Translator: Claire Edward Reviewer: Tanya Cushman Thank you. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, welcome. My name is Darko Butorac. I'm going to talk to you tonight about the language of orchestral conducting. Now, for many of us, our first views on the subject were shaped by a great colleague of mine, a famous maestro, Mr. Bugs Bunny. (Laughter) If you remember, he donned his white-gloved hand and held it on high as the tenors sang the eternal B-flat turning green. And as trying as opera singers can be sometimes, this is not what conducting is all about. The language of conducting is certainly a complex one and, to the casual observer, can appear almost mystical. There is something very magical about moving your hands, and all of a sudden, sound emerging. Now, if we think of language as using words to express our ideas and emotions, I think of conducting as a language that uses gesture to turn ideas into music. This is a three-part process. First, we have objective study of the score; then, creation of a subjective vision; and finally, the synthesis of the two into expressive gesture. So let's start with the objective study. Every time I open a new score, I go through it very slowly and try to absorb all the little details, the dots and dashes, the black notes on the eternal white pages. All the while, there is no personal expression going on; there is no interpretation. Just the facts, Ma'am. (Laughter) It would be very much - Let's do an example. Let's take the Romeo and Juliet Overture, by Tchaikovsky. So we open the first page; we see the list of instruments. Four of them play: two clarinets, two bassoons. The key is F-sharp minor, very dark. There is a four-bar phrase rising, and there's a little crescendo at the end. And then there's an Italian tempo marking which says "Andante non tanto, quasi moderato," which means, "A not-a too fast, a not-a too slow." (Laughter) And I do this for the whole piece; I absorb all these little details but, again, without any personal expression. It would be as if we took the text of Shakespeare and memorized it like this: (Monotone voice) "Two households, both alike in dignity, in fair Verona, where we lay our scene." (Laughter) Not particularly inspiring. Dead and robotic - how do you bring it to life? You add subjective vision and personal expression. So the musical score is very much similar to a script. It offers a lot of information; it tells us to play things fast or slow, loud or soft, but not how loud or how soft. Every parameter of music is malleable: the dynamics, the articulations, the colour, the tone. The job of the conductor is to manage each and [every] one of them so that the piece has an organic quality, from beginning to the end. I take you on a journey every time, and I manage the intensity of these different elements so there is a clear climax and a clear release. And mind you, this is not exactly decided by personal whim. You can't just do, you know, "I'll do two shots of coffee in the morning, and let's just go faster tonight. No, it's a journey of discovery; you look for clues. You look at the harmony - the harmony implies certain tensions. You learn about the style of the period, other works of the composer, and certainly the composer's biography. So in the case of Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet, I mentioned it begins with four instruments: two clarinets, two bassoons. Very dark color in the low register. Each one has an independent voice, so it's like a choral. And we know Tchaikovsky is Russian. He was raised in the Orthodox faith; therefore, he's familiar with Orthodox chant. And that's exactly what this music evokes. So now we think, "In Shakespeare, who is related to the Church?" Aha, Friar Lawrence. And so the opening of the piece, to me, seems like Friar Lawrence sitting down and telling us this fantastic story of two forlorn lovers. "Two households, both alike in dignity, in fair Verona, where we lay our scene." This is where artistic choices begin to matter; this is how music comes to life. Now we come to the third part, the synthesis of the subjective and the objective into gesture. Let's talk about how we get an orchestra to actually make a sound together. So, I will - I'm going to turn all of you into one giant TEDx clapping orchestra. Don't worry, musical talent not required. All you have to do is clap together. Here we go, ready? Follow my lead. (Audience claps) Yeah, not very together, is it? (Laughter) Alright, to explain how you actually have to start the orchestra properly, let me use a fantastic technological gadget. (Laughter) Please clap when the ball hits my hand. (Audience claps) Aha! Very nice, good healthy forte! The reason this works is because we know exactly when the ball will hit my hand. (Audience claps) Wow, you're well trained. Here you go. (Laughter) Now I'm going to take my hand and do the same thing. So, I'll just relax and let it fall down. Let's do it again. (Audience claps) Yes, a little early in the first violins! (Laughter) I'm going to remove my left hand, and we'll do it again. Just clap when the hand returns. (Audience claps) Yes, when it goes down, yeah. (Laughter) Very good. And notice what happens is the gesture imitates breathing. Inhalation and exhalation. Yeah, exactly! It's the same thing chamber musicians do when they play together; they inhale as they start to play together. Now let's talk about what the hands actually do. In proper school fashion, our crash course continues. The right hand is used to keep the orchestra together by showing patterns, and the pattern depends on the meter of the music. So if we have duple meter, we go like this. One. Two. (One person claps) Man, you're really, really excited - good, I like it! Alright, so that's duple meter, one and two, up and down. If it's a piece in three, it's a triangle. So it's one, two and three. A piece in four looks like this: one, two, three, four. Or a good mnemonic is floor, door, window, ceiling. (Laughter) And then if you're really talented, you can try this. One, two, three, ah! (Laughter) So that takes care of the right hand. The left hand is used for expression, in addition to fixing your hair. And it may show things like let's play smoothly or let's play softly. Or, Mr. Tuba Player, I know you haven't been playing for 467 measures, but please play the next downbeat. And of course, you have to do this both at the same time, left hand and right hand. So we need a little bit of coordination between the left and right brain. So here's a fantastic exercise to embarrass you. Please point your left hand at me. Exactly, and we'll go together, we'll go down, out, up and in. So in other words, like one, two, three, four. Perfect! Very talented group. (Laughter) Next, the other hand. And now we'll make a triangle, so it's going to be like this: one, two, three. And by the fear in your eyes, I can tell that you know what's coming next. (Laughter) So, here we go, both hands together; if you get lost, just stay with me, stay good. Here we go. Nice and slow. (Laughter) Need more challenge? We can go faster. Or if you're really good, I can count to five, you know - one, two, three, four, five. Okay. (Applause) So now you're ready. You have your right hand; you have your left hand; you have the coordination. You're ready to conduct, right? Not quite. You see, what we talked about so far has just been the grammar of conducting. The first step to true mastery is realizing that hand motions are just hand motions. This is my hand going up and down - this is not a crescendo. Great conducting starts with a little bit of method acting. You take that which you learned, and you form a clear sound picture in your head. It's in your body, and out of there, it comes out. So then a crescendo can be like this. It's something very honest that comes from within you. The second step to great conducting is the realization that leadership requires a really fine balance between empowerment and management. You have 75 musicians in front of you, centuries of collective musical experience. And the great conductor will know exactly when they need a clear beat, or when they need to step out of the way and just shape the music. The conductor Herbert von Karajan put it beautifully; he said, "The purpose of each conductor should be to make himself unnecessary." And what he meant by this was that the musical experience on stage is not about following a beat but rather about all the musicians breathing together, playing together, seeing and having one vision of a work of music. True teamwork. And the orchestra is one of the best examples in life of the whole being so much larger than the sum of its parts. You see, every performance is not just an opportunity to recreate what the composer had in mind; it's an incredible opportunity to inspire a community, to bring goosebumps, to bring tears, joy, excitement, a visceral connection to the music. So that when you leave the theatre, you can feel inspired, and you take that passion, and you bring it to your everyday life and work, and you make the whole world a better place as a result. This is why we need great art. This is why we need great music. Thank you. (Applause)