Page:Essentials in Conducting.djvu/52

40 in their display of emotion that the music would be entirely distorted, losing what is after all its main raison d'être, viz., the element of beauty. But there seems at present to be no especial danger that such an event will occur; the tendency seems rather to be toward overemphasizing intellectualism in music, and toward turning our art into a science. The thing that we should like to convince the prospective conductor of is that real interpretation—i.e., genuinely expressive musical performance—demands an actual display of emotion on the part of the conductor if the ideal sort of reaction is to be aroused in the audience.

In order to interpret a musical work, then, the conductor himself must first study it so as to discover what the composer intended to express. Having become thoroughly permeated with the composer's message, he may then by instinctive imitation arouse in his chorus or orchestra so strong a reflection of this mood that they will perform the work in the correct spirit, the audience in turn catching its essential significance, and each listener in his own way responding to the composer's message.

Musical interpretation consists thus in impressing upon the listener the essential character of the music by emphasizing the important elements and subordinating the unimportant ones; by indicating in a clear-cut and unmistakable way the phrasing, and through skilful phrasing making evident the design of the composition as a