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DEVELOPING ARTISTIC QUALITES IN THE CHOIRMASTER
E. A. Petelina
The paper studies the significant issues of the conductor's professionally relevant qualities, similar and different features of a dramatic identification of the actor and the musician, the basics of the artistic self-expression as a process of transformation and recreation of new music artistic products
Key words:dramatic identification, creativity, self-expression
The major problem of choirmaster training consists in providing creative academic activities to become the ground for the student's development as a creative personality. In choir conducting manual skills have the greatest importance, as the conductor has no all-time access to his tool that is a choir. In fact, the choir body is the instrument created by the conductor during the rehearsing; it is always temporary, it has unpredictable sounding and it depends on a lot of circumstances related to its current sounding. The conductor is a superior artist, free from the material, he does not deal with the instruments and «like God he creates with spirit and is not limited by the capacities of the musicians'«tools» [11, 42].
V. G. Razhnikov in his work «Dialogues about Musical Pedagogy» pays special attention to the similarity between the actor and the conductor. In his opinion, they are similar in the art of dramatic identification. «The modality of dramatic identification (the performers determine what to identify themselves with). ... In a play there is a character depicted and the actor's main target is to recreate the character's image. In a musical piece there is no such a character, even if it is a composition and has somebody's proper name. «The character» is assigned by the musician if the latter feels it necessary. Artistry arises through a special fovoured approach to a musical piece» [11, 50]. The famous conductor Bruno Walter thought that the performer and the actor have the same way straight from their own self to «the other» [2, 13]. At the same time, according to V. G. Razhnikov, «music performing identification» differs from the one employed in acting by its indistinctness. The former takes place in the background hidden from the listener and «the artistically motivated sounding appears as a result of inner work and not as the «art of acting» proper with characters and events» [11, 51]. K. P. Kondrashin noted that it is essential to develop the artistic sprit through miming when conducting in class [6, 178]. «Artistry as a special form of behaviour in class has not only formal but also a substantial value when it changes the mood of a student » [2; 46]. And K. A. Olkhov notes: «In many cases the conductor should not really apply force (physical tension) as much as he should act it. Miming comes here as a helping hand. Due to miming any move of the conductor may be perceived as tense though in reality his hand may be absolutely relaxed at this time.
Петелина Елена Анатольевна -ВГПУ,канд.пед. наук, доцент, тел. 89525594343
The ability to create this illusion makes basis for any artistry ... while expecting the performers to make the sounding tense, the conductor should not be tense himself. He should render the necessary information by means of artistic (not realistic) ways» [8, 28-29].
Therefore, the performance of the conductor expressed in gestures, miming and body mobility makes an illusion of sensual experience in some or other disclosed pieces of a music flow. At that it should be noted that conducting is an art of «presenting a dramatic image, empathizing this image or identification with one, and it also anticipates the moves of the conductor in relation to the sounding choir piece. According to K. A. Olkhov's observation [8,12], the peculiarity of the conductor's identification consists in the polyfunctional character of his role combining «the function of an actor and a stage director, as one devises and stages «a musical play» and simultaneously stars in this play».
A. M. Pazovsky also dwelt upon it: «Theoretically, the conductor should be a potential stage director ... and an actor.» [9, 83]. That is why the recreation of a musical image with the help of miming and body mobility and simultaneous conducting a choir urges a conductor to obtain a rational and non-artistic spirit realized through interpreting a sounding choir composition.
Speaking about the similarities and differences of the two professions: the one of an actor and that of a conductor, we should note that conducting comprises two somewhat incompatible categories. They are notionality and the picturesque of a gesture reflected in the balance of a rational spirit and an emotional sprit (in timing and movement). Timing performs a regulative, auxiliary, rational function and the recreation of a music image in movement demonstrates the brightness of emotions, empathy expressed by the conductor during the flow of a music piece.
K. S. Stanislavsky observed that the inner feeling of energy passing through your body is known to be a complex psycophysiological phenomenon that is «a feeling of movement» [14, 37]. The same idea is stressed by B. Walter: «... the gesture of a conductor is not only a movement of his hands but also a movement of the conductor's soul» [3, 105]. F. I. Shalyapin pointed out the same: «. an expressive gesture is not a body's movement but a soul's movement» [16,284]. In conducting body movement appears in music performances of a conductor and helps him direct the performance of the group. In the performances of a conductor the manual recreation of a music image is
related not to a pantomime but to a genuine choir piece. In B. F. Simonov's opinion, [13] it is explained through the «entity of the music thinking as some ideal substance with the actual manual manifestation of this thinking».
We share A. M. Pazovsky's point of view that it is not outer beauty that a conductor needs but musical expressiveness of a gesture [9, 89]. K. S. Stanislavsky noted that it is impossible to express the high through the low, the noble through the vulgar, and the beautiful through the ugly [15, 169]. A clear, beautiful, esthetic gesture is connected with the art of pantomime. Pantomime is a maximal generalization of the image. Conducting also deals with the generalization of the mentally sounding music, with turning its mental dramatic model into a manual model of a processual musical image .
Unlike the actor, the conductor never fully identifies himself with the music image he recreates. G. L. Erzhemsky notes that the conductor identifying himself with some particular members of the orchestra in some inner actions, does not have the right to identify himself with some definite performer being the manager of the performance, in the first place [5, 16].
«It is the whole integrity of constructive and regulating actions, their duality and make a conductor-interpreter communicate to the orchestra not the outer form, a structure..., but his own interpretation of the produced music content» [5,17].
Considering the problem of likeness between the acting craft and conducting, we should note that the conductor possesses two systems of gestures in his moves. The first system is «professional motor automatism» [5, 18] holding elementary technologic information rendered by a complex of expressive moves and actions through various forms of expressive means. With the help of pantomime the actor brings to life some or another outer movement based on the inner energy. According to K. S. Stanislavsky's idea «inner energy flow» in the conductor's body mobility combines with the rhythmic «stressed moments of tempo-rhythm» [14, 37].
«Where there is life there is movement, where there is movement there is tempo, where there is tempo there is rhythm» [14,171]. So rhythmical pantomime is plastically rythmitised moves in conducting and it includes a dramatic image of the produced music and at the same time its metro-rythmic pulse.
For our research not only informative, semantic aspect of the conductor's moves is important, but also, as it was said above, a psychological component carrying modality and the intensity of feelings.
According to the classification by S. L. Rubinstein, there are expressive, semantic, operational and other kinds of movements. Expressive movements have a special value in the conductor's craft. They enrich and differentiate in the process of human communication and gain the character of the specific dramatic «language» for rendering different feelings, attitudes and evaluations [12]. We believe that this process in the conductor's craft can be related to artistic
self-expression as a non-verbal means of communication.
Nowadays science does not present a definite point of view on the notion of self-expression, though there are some studies on this issue [1; 7; 10]:
- a personality's attitude expressed by feelings, actions, words, miming and gestures and the expression of their self «with a more or less degree of originality, freedom and expressiveness» [1, 111];
- showing the psychological peculiarities of a person (cognitive processes, properties and conditions, interests, abilities) through actions, reactions and speech [10];
- a person's actions performed as a result of their own feelings, beliefs, attitudes etc. [10];
- according to D. N. Uznadze's theory a personality expresses himself/ herself in some activity, communication but being objectivised this personality self-expresses through the plastic reflection of the music image in a creative choirmaster activity;
- «the environment where a person gets experience of extended, renewed self-actualization and self-sentiment somewhat simultaneously and recollects and anticipates his/her true abilities» [7];
We consider self-expression as a creative process in a social and personal aspect to be most productive and promising. Different forms of creative self-expression rest on the single core component. It is the manifestation of a person's «creative self» [7].
The essence of the notion «creativity» is studied in philosophic and psychology and pedagogical literature, generally, from two points of view. Creativity is considered as a property of matter and as the highest form of activity. In psychology and pedagogy in the context of the activity approach creativity is analyzed mainly through the cause and effects logic. It is seen as a process, as a style and a way of activity, as a product and a result of an activity (I. V. Strakhov, Y. B. Borev, S. K. Rappoport and others).
L. S. Vigotsky considers creativity as an activity «creating something new with no reference to whether this new something will be a material object in the environment or some definite mental and emotional way living and manifesting itself only in the person» [4,3].
S. L. Rubinshtein defined creativity as «an activity creating something new and original that is sure to stay in the history of not only the creator himself/herself but also in the history of the science and art etc.» [12,478].
A. V. Brushlinsky singles out such aspects as the discovery of the unknown, overcoming patterns and stereotypes; O. K. Tikhomirov grants a special place to goal-setting; A. Maslow thinks that creativity manifests itself in everyday life in different forms of self-expression; Y. A. Ponomarev defines creativity as development, the appearance of new structures, new methods of activity.
Numerous studies make it possible to define the view of a person as an evolving creature, who tends to self-identify and self-anticipate, as a subject of transformation.
Creativity is the most important human-forming factor of the humanity. The person as a kind cannot exist without creativity as his/her aspiration to creativity is caused by the necessity to exist. The absence of this necessity leads an individual to degrading. In the historic aspect there are some criteria for creativity appearance. They are the forming of the generating psychological power; the appearance of the psyche elements to be realized; using these elements to create some relative ensemble working in the innovative way; the appearance of imagination, analogy etc. features. This was later expressed in the creation of objective reality forms having no analogies in the outer activity (illusions, fantasies, hopes etc.).
Art is a human activity, which means that one person my means of outer signs consciously communicates the experienced feelings to other people while other people perceive these feelings and experience them. Esthetic experience for every person is always basic and new due to the uniqueness of the person. That is why, according to L. S. Vigotsky's words, any artistic discovery, the adequate embodiment of an artistic idea inevitably becomes creative. Simultaneously, this is also a specific act of self-actualization and self-expression as a discovery of a unique personality in one's self [4].
A developed esthetic attitude allows a personality to perceive a sensual object not as an outer contour but as an expression of the essence, the inner life similar to him. Perceiving and understanding the environment in such a way contributes to producing by the choirmaster a creative product which is a music composition. It not only contributes but also makes the process of producing an artistic image possible.
Creative self-expression is an active process of transformation and recreation of new music and creative products with the aim of self-perfection and self-realization through developing personal possibilities of a musician and individual abilities in a music and creative activity. Therefore, dramatic abilities as means of creative self-expression reflect the conductor's state, the processes related to perceiving non-verbal means of communication as well as the attitudes and evaluations of the subjects of the educational musical process, which means they reflect his expressive behavior.
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Voronezh State Pedagogical University
DEVELOPING ARTISTIC QUALITIES IN THE CHOIRMASTER
E. A. Petelina
The paper studies the significant issues of the conductor's professionally relevant qualities, similar and different features of a dramatic identification of the actor and the musician. It is formed on the basis of the artistic self-expression as a process of transformation and recreation of new music artistic products
Key words:dramatic identification, creativity, self-expression
