocalism wed to dramatic intensity, Lieberson is unsurpassed. Her every phrase and gesture carries weight. Lieberson's singing of the lament? I had to sit in silence afterward and collect myself... This recording, with [Nicholas] McGegan leading a remarkably responsive Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, cuts to the heart of the work. The Dido and Aeneas (sung by baritone Michael Dean) exchange in Act III seethes, and Lieberson's cry of 'By all that's good!' is shattering. For once, the roles of the Sorceress (mezzo-soprano Ellen Rabiner) and the Witches (sopranos Christine Brandes and Ruth Rainero) are colorful but not so broad as to descend into Monty Python parody."

As for the concert, it has named a top pick of the fall by critics and editors of the Chronicle, KQED, Mercury News, Examiner and Classical Voice. San Francisco Classical Voice previewed it in last week's enewsletter:

"McGegan and the orchestra are buoyed, not bowed down, by their specialist knowledge, and undaunted by the technical difficulties of some of the older instruments. They master intricate rhythmic and phrasing details that you don’t normally hear from modern instrument orchestras, yet play them with a conviction and ease that sounds natural. McGegan’s adrenaline-filled gestures transmit his excitement, and the orchestra normally responds by lifting you out of your seat. This is music-making by people who have been to the early-music revolution and come back enriched." Read more of Michael Zwiebach's preview.

To learn more about this concert, click the links below:

Click to listen to the audio preview with Nic and Chorale Director Bruce Lamott and stings musician Maria Caswell.

Click to read our program notes.

Click to read a note from Nic.

You can also listen to selections from our recording of Dido and Aeneas on November's concert page. Hint: when you click on "Learn more about these recordings," you can read about these works!

An don't forget: 45-minutes before every concert we offer free lectures to our ticket holders.

One of these people is not like the others... Comparing period and modern violin[ist]s (Part 3)

During the last concert set, David Wilson asked his colleagues in the violin and viola sections of Philharmonia Baroque the most important question about the difference between the baroque violin and modern violin: not about construction, nor about how the instruments are held or played, but what makes a period violinist:

"As far as I know, no one has yet begun their violinistic career as a baroque violinist. We are trained as modern violinists and at some point along the way we discover this other path and begin to pursue it (I sometimes call this ‘going over to the Dark Side’). Doing so requires an open-mindedness, a willingness to try new things and possibly to discard a great deal of habit. Making the switch involves a great deal of time, effort, and even expense on the part of a player.

"So, why bother? I asked that question of a number of my fellow musicians, and here are some of the answers I got:

Baroque instruments are ‘native speakers’ of the musical rhetoric of their time. In original ‘dialects,’ they enable musicians to delve into and to genuinely articulate the elegance, emotional power and humor in baroque music.

— Lisa Grodin

It is the subtle, sensuous responsiveness that always draws me to the baroque violin. While playing on gut and especially while using a baroque bow, I feel I have a greater range of musical color, a more fleet, capricious ability to show the ever-changing character and mood of the music.

— Katherine Kyme

‘the baroque violin’

or, as it was called in the 18th century

‘the modern violin’

we use baroque instruments as means for a shamanistic exploration of the ways of our ancestors

– as the hunter dances in imitation of the game, in order to become the game –

we bring the words of our ancestors to our lips via their writings

we look through their eyes into their paintings and drawings

we put our ancestors’ hands before our eyes via facsimiles

we grasp their tools in our hands via their instruments

and so we attempt to reenter their world

or invite their spirits into ours

and thus reanimate

their voices

in our ears

— Anthony Martin

I am able to do much more nuanced playing with the baroque bow, and the lower tension on the strings allows me to draw out a singing tone without effort. My baroque instruments, geared for chamber music and small orchestras, are more personable, intimate, individually expressive... and the best thing is you don't have to constantly shake the note to make it sing!

— Maria Caswell

Every culture has created its own particular sound world; and none of them are the same, all are unique. I suspect that many of us who love Baroque instruments have some desire to visit the people of that lost world, a curiosity and love which is somewhat satisfied in the playing of ‘their’ instruments in a way ‘they’ might have recognized.

— Elizabeth Blumenstock"

Of course, we couldn't couldn't post this blog without asking David the same question he posed to his colleagues: Why baroque violin, David?

The first time I ever heard baroque music on period instruments, I literally had chills running down my spine and tears running down my face—I was profoundly moved by the sound of the instruments and the way that sound showed the power of the music. For me it was like having heard poetry read by a voice synthesizer, and then hearing it read by a poet. I knew I wanted to learn how to make music in that way.

— David Wilson

Libby visits the Fromm

Last Tuesday, period violinist Libby Wallfisch, who was in town to lead our October concerts, journeyed out into the rain to the Fromm Institute with David Wilson to speak at the weekly "Brown Bags" speaker series. Thank you Command Performances Representative Bob Morgan for having us! Here are a few photos from the day:

Libby talks about how her baroque violin is built differently than the modern ones that the "Frommies" are used to seeing played at the San Francisco Symphony.

Much like the wands of J.K. Rowling's imagining, rarely were two bows alike in the Baroque era, as every region had its preferred shape to fit the local playing styles and techniques, not to mention every bow craftsman had his own signature. Organizer Bob Morgan (left) looks on.

As you'll know from an earlier post, the baroque violin was played while held with the left hand and supported by the collarbone. This "chin-off" technique may seem odd to us now, but the violin began life as a street instrument. Libby demonstrates here how it was popular among Renaissance era fiddlers to hold the instrument at the "third rib" (she's miming an engraving that suggests that the fiddlers also found it fashionable to play with a pipe dangling between their lips, a tankard of ale on the table and a few buxom women on hand to... uh... woo).

One of these things is not played like the other... Comparing period and modern violins (Part 2)

Now that we have some idea how a baroque violin is built differently than a modern one, we've asked David Wilson to explain the differences between playing period violins and modern violins:

"What makes a baroque violinist? Having period-appropriate equipment (violin and bow) is the beginning, but playing the baroque violin also calls for very different techniques than the modern violin.

"While watching the violin sections of Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra perform, the first thing you might notice is that the baroque violin is held differently. The end of the violin rests on the player’s collarbone at one end and is supported by the player’s left hand at the other, rather than being held between the chin and the shoulder like a modern violin. The result is that the player’s head is free to assume a natural, relaxed position while playing."

Click to watch a video in which you can see how period violinists hold their instruments (you may recognize all of the musicians, they all perform with PBO!). Compare this to how modern violin teacher and professor Todd Ehle instructs his virtual students how to hold their instruments.

"The leader and soloist for PBO’s October concert set, violinist Elizabeth Wallfisch, is one of the leading proponents of the 'chin-off' approach to baroque violin playing, in which the player’s head never touches the violin. All changes of left-hand position are accomplished by means of a graceful ballet of sliding and pivoting.

"Another important difference lies in the way energy is transferred through the bow and onto the strings. Modern technique (using a modern bow) involves (to a certain extent) a 'levering' motion with the wrist and fingers of the right hand to press the hair of the bow against the strings. To do this ergonomically, the right elbow is characteristically held at about the same height as the wrist. In contrast, a baroque violinist thinks more about using gravity to transfer the weight of the right arm through the bow and onto the string. As a result, again for ergonomic reasons, baroque violinists tend to play with the right elbow noticeably lower than the right wrist."

Click here to listen to period violinist Rachel Podger explain some more of the differences between playing period and modern violins.

One of these things is not like the other... Comparing period and modern violins (Part 1)

Our October concert features period violinist Libby Wallfisch and, of course, the baroque violin. We asked violinist and PBO staff member David Wilson to help clue us in about the differences between the period violins you see played in our orchestra and the modern ones by our friends at the Symphony:

"The way that violins are made today are very different than when the instruments were made in the Baroque period (1600-1750 or so), but only a few of the differences can be seen right away. One of the first things that most people notice is that a baroque violin has no chinrest. Invented around 1810, the chinrest is a wooden device much like a shallow cup or bowl that allows a modern violinist to support the violin with the chin and shoulder. The baroque violin is held differently – with the left hand and the collarbone – so no chinrest is needed. Another thing many people notice is that the fingerboard (the piece of wood which runs under the strings) is shorter on a baroque violin than on a modern violin. You can see these differences clearly on the violins below, the baroque violin is on the left and the modern one on the right.

"If you were looking at these instruments in person, you might also notice that the strings are different: three of the four strings on the baroque violin are plain sheep’s gut and the G string (the lowest one) is made of silver wire wound around a core of sheep’s gut. On the modern violin, the lower three strings are made of metal wire wound around cores of either gut or an artificial material and the highest string is a plain strand of steel wire. The high E string also has a special fine-tuning device visible on the tailpiece (the piece of wood near the chinrest to which the strings are attached).

"More difficult to notice (but very significant) is the differences in the necks of the violins. On a baroque violin, the neck is attached to the body in the same plane as the body, and the fingerboard sits on a wedge of wood on top of the neck. On a modern violin, the neck is tipped back at an angle to the body, and the fingerboard is attached directly to the neck. You can see this below.

These are just a few differences in construction that give the baroque violin a warmer, richer sound than its bright-sounding grandchild."

In case you you were curious, Timothy G. Johnson built both of the above violins during the same time period from many of the same materials (note the similarities of the wood used for the body). We thank him for the use of these photos. The baroque violin belongs to the author and is a Stradivari model. It actually has two siblings in the PBO family – a violin played by Maxine Nemerovski and a cello played by David Goldblatt.

Learn more about our October set: "The Concerto – An Adversarial Friendship."