Climbing the Greasy Pole

Liz Garnett blogs about Bertalot’s greasy pole metaphor:

John Bertalot produces a wonderful description of the rehearsal process in his book How to be a Successful Choir Director. He says:

 

The leading of practices is like pushing a man up a greasy pole. He goes up with a bit of effort, but slides down naturally when you leave him alone.  I like this metaphor not just because it is vivid and surprising – and therefore expressive and memorable – but because it is rich enough to tell us things beyond the immediate message it is presented to convey.

 

The primary point is to cast the rehearsal process as a constant battle against entropy. Musical achievements are not stable things that you can put down somewhere and expect to find them just as you left them without further attention. This may be obvious, but it’s useful to keep the obvious in mind at times. When you turn up to rehearsal and the things you nailed last week are sounding wobbly again, for instance, is a good time to recall this image. Instead of getting frustrated that the gains have slipped back, it helps you think, ‘Oh yes, human beings, they forget things – we need to go over this again.’