- Part of 'A topology of musical encounter' (summary) -
Materialistics form a personal collection of musical materials. This seems an outpost with no end, and in the case of an active professional, this is of course continuously in development. Still, if you ask musicians about those materials that represent the essence of ‘what they do’, everybody is able to come up with concrete and clear examples. Material individualistics are those aspects of music that actually come to sound. This includes rhythms, melodies, themes, harmonic sequences, playing techniques and ornamentation. Materialistics are the subject for personalistics. The personal reflections and opinions that we name personalistics, all somehow relate to certain characteristics of the actual musical material a musician works with. This detailed information on musical material is the interior content of what we generalise as a style.
The selection of materials that typify ones musical language is very easy and clear cut with some musicians, and very difficult with others. With Latin-percussionist Leticia it proved to be a comprehensible package to overview all the basic grooves and patterns that form the essentials of the Latin-Cuban music. Supported by her large experience as a teacher it is not only a matter to compare and distinguish the Son from the Rumba clave, the Bongo from the Tumbao and the Merengue from the Plena, but she can make immediately clear how the rhythms are built up, how they fit in different time frames and which combine with others and how they are varied in different styles. This clarity of musical ideas is ideal for the documentation of materialistics.
The reality in many other cases is far more complex than this example, and it proved not always possible to find a clear stylistic profile that encompasses the materialistics accurately. I recall an inspiring meeting with pianist and composer Marius van Paassen. It seemed impossible to discover any materialistics that he would prefer above others. For every musical example that he commented on, there was an opposite example that he signified as equally interesting for him. After repeated attempts from my side to persuade him towards a more material approach to his engagement with Romanticism I managed to notate a statement that is sort of materialistic.
“A pianistic mean that I use is the romantic concept of phrasing, the ‘expressivo’ playing through armweight. What is breath support for the voice is arm weight for the pianist. After you attack the key you continue to lean on it. Physically speaking this has no use, but it still helps in the interpretation and phrasing of the music. Although this style of playing doesn’t belong to Mozart, where the movement comes solely from the wrists, I do apply it every morning when I play Mozart. I believe that the strict tempi and playing techniques in Mozart are sometimes too forced, and I believe this music can be approached more free. Or for instance Stravinsky, who would clear this problem rationally by stating that after the attack nothing happens, so the pianist might as well play staccato. Even in his pieces you can’t avoid to eventually interpret, and then the arm weight comes into play to aid the musical expression.”
- in conversation with Marius van Paassen, pianist and composer
Although still hard to grasp, we have found a certain materialistic – a pianistic expression that has a direct influence of the sounding result. I can assure you that after this Marius has given me several other examples that will show his vision and involvement in other and opposing methods of musical creation. The most integer attitude is to document all the different influences that he contributes. It might prove an essential characteristic of him that he is interested in highly diverse musical perspectives, and beholds a practical treatment of all of them next to each other.
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