The performers view: Studio Silence

Emilie Crapoulet

I am alone, immersed in a world within a world where sound is all that matters. Sound and silence. The external world has been shut out so effectively by thick walls and hermetic double-doors, that it has ceased to even exist. Suddenly, as if the wings of a firefly has briefly touched the glassy water of a pond, breaking the surface into a million ripples of twinkling wavelets, the ceiling creaks under some invisible pressure, sending slivers of atoms flying through the silence, their ephemeral energy quickly spent in the surrounding space... I sit motionless at the piano, my hands lying on my lap, my head bowed in intense and quiet concentration. I am about to perform one of my favourite pieces, a Ballade by Frederic Chopin. His fourth and last. Different from the others. Pervaded by mournful gypsy tunes reminiscent of Chopin’s Polish roots, this work has always had an elusive, strange and mysterious quality. I remember walking alone in the hills, preparing this moment, playing the music in my head, over and over again, asking myself “what, why, how?”, and linking tones with tones, phrases with phrases, chords with chords, trying to make sense of the music. As I searched for a meaning, a new world appeared, a world of abstract patterns and colours, relations and structures, a world which I would soon be bringing to life and communicating to my audience... A click. The black speaker in the corner of the studio suddenly comes to life, its little red light flashing urgently in the muted light, breaking the stillness.  I look up towards the control room, vaguely seeing human shapes in the penumbra, separated from me by a thick tinted glass window. They wave and smile. I nod and wave back. ‘All set, ready to go, take 1’. The disembodied voice of the producer breaks through the air. With another click, the sound engineer flips the microphone switch off. Again, I am alone. Again, a wave of silence washes over me. But it is not silent. Small sounds which would have otherwise gone unnoticed are suddenly magnified out of all proportion. The aeration vents are gently breathing in and out and the fluorescent lights are softly buzzing. The room feels alive, like some sleeping beast which will soon awaken to the sound and fury of Chopin’s Ballade. I am not only to play the music. For a moment, I am to forget myself and be the music, and so doing draw my audience into the music sothat they too forget themselves and become the music. But today, my audience is a forest of grey and black microphones. These are particularly difficult ears to please. Blind, unresponsive, unforgiving, silent, cold and calculating, they will remember and record every detail of my performance, the good moments, but also, the bad. It is difficult not to become self-conscious of one’s technical limitations, to focus on the bad rather than the good. It is difficult not to give up in despair when two minutes into the music, something goes wrong and the whole section needs to be played again, and again, until every note has its correct place in the flow of the music. Every flaw, however minute, needs to be rectifieduntil the piece is “perfect”. But what is perfection in performance? In a concert situation, many variables affect one’s interpretation. The piano itself, sometimes bright, sometimes muted, its action heavy or light, greatly influences the way one plays a piece. The acoustics of the room – from a reverberant church to a dry, deadened hall – will affect its sound-world. The audience, quiet or noisy, sullen or enthusiastic will change the whole atmosphere of the concert-hall. Tempo, voicing, balance, phrasing or dynamic progressions are thus governed by such external variables, by a constant adjusting and readjusting of the interpretation to suit the moment, thus creating a two-way communication between the artist and the audience. That is why each and every live performance is never perfect as such because it is always different, but also always new and exciting, spontaneous and alive. How different is the experience of the recording studio. Playing on one of the most beautifully toned anddesirable pianos in the world, in one of the most carefully gauged acoustics in the world, without the distractions that even the most well-behaved audience will provoke, my interpretation is stripped down to its most essential expression. Pencil poised above the score, the producer is waiting patiently, straining to hear the first notes of the piece, wishing me to play my best, ready to inspire me to new heights by taking on the role of an entire audience, responsive, enthusiastic and trustworthy. My lifeline. The Tonmeister sits at the control panel, keeping an eye on the little screens, hands hovering over the buttons, ready to adjust volume and balance. He has already spent hours perfecting the sound, moving microphones here and there, until the recorded piano sounds as life-like and natural as the piano itself. I reflect that they too are in a parallel world – a small box of a room dominated by two giant loudspeakers. Connected together by a thin network of wires, we are never so close as in those instants of silence before I play, when I can sense them holding their breaths, willing me to outdo myself. Lifting my hands to the keyboard, I close my eyes and feel the space around me receding,the walls of the studio falling away. The first three bell-like notes of the opening of the ballade seem to softly probe the surrounding air, an emerging melody as mellifluous and enticing as the call of a siren to lost sailors. Gradually, more voices are heard and the calm opening section gives way to an ever-increasing crescendo of colours, textures and speed. Like fireworks, criss-crossing waves of sound build webs of lightning filaments, the chains of atoms dancing hand in hand to the sound of music. Sound is colour. Sound is texture. Sound is pattern. A revelation. I can see it, I can feel it, I can create it. Swaying slightly on the piano stool, I set my whole mind and body on building a living, ever changingarchitecture of sound from Chopin’s masterpiece. As the last notes of the piece die away, I feel the room heave a sigh, as if exhausted by such an onslaught of sound. The Tonmeister and producer are smiling and laughing, happy at the result. I too am elated, if slightly dazed by the intensity of the performance. Even so, for the next 3 hours, we painstakingly go through the piece line by line, page by page, over and over again as I try to recapture the spontaneity of the first take and improve each section so that the producer’s final jigsaw of assembled takes will be as spontaneous, seamless and flowing as that first performance, so that it will be perfect not only in letter but in spirit. At the end of thisexperience, it seems to me that, together, we have transcended the emptiness and inhumanity of the recording studio, that I have been playing not to a blank wall of microphones but to a universal audience, the music thus reaching out far beyond the walls of the concert hall. Finally, we close the lid of the piano, disconnect the microphones and switch off the lights, locking the doors behind us. In its silence, the dark empty room dreams of music past and future. I am alone, immersed in a world within a world where sound is all that matters. Sound and silence. The external world has been shut out so effectively by thick walls and hermetic double-doors, that it has ceased to even exist. Suddenly, as if the wings of a firefly has briefly touched the glassy water of a pond, breaking the surface into a million ripples of twinkling wavelets, the ceiling creaks under some invisible pressure, sending slivers of atoms flying through the silence, their ephemeral energy quickly spent in the surrounding space... I sit motionless at the piano, my hands lying on my lap, my head bowed in intense and quiet concentration. I am about to perform one of my favourite pieces, a Ballade

Making a classical recording.doc