From: roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Subject: Re: government and the arts
Originator: news@ernie.Princeton.EDU
Organization: Princeton University
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 1992 04:49:24 GMT

In article <dgold.0aip@basso.actrix.gen.nz> 
dgold@basso.actrix.gen.nz (Dale Gold) writes:
>Quoted from <1992Apr10.031947.14385@Princeton.EDU>
 by roger@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig):
>> In article <ku95urINN1ah@calvin.usc.edu> 
alves@calvin.usc.edu (William Alves) writes:
>>>In article <2038@transfer.stratus.com> 
jmann@vineland.pubs.stratus.com writes:

>> I'm not sure that this is the case.  A Kapellmeister who composed a lot
>> didn't make much more than one who composed a little.  Many composers
>> were virtuosi (and later on conductors) who made the vast majority of
>> their income from public performance.  This is true of many 20thC
>> composers, too; others, like Schoenberg, taught.  

>> What's REALLY new in the 20th century is the composer who doesn't
>> perform at all.  And THAT is why some composers drive cabs, imho --
>> because the *possibility* of composing without being a performer is
>> there.  Yes, some composers who DO perform ALSO drive cabs.  But the job
>> description has changed.

>Ahh, they're singing my song... sigh...

>>> Sure Bach had to be an administrator
>>>and performer and even teach Latin, but a large part of his job was com-
>>>posing. He was paid to essentially write, rehearse, and perform cantatas
>>>for weekly services. Imagine finding an analogous gig in the US now!

>> Very little of the music Bach wrote after 1730 was related to his job:
>> not the Clavieruebung, or WTCII, or the B Minor Mass.  

>I was under the impression that the B Minor Mass was submitted as an
>application for a job which JSB didn't get. 

Right, he wanted to compose for the Dresden court, so he sent them the
Kyrie and Gloria.   But this is not job-related composing!  He wasn't
being paid for this.

(In fact, much of it isn't composing.  Many movements of the Mass are
contrefacta of earlier cantata movements; at one time, Robert Marshall
told me he thought ALL the movements of the MAss were contrefacta.  I
don't know if he still thinks this. )

>>>I think too that even the non-composing part of a university job is more
>>>time-consuming than Bach's administering, 

>> HAH!  He had to rehearse THREE church choirs, teach in the school, and
>> manage the Collegium Musicum.  He probably rehearsed the soloists, too.
>> And practiced the organ...  He was the chief (And only) adminstrator of
>> ALL musical activities in one of Germany's larget cities.  Only Hamburg
>> was a bigger job, and Telemann had that one.  

>But all of Bach's activities that you mention are at least musical, and
>teaching, rehearsing and practicing could all be valuable to a composer,
>even at the hectic pace that he apparently lived with. 

Well, he also taught Latin, and I'm not sure whether drilling solfeggio
is better or worse than auditioning trumpet players.  He also had to
handle administrative things like paying the singers, keeping accounts,
going to the city council to complain about lack of support and good
singers (the famous letter of 1729), recruiting, etc.

>I doubt that he ever had to listen to 100 trumpet auditions in 2 days, or
>attend weekly staff meetings, or suffer many of the non-productive
>activities that todya's musicians have to suffer when they fall into
>administrative roles. 

I think he did quite a bit of that.  He was the musical czar of Leipzig,
and had very few administrative assistants, if any.

Roger


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