Comments by Handel, Beecham and me…

George Frederick Handel (1685-1759) is one of the many composers whose music remains associated with English pageantry. Performances of his music still draw audiences, excite players both professional and amateur, and the first two bars of the Hallelujah Chorus opening is one bit of classical music that even the most diehard deniers of classical styles would perhaps recognise and be able to identify to some degree.

He was known to be a tough cookie with troublesome singers, often rival sopranos whose behaviour is said to have been rather catty. Another memorable remark is his one about the English who merely like music to tap their feet to. Conductor Thomas Beecham ( 1879-1961 ) followed that with the observation that the English only like the noise it makes. In other words, the English are not always very discerning in their musical tastes. Yet, England has been the birthplace of significant composers, especially during the Tudor era, and in more recent times many more, not forgetting the popular creative geniuses from Liverpool, and all those who follow today. Despite the 19th century German critic who said that England is a land without music, the British Isles produces musicians of both sexes who create and recreate fabulous music in all styles.

Yet, Handel’s and Beecham’s observations about English musical discernment still ring true, nowhere more clearly than in our own beloved world of organ music. Contacts with European trained musicians often demonstrate how our system of teaching music does not go far enough in terms of teaching how to listen and hear what is going on. Much goes in one ear and straight out through the other. Deep listening is absent. The organ is an instrument which excites the ear because of its vast range of timbres and wide range of volume. It attracts those both with and without the capacity to listen properly to music that one plays and listens to, including organ recitals. An electronic organ with built in recording facility should be an excellent aid to demolishing one’s ‘I am a great player’ ego when one hears playback with slips, wrong notes, inexact tempi, disappointing when one has worked hard to learn a new piece, psalm chant, anthem or hymn. It is too easy to be beguiled into thinking that one is listening to a great performance full of sparkle and bravura by a famous figure when a more discerning ear can spot significant weaknesses in delivery. This is where Handel’s and Beecham’s comments remain relevant today. It has been known for live performances to be pronounced as the very best recitals ever, whilst others hailed the same events as plain embarrassing.

There is a strange paradox that I have never quite been able to explain. Musically untrained people can have a very sharp instinct for being able to tell if what they hear is right or wrong in terms of musical delivery. I was often criticised as a child for playing too fast by people who couldn’t play anything, yet they were spot on in their observations about me. Those comments were upsetting, but I swallowed hard and admitted they were right. Yet, many people who work hard at trying to pass RCO diplomas have difficulty in one or two areas that involve the ear and technique. It is as if the effort being made to learn repertoire shuts down the awareness of the ear, resulting in disappointment. Listening and discerning with eyes and mouth closed and ears wide open is one way to help, the other is paying full attention to technique, to getting all notes confidently accurate, doing what the music says, not what you think it says, listening all the time for the music within and behind the notes. One is reminded of the RSCM Choristers’ Prayer about ‘ singing with the spirit and the understanding also’. Handel and Beecham would surely approve.

Marilyn Harper