Historical View of Conductor Rise Missing

Source: Singapore Piano Shop & Music Book Online Shop   Published: 7/3/2020 6:11:11 AM   Clicked: 2198

Social spaces in Germany and the structure of the orchestra itself changed from the late eighteenth to the early nineteenth century.Where, earlier, orchestral music functioned in courts and the church, now orchestral music began to be played to the new and rising middle class. Isolated, single concerts transformed into the modern subscription series, and concerts moved from the church, theater, opera house, and tavern to the new, modern concert hall.

The symphony orchestra became standardized into choirs of clearly defined sections (strings, winds, brass), with a relatively fixed number of players in each section. These sections were laid out on stage in a wide variety of configurations that became standard in the early nineteenth century. The individual music stand became the standard platform from which performers projected music to the audience in the new space of the concert hall.

The idea and ideology of the genius developed during this period. Works of great composers contained difficult musical effects that required coordinated execution in performance. Standardized procedures

of orchestral rehearsal became the norm.12 Single movements and opera excerpts were played less and less frequently in favor of performances of entire instrumental works. The concertmaster gradually ceased playing his violin while conducting orchestral performances and instead beat time (with audible time-beating declining in favor of silent time beating) with his bow, a baton, a roll of paper, or a handkerchief.

By the early nineteenth century, the Kapellmeister and the concertmaster merged into the single modern conductor, who made music with his back turned to his audience. This turn might seem to be a turn away from the audience, but I would like to understand it as a turn toward a new kind of textuality in music in the early years of historical modernism.