COMMUNICATING
TO A WIDER PUBLIC
An exchange with John Duarte
The
level of public awareness of the bassoon
tends, like the instrument itself, to
be 'low register', a situation that the
American virtuoso Daniel Smith aims to
change. "If it were better known, I feel
that people would find it attractive,
exciting and beautiful. After recitals,
people often say to me, "I never knew
the bassoon could do that, it's like hearing
the human voice". Smith came to the bassoon
comparatively late in life, in his mid-twenties.
"I already had a degree on flute and played
all the woodwinds, saxophone, clarinet,
oboe. But I wanted to do something really
exceptionally well - how many skills can
you maintain at that level? The bassoon
was a real challenge and you have multiple
problems to overcome". The bassoon both
looks like and is a difficult instrument.
Having assembled his instrument, an operation
suggesting that a certificate in pipe-fitting
might be advantageous, he demonstrated
some of those problems. "Instead of using
the fingers in sequence in the upper register,
you have to rearrange them, including
thumbs and pinkies, and from note to note.
The left hand thumb has the choice of
nine or ten keys and in the upper register
it may have to hit three of them simultaneously,
with the fingers being rearranged on the
other side".
The
public might have been much more aware
of the bassoon if others had followed
Vivaldi's example: 37 completed concertos
of high quality, of which many remain
to be recorded. This month sees the release
of yet another of a planned set of six
CDs, the first integral recording of these
works. "The 12 concertos on the first
two discs with the English Chamber Orchestra
were all first recordings. Integral recordings
become archival, interesting to universities
and libraries. But for me it's beyond
practicalities like sales: I love the
music-I don't see how you can't like it!"
Since it is a large-scale, 'archival'
project, why not go the whole hog and
use a Baroque bassoon? "It's much more
difficult to play and to play in tune,
and the concertos are difficult anyway.
If they had access to a modern instrument,
I'm sure the players of those times would
have used it because of all the improvements.
They're both nice - why does it have to
be at the expense of the other?" Will
the scores be embellished or as written?
"I was reluctant to plunge into embellishment
right away - I'm not that much of a scholar,
so I backed off and decided to be on safer
ground doing them as printed, as many
others have done over the years. But I'm
rethinking this position and I might decide
later to go that route. Right now, I am
trying to make the emotional message come
through".
Embellishment,
though not necessarily 'authentic', should
come naturally to Smith, who began his
musical life in jazz, dance, and other
'light-musical' ensembles (we spent some
time discussing jazz of earlier decades
and he agrees that the bassoon would be
well-suited to the blues) 'Bassoon Bon-Bons',
the crossover recording he made recently
with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
focuses on arrangements of pieces by Bach,
Debussy, Kreisler et al. He is however,
well equipped to do justice to a suite
that Claude Bolling has expressed interest
in writing for him. Whatever he may play,
his belief that "anything that's played
well, with a lot of feeling and sincere
effort behind it, has it's merits" will
help Daniel Smith communicate to a wider
public the message that "bassoon is beautiful".
-
John Duarte
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