NEOCLASSICISM IN MUSIC PERFORMANCE

Abstract

Neoclassicism in music is a very complex stylistic phenomenon. Scientific and artistic discussions do not ceaseto rage around it until this day. The vast amount of research has centered around neoclassical composers’ oeuvrebypassing performing and pedagogical activities which are equally important and closely related to art of composition.

The most important prerequisite for the XX century Neoclassicism in music was the emergence of the conceptof "classical music" with its canon based on the works of the "classical" period, which was associated with the names ofHaydn, Mozart and Beethoven. In the era of romanticism a phenomenon of simultaneous coexistence of differenthistorical styles appeared in the musical practice.

Absolutization of the idea of individual personal expression acceleratedthe process of permanent renewal of means of expression and put greater distance between the past and the modern(romantic) in music. In the constant search for the new many composers of late Romanticism drew inspiration from theidealized "classical", thus creating a situation of simultaneous deliberate coexistence of different historical stylisticcomponents within the same piece of music. In concert halls such a situation manifested itself in the neighborhood of works by contemporary authors andworks of the old masters within one program.

The increasingly visible presence in various fields of musical activity ofidealized "classical" competing in its impact on the audience with an individualized "modern" led to the splitting of theXIXth century music performance in two trends – more individualized and more idealized. The most important factorwhich helped such stylistic disengagement was a gradual separation of the two (until the second half of the XIXth centuryinextricably welded) incarnations of a professional musician – composer and performer.

Artists were focused not only onmatters of expression, virtuosity, transcendence of performance but also on the problems of the correct rendition of theauthor’s text, stylistic congruity, interpretive freedom, expanding the repertoire with hitherto little-known works of the past.In contrast to composers whose appeal to the "classical" could be realized in a variety of forms (quotations,resurrection of the old genres and forms, various stylizations and so on) performers could oapproach the "classical" idealonly by strict adherence to the score.

Since precise information on the rules of interpretation relevant to the classical erawas not available to the artists of the late XIX century (old treatises were not reprinted, old instruments came out of useand fell into disrepair, traditions of performance have undergone drastic changes through many generations) anapproach to the musical text was defined by the basic stylistic positions of the Romantic era. Thus not only, as previouslyindicated, in one concert but also in the performance of one work of previous (classical or baroque) eras there was asituation of coexistence of the ideal "classical" (in this case the musical text) and the "modern" (interpretive approach tothe text). Paradoxically the more accurately a musician followed the musical text (the more objective, "classical" was theinterpretation), the farther he could find himself from the way this text would have been performed in the era of its writing,due to the lack of knowledge and tradition of deciphering the notation conventions.Such a situation we would call neo-classical. Under the neo-classical, we understand the situation of interactionof multiaesthetic and stylistic elements one of which is perceived as modern, the other – as classical.

The origin of the neo-classical situation in the performing and composing music practices of the XIXth century,defined by many musicologists as "classicistic" and "neo-classical" trends, is due to the fact that the historicalconsciousness of art increased in the era of romanticism and gradually led to the actualization of the ideas oftimelessness in art. In practice, this could be realized only in the aesthetic and stylistic simultaneous variety of times. Inthe performing arts the "classica"l vector of this variety was put in effect through the desire for fidelity to the author's text.As the text of the works of the XVIIIth century seemed modest in comparison with the complex textural and harmonicromantic constructions, the objective style of playing comprised such qualities as a sense of proportion, rigor andrestraint.

The close interconnection in the development of neo-classical trends in composing and performing resulted intheir joint culmination in the 1920-30-ies. It is the heyday of musical neoclassicism in composing, the leading style inmusic performance of this period is the "fetishism of objectivity" (P. Casals).

Due to its orientation to the music of the past, music performance from the end of the XIXth century through theXX century was inevitably realized in the neo-classical situation of interaction between the idealized "classical" and thecontemporary "modern" principles, the first of which is manifested in the desire for accurate reproduction of the author'stext, the second – in conditions of its reproduction and perception (concert hall, the aural experience of the audience,performing traditions and so on).