Blog from Schumann’s 3rd symphony (the Rhenish) with the Orchestre Revolutionaire et Romantique, John Eliot Gardiner, conductor. Autumn 2010.
An almost buried feeling of my lips not being in the right place - a bit too “pinchy”, or maybe too open, lower lip too far down so slightly set-in, blowing at the wrong angle. What a lot of information - it must take a lot of energy and worry to have all this in my head, even though it is held almost non-verbally. It is obvious in a physical sense but not analysed until I consciously did so. Anyway, the feeling is that if I play like this I would not be very flexible. It feels too stuck. That is how it feels, but I can’t make it go away.
Of course - do it more! Get stuck into the mouthpiece more, even if it does feel too “tight” and open-mouthed. Results are excellent - good sound, flexibility (contrary to my expectation), able to blow freely, feeling of contact with the notes, sort of “tasting” them. Super, enjoyable performance.
So perhaps the actual inflexibility I started with was because of my resistance to what was happening, my trying to put right what felt wrong. When I went with it, flexibility was excellent. Your body knows more than your head.
I did it again! In a silent film performance with the BBC Symphony. Great feeling.
So, in general: make contact with your unexpressed assumption about how to play. Go against it, but with the thing that feels wrong or uncomfortable.
Schumann 3 in Geneva
Oct 2011
