Oxford and Cambridge Musical Club
|
|
Oxford and Cambridge Musical Club |
|
It’s the Music Secretary’s job to tempt as many members as possible to make music in the Club. What I’d hoped to do, before the end of my stint, was to recognize everyone and feel I could scan right through the list of names, confident that everyone there was getting something of value from belonging. I haven’t quite managed that, but I think I’ve come close.
I’ll begin with a summary of the year, though, in fact, holding this AGM in February means I’m reporting on a mere 10 months. During that time we’ve fitted in 18 events. To run quickly through them, they’ve included: the traditional AGM, Open, and New Members’ concerts; the Opera; the second of our tribute concerts to living members; and four workshops, viz: a second Pro Corda day for strings, two All Wind Play Days and our third Concerto Workshop. Three other events that broke away from our standard chamber concert format were: Donald Ray’s two-piano concert, Alan Reddish’s large wind ensemble in St.Cyprian’s and Clare Shanks’ Bach Cantata using period instruments. Finally, six members put together chamber programmes, some with a theme and some without, but all with strong personal flavour.
What we haven’t had, or (more accurately) aren’t having at this very minute, is the Gala Concert which I miss, but which was overwhelmingly voted out of existence last year.
In preparing the current calendar, I hoped we might recruit a couple of young conductors as members by dangling interesting programmes in front of them, but my gamble didn’t pay off. They each came and conducted, then disappeared into the sunset with an uncompleted application form. The same thing happened with other performers as well, and I apologize for thus letting too many guests into some of our concerts.
The year began with anxiety about the Haldane Room, which was awaiting refurbishment and lay for a long time bleakly stripped down and gloomy. We knew that any Wednesday concert might have to be shifted at the last moment if work eventually began, and the uncertainty was dispiriting. In the event, it was only the Chairman’s programme of women composers in late November that had to move, giving us a highly enjoyable visit to the Garden Room. We returned earlier this month to find the Haldane Room not quite finished, but better lit and looking a lot more businesslike. Luckily, and importantly, it contained a good supply of armless chairs, always in demand from instrumentalists. The Steinway piano seems unaffected, and, though we heard in June that the UCL Chamber Music Club had agreed to ask Steinways to look at it, I’m not sure whether anything will happen in practice.
Last year I announced that Carole Kaldor might be able to put together parties of our members for the purpose of spending musical weekends together at Leiston Abbey, headquarters of Pro Corda. It now looks as though Pro Corda will want to arrange the weekends themselves; as I understand it, we’d be welcome to attend as course members, but we wouldn’t after all have the place to ourselves.
I believe there are a couple of topics the Club needs to think about and debate. The first concerns the format of what we still call our ‘concerts’, even though a fair number of them are really workshops or play-days. In our Club Rules, the second object of the Club is given as “to hold meetings where music shall be performed by members and guests”. There’s now an interesting pull between the traditional idea of a set-piece concert, which expects and sometimes even gets an audience, and the freer format event, like our All Wind Play Days. When Hugh Rosenbaum introduced these, he firmly told audiences to stay away so that the assembled players would feel no pressure. They could play whatever they liked, sight-reading or rehearsing as they chose. He may have broken the concert mould, but he hit the spot, and his play-days are unfailingly popular.
On the other hand, formal concerts with printed programmes do require audiences and these days find them harder to get. The way I see it, our members are neither unresponsive nor lazy, but have rich lives and bursting diaries. We shan’t often see them at concerts except when they’ve found time to perform themselves. A good set-piece concert will therefore need to involve perhaps half a dozen contrasted items, with each group heard at least by the other five who are waiting their turn. Supportive guests will also help fill up the room.
Although in this way programmed concerts can still work, I’ve noticed that our Club often comes more fully to life during free-format or workshop events, and I think we could do with more of them. Our three Concerto Workshops, under two different conductors, have found it easy to recruit the alert and enthusiastic orchestral players that would never sign up for a string of evening rehearsals. A year ago there was talk of replacing our annual opera performance with an all-day workshop on the three operas that make up Puccini’s Trittico. Although we opted for a conventionally rehearsed Magic Flute instead, it was an exciting idea and could still happen. There may also be scope for singers, pianists, string players and early musicians to join the wind-players in holding their own separate get-togethers. We have Hugh to thank for widening our horizons, and we could do with more ideas of the same kind, from him or anyone else.
My other debating point concerns the number of performers in the Club. I don’t want our banks to burst.
We have about 150 members at present that are prepared to perform, and this number is only just accommodated by our annual programme of 22 events. It works out that each performing member is entitled to 12 minutes a year as a soloist, though obviously much longer if performing in groups. As our membership gets bigger, younger, more active and more soloistic, we shall feel the pressure. There just won’t be slots left in concerts.
In this context I started wondering about the Pro Corda alumni who began joining us in 2006. I knew about their musical excellence from hearing those two dazzling quartets that came to our Galas, but I found the organization was a good ten times bigger than I’d imagined. It turned out we were on course to have built up a Pro Corda contingent of three or four hundred by 2014, which figure assumes they’d continue joining as 18-year olds at the rate of 40 or so a year, and stay on our books till they reached the age of 26, 8 years later. They’d be full voting members, outnumbering the rest of us by the time of the London Olympics, and the Music Secretary would be democratically bound to give top priority to their needs. So far they have kept away and refused invitations to play, but heaven knows what we’d do if they began to take a full part in Club life. Either our 12-minute allowance would drop to 4, or we’d need weekly concerts. We should keep our eyes open, because the landscape of our Club could change beyond recognition. Bigger would mean different, but not necessarily better.
I am standing down as Music Secretary, but delighted to be passing things over to the generous and imaginative hands of Graham Bowler. I’m sure he’ll find the job as rewarding and absorbing as I have.
Nick Murray (Music Committee Chairman)
February 2008
| Back to Top | 2007-8 | Home |
Page last updated: 25 February 2008 |