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second wind
May. 8th, 2007 08:27 pmYeah, more about my SFCV article on the Stanford historical performances symposium, because a week has passed since publication, which means it's Letters to the Editor time!
My editors asked me to keep my article well under 2000 words. Why? Because people don't like to read stuff longer than that on the web. I think that says a lot about the web, but anyway ... So there was a lot said at the symposium that got left out of the article*, and sure enough the three published letters, all apparently from non-attendees, zero in on exactly those things. So I got to write a reply (in extreme haste, owing to odd editorial customs) trying to fill in the holes a little.
The first writer was shocked to learn that musicologists are actually giving historical credence to player piano rolls, which he claims are totally unreliable. In my reply I may have shown a little testiness at his having taken an 1800-word journalistic article as a full analysis of a complex musicological problem. But his complaints all came up at the time; some were accepted and some were considered and denied. The correspondent doubts the validity of piano rolls because sometimes they differ from sound recordings by the same person. Indeed they do, but the possibility was raised at the symposium that maybe it's the sound recordings which don't accurately represent the performer's concert style.
So who knows? Certainly not I. The third writer seems to mistake me for an expert on the subject. But I'm actually just a reporter and music-lover who was there to listen and learn, and only tentatively to offer a few opinions of my own, and those more on my personal taste than on musical or historical issues.
*as those of you who asked for my full notes now know; you did all get them, yes?
My editors asked me to keep my article well under 2000 words. Why? Because people don't like to read stuff longer than that on the web. I think that says a lot about the web, but anyway ... So there was a lot said at the symposium that got left out of the article*, and sure enough the three published letters, all apparently from non-attendees, zero in on exactly those things. So I got to write a reply (in extreme haste, owing to odd editorial customs) trying to fill in the holes a little.
The first writer was shocked to learn that musicologists are actually giving historical credence to player piano rolls, which he claims are totally unreliable. In my reply I may have shown a little testiness at his having taken an 1800-word journalistic article as a full analysis of a complex musicological problem. But his complaints all came up at the time; some were accepted and some were considered and denied. The correspondent doubts the validity of piano rolls because sometimes they differ from sound recordings by the same person. Indeed they do, but the possibility was raised at the symposium that maybe it's the sound recordings which don't accurately represent the performer's concert style.
So who knows? Certainly not I. The third writer seems to mistake me for an expert on the subject. But I'm actually just a reporter and music-lover who was there to listen and learn, and only tentatively to offer a few opinions of my own, and those more on my personal taste than on musical or historical issues.
*as those of you who asked for my full notes now know; you did all get them, yes?
