Although it is known by almost all of you, let us first establish the following basic concept: one thing is the "particellas" or individual parts of each instrument, and another is the "score" itself, where the complete music is with the parts corresponding to each voice of the ensemble.
Let's start from a hypothetical but very common situation: a duet of "X instrument" and piano (eg clarinet and piano). The clarinetist - who is surely the one who knows the specific repertoire best of the two - provides the pianist with the score for him to study.
The score (the "paper") that the pianist will use is the complete score -since it includes the clarinet part on an upper staff-, while the clarinetist's contains only his part (sorry if everything I said up to here is too much). elementary for you, but I want to get to an important concept).
So far everything is OK, but we are on the verge of a possible inconvenience: that the clarinetist has given his colleague the only sheet music he had, and that for the rest of the rehearsals he only has his particella.
Every instrumentalist or ensemble should study a work always consulting the full score. It is there where each musician can clearly see the organization and structure of the work, the relationship between the voices (rhythm, dynamics), etc.
Nothing is clearer than being able to see all this. This direct approach to the work as a whole as the composer wrote it cannot be replaced by the mere act of rehearsing or repeating a thousand times using only the individual parts.
The more instruments that make up the ensemble, the more necessary it is to have the full score on hand at rehearsals.
Situations that waste time and can be avoided:
- "Let's see, what rhythm do you guys have in measure 33? Shall we go there together? I have an eighth note triplet on the first beat, then an eighth note rest, two sixteenth notes, blablabla..."
- "My rallentando begins three bars before the letter F, do you have the same thing?
Let me see your part..."
I repeat: each member of the ensemble should have a copy of the complete score (score, in English) of the piece they are working on. Ideally all musicians in the group should use the same edition of the work. Otherwise, the necessary annotations (articulation, dynamics, tempo, etc.) will have to be made on the paper to unify them.
Another very important detail for practical purposes is to unify the essay letters or numbers and write them down in each part. This will also save valuable time on rehearsals.
To finish I want to share with you an anecdote taken from the book "Invitation to Music" (Jonathan Kramer, Editorial Vergara).
The year was 1878, Brahms was composing his famous violin concerto and decided to ask his friend and accomplished violinist Joseph Joachim for advice. Frequently, I asked him about the difficulty of certain passages. Joachim's advice to simplify some of the music was often ignored, although, paradoxically, his purely musical criticisms were generally heeded.
While working on the piece, Brahms wrote to Joachim: "Having written it, I really don't know what you will think about the solo part alone. My intention was, of course, that you correct it, without paying attention to the quality of the composition, and If you thought it wasn't worthy of orchestration, tell me. I'll be glad if you mark the parts that are difficult or impossible to play."
Joachim replied to the letter: "It gives me great pleasure to know that you are composing a violin concerto. I have carefully read what you sent and made a few notes and modifications, but there is little I can say without having the complete score. However I can make good use of most of this piece and there is a substantial amount of good violin music in it, but whether it can be played comfortably in a hot concert hall remains to be seen."
It is evident from this letter that Joachim was a first rate musician. He was reluctant to pass judgment solely on the violin part, even if it was the one he would play solo, not knowing how it would fit into the full ensemble.
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