Do I have to use a pattern?

Comments

1. Wayne Toews says

   February 13, 2010 at 2:35 pm

   I add to the important and wise comments already presented that modification of a pattern becomes an element of artistic expression.  (It’s actually a trick to get the ensemble to pay attention, even if briefly.     )   To paraphrase Leonard B. Meyer – Music has meaning when an expectation is set and its resolution is delayed.   The patterns allow conductors to set expectations.  As John Howell has pointed out and others have implied, the acquisition of technique is the key.   I enjoyed watching Jerome Hoberman and Timothy Paul Banks conduct on YouTube.  Unfortunately, many others on YouTube, especially the “experts”, are dispensing nonsense.

    

   The diagram included with the question perpetuates the mistaken idea that it is the bottom of the gesture and the direction of the motion that indicates the beat when, in fact, it is the timing and placement of the slowest motion between the beat points that allows performers to anticipate successive beat points. 

    

   Wayne Toews

   conductorschool.com

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2. Timothy Banks says

   February 11, 2010 at 9:19 pm

    I come in after my distinguished colleagues above, but with the same idea… there is absolutely no valid argument against patterns, in much the same way that there is no argument against the use of the words of a given language, which are only concretely expressive when they are both artistically and correctly used and ordered.

    

   I only add what I consider to be an important point that has been revealed to me  and others through many years of observation of the conductor/performer relationship:  the greatest preponderance of gestural communication from conductors is perceived by performers through peripheral vision.   As a result, subtle and expressive manipulation of a known gestural language can indeed be extremely effective, while so called “expressive” but non-standard gestures do little to actually “say” anything to the performers.

    

   My colleagues above would likely admit that many of the non-standard, Dalcrozian gestures used by stylish choral conductors today can be extremely effective after they have become a part of the standard gestural vocabulary of a conductor and his/her own regular group.  But put that same conductor in front of another ensemble (vocal or instrumental), and we’re suddenly observing an attempt to speak English in a non-English-comprehending community (so to speak).

    

   I think too often my beloved choral colleagues argue against points that have long ago been settled in the “courts” of trial and error of opera pits and orchestras all over the world in the past 200 or so years.  (After all, this conducting thing is really only about that old.)  Could it be that we are not insisting upon this synthesis of clarity and expressivity in our conductor training?

    

   And, if I may quibble a bit as a conducting teacher of nearly three decades…. even the 2 pattern diagrammed above does not meet the criteria for absolute clarity, as there is no way to distinguish which is beat 1 and which is beat 2 on the same plane  (notably from any angle other that straight-on)… no clarity, no expressivity.  

    

   As a dear colleague of mine commented many years ago, as he frantically tried to play his viola part under the baton of a self-possessed “expressive” vocal conductor:

         “Look, Russell, just tell me where to put it.”   (He was, of course, referring to his notes.)

    

   All the best,  Tim

    

   Timothy Paul Banks, D.Mus.A.     | Professor, Choral Studies & Conducting
   School of the Arts, Samford University, Birmingham, AL 35229 USA
   tpbanks@samford.edu">tpbanks@samford.edu   |    205.726.2486    |    www.timbanks.org

    

    

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3. John Howell says

   February 11, 2010 at 5:03 pm

   There is no “case against patterns”!!!!

    

   Point 1:  Clarity comes first, expressiveness should be added but does not replace it.  it’s called technique, and mirror conducting is its enemy.  Robert Shaw never lacked expressiveness, but his beat was always perfectly clear.  Q.E.D.

    

   Point 2:  In really good music there are often multiple “interesting musical features” taking place at a particular point.  Trying to “conduct” them all requires both hands, your chin, and your left foot!  Ergo, you don’t try to conduct them all.  Your body is your instrument, but calesthenics are not leadership.  When Max Rudolph was a very old man, he scarsely moved on the podium, but his orchestra followed him beautifully because he got out of their way and let them make the music.

    

   Point 3:  An unfortunate bad habit of many public school conductors, especially band directors, is conducting something in a fast 4 rather than the slower 2 the music calls for, “to keep everyone together.”  Along with counting off free measures and giving multiple and confusing preparatory beats, of course.  Again, it’s called technique.

    

   Addendum to Point 1:  Just put an “expressive” choral conductor in front of an orchestra and see how long he or she lasts!!!!!  You have to be able to “speak” the same language as your performers–ALL of them!

    

   All the best,

    

   John

    

    

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4. Robert W. Parker says

   February 11, 2010 at 11:52 am

   Everything cited in “the case against patterns” in the original post is really the case against the person guilty of those things being allowed on the podium at all.

    

   Patterns increase the amount of mental energy available to apply to the performance, because the players don’t have to waste their mental energy figuring out essential underlying mechanics such as “Which one of those is the downbeat?” or “Are we in two or four?” or “What exactly is the tempo.” (Conductors whose patterns are poor actually cause that problem.)

    

   Besides… how many years have all us conductors of ensembles of every size and shape been using patterns? In how many performances?

    

   The people have voted. Patterns work.

    

   Rather than reinventing a working wheel, attention needs to be paid towards helping conductors increase their clarity of gesture. The existing gestural language is perfectly sufficient to the task (the people have voted, see above). If you don’t know how to use the language, the right answer isn’t to reinvent the language to fit your ignorance, it’s to use the language correctly.

    

   Robert

   Who, as a freelance percussionist, has sat at the back of far too many orchestras

   “conducted” by someone who was only clear in their own imaginations,

   not in their “technique,” if you could call it that

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5. Jerome Hoberman says

   February 11, 2010 at 8:52 am

   “The Case against Patterns: They box in the directing technique, and inhibit the conductor’s expressiveness. They may not reflect what is actually the most interesting musical feature at a particular point. They encourage conductors to ‘beat the music to pieces,’ as William [sic] Ehmann puts it.”

    

   Certainly any pattern or system — not only beat patterns — will be misused by an incompetent conductor, or incompetent anything, for that matter.  And systems and patterns don’t substitute for talent when there is none.  But there is no effective and successful conductor who dispenses with beat patterns, for the reasons given in “The Case for…”  A reflection of the “most interesting” (or most important) “musical feature at a particular point” is easily suggested within an orthodox yet flexible beat.  It’s hard to imagine that Wilhelm Ehmann himself didn’t conduct using standard beat patterns.

    

   Jerome Hoberman

   Music Director/Conductor, The Hong Kong Bach Choir & Orchestra

   Principal Conductor, Baguio Cathedral International Music Festival (Philippines)

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