Michael Browder
12 comments By Michael Browder
I am normally very sympathetic to these issues. I play and travel with violins myself. However, anybody who travels with Ryanair deserves their fate. It is well known what and whom they are. I categorically refuse to fly with them under any circumstance.
"The ultimate goal of the competition is not ranking."--I think the jury needs to use their dictionary and look up the word "competition." If I were a finalist (which already involves a ranking with those that didn't make it that far), I'd be upset as the money and dispersal has been changed from what I signed up for. To devote all that time under one set of rules and then learn that everything is changed. Well that's not fair.
Anyone using Ryanair for an audition, is just foolish to begin with. There are so many things that can wrong aside from problems with the instrument. Ryanair is a known problem. It is not reliable from the point of view of professionals or would be professionals getting somewhere. I'd like to feel sorry here, but really.....
Seems like conducting from the violin is more about ego of the soloist than anything else. Every time I watch one, I think the same, "Well, they really can't do both, can they." Even for historical performances, I don't care. I care about the music, not about that kind of accuracy. I care about the music, and it suffers.
A string quartet is not an orchestra. If you replace 1/2 the ensemble, you are not the same ensemble. Keep the name if you like, but you are not the same. Can't be. Shouldn't be. Move on!
I mostly agree with David Tayler. This set of prescriptions above is full of conjecture, and too absolute for my taste.
Well there are a lot of experts who don't buy the explanations in this paper. It would be fair to include their opinions as well.
Yeah, I don't buy at all the explanation of Elena Lavrenova. If one follows the original Facebook post, and understands the logic, it is hard to disagree with their conclusions. Regardless of whether they should have gone onward, the competition is paid a fee by the entrants. This is not an orchestral audition as numerous people have noted. There is almost certainly no technical explanation that can be invoked. The jury basically did not listen to the performances.
This is just my daily practice routine (I mean concertos sans orchestra)! Thanks Hilary. Fantastic as usual.
On behalf of Ludwig, I say, THANK YOU, Itzhak!
Great, great article. I couldn't agree more.
There are definitely political factor's and other things that influence the outcome strongly. One simply cannot say "the best contestant won." There are usually a number of great contestants and not offending the jury is paramount. And although some view it as a great thing to spend so long so intensely on their pieces for a competition, others don't, rightfully so, IMO. I think competitions are disgusting, frankly, no matter how exciting to watch as the author noted.For me the number 2 was superior--slightly richer in all registers-- which is exactly why I thought it was NOT the Strad (vis a vis the Paris and Milwaukee experiments). Both sounded like good instruments to me, though. I am long over the worship of 'old instruments.'
Commented on: 17 September 2024
Violinist Esther Abrami experiences ‘rudeness and public humiliation’ as Ryanair refuses to let her fly with her violin