Ray Osnato wrote:

>I think I was not clear.  I would never state that there were not
>instrumentalists in the past who were great virtuosos, with technique
>that would put many of today's soloists to shame.  Karl mentions some
>of them later in his post.  I think of Josef Hoffmann, Ignaz Friedman,
>Arthur de Greef and others (my pianistic past rears its head).  What I
>meant was that the virtuosity and technique of orchestral ensembles and
>the players in them is probably better today than ever before.  I can
>recall some pretty scrappy playing from the BPO and the VPO on recordings
>from the 20's and 30's.

Yet, I can remember some really lousy playing done by the MET orchestra
back in the late 60s.  And, on the other hand, I recall the New York
Phil set which featured some live stuff from the late 20s...the playing
was really excellent, similarly, I have a few samples of Boston Symphony
broadcasts from the late 30s...virtuoso for sure.

I would guess that these days, there are more excellent ensemble players
out there.  And as I mentioned before, their trained in a wider variety
of gestures than before.  I am reminded of the first US performance of
the Copland Short Symphony, an NBC broadcast from the 40s.  I play it
for my class in American music as a demonstration of how difficult it
was for the best of musicians to handle some of the more modern gestures.
Stokowski conducted.  The fact that he even took on the piece speaks
highly for his devotion to the art.  However, even with the best of
musicians of the time, they had plenty of trouble staying together.  I
would not fault Stokowski, but it was just that I doubt many of them had
much experience with the meter changes...at times, more difficult than
one would ever find in Le Sacre.  I then follow up with the Tilson Thomas
recording...not only great expression, but great precision as well.

For me, it is interesting to speculate what a Brahms symphony sounded
like at its first performance.  As a musicologist, I have read so many
accounts of past performance, yet, I wonder, what was the basis of their
expectations.  If something was played with "great precision" did that
mean precision by today's standards, or were they just getting most of
the notes.

Perhaps, in the past, there were but pockets of virtuosity.  I wonder,
back in say the 1890s, how many orchestral players did nothing but play
their instruments.  Did they have the time to devote to practicing.

For me, it seems problematic to generalize about these things...did Liszt
get all of the right notes in his own music?  I wonder, even if I can
hear a Liszt pupil, like da Motta getting all of the right notes.

Karl