Allan McMur­ray
Dis­tin­guished Pro­fessor
Robert and Judy Charles Pro­fessor of Con­duct­ing
Uni­ver­sity of Col­or­ado – Boulder

I have had the oppor­tun­ity to work with instru­mental ensembles through­out the United States.  It has been a joy­ous exper­i­ence meet­ing and mak­ing music with stu­dents who love being together in pur­pose and in per­form­ance, but I have con­stantly been reminded of the dif­fer­ent levels of com­mit­ment that can be found.

The com­mon level of com­mit­ment is that of the par­ti­cipant.  The music par­ti­cipant enjoys the exper­i­ence of get­ting together with friends and enga­ging in the events.  The par­ti­cipant is con­scien­tious about rehearsal times, works to learn the music in rehearsal and is inter­ested in being a good sec­tion mem­ber.  The par­ti­cipant likes music with a good beat.

The next level is that of a player (or singer).  The player/singer is a per­son who loves music because it gives him/her a chance to play.  The player wants to play a lot and prac­tices to achieve range and tech­nique that can rep­res­ent a great sound whenever the player plays.  The player arrives early to prac­tice his “licks” and wants great parts to play.  In fact, the player judges music based on her part.  If it’s a good part, it is a good piece of music, if it’s a bad part, it is a bad piece of music.  The player likes solos, and strives to be heard.  The player loves his instru­ment and enjoys get­ting together with other “play­ers”.  The player will learn his/her part out­side of rehears­als to he/she can sound good in rehearsals.

The third level is that of the musi­cian.  The musi­cian plays his instru­ment well and shows up to rehears­als with his part mastered.  The musi­cian loves cham­ber music and ensemble because of the oppor­tun­ity for musical col­lab­or­a­tion. The musi­cian does not come to rehearsal to learn her/his own part; the musi­cian comes to a rehearsal to learn every­one else’s part.  In that way, the musi­cian I learn­ing how to play together by con­cen­trat­ing on inton­a­tion, artic­u­la­tion, phras­ing, blend, bal­ance and style.  The musi­cian is about listen­ing, learn­ing and col­lab­or­at­ing with other musi­cians.  The musi­cian eval­u­ates whether a piece of music is good or not by the sounds that are cre­ated by every­one and enjoys listen­ing as much as play­ing.  The musi­cian likes being a con­trib­ut­ing part of every rehearsal through collaboration.

The fourth level is that of the artist.  The artist has all the skills of the player and the musi­cian, but the artist is also a cre­ator.  The artist comes to every rehearsal pre­pared in every way, and leaves every rehearsal with new goals.  The artist loves great music mak­ing and loves to bring expres­sion and inspir­a­tion to the per­form­ance.  The artist has ima­gin­a­tion that is fueled by oppor­tun­ity.  That oppor­tun­ity might come in a solo pas­sage or in an approach to style that amp­li­fies the intent of the piece.  The artist is a col­lab­or­ator with the other mem­bers of the ensemble, with the con­ductor, and with the com­poser.  The artist is intu­it­ive and ori­ginal, but only uses those skills in pur­suit of the most beau­ti­ful per­form­ance pos­sible.  The artist eval­u­ates whether a piece of music is good or not by how it is com­posed and what it expresses.  The artist has the poten­tial to elev­ate the listener’s per­cep­tion of an aver­age piece through an extraordin­ary per­form­ance.  The artist loves music because music fuels his/her soul.

If it were only about choos­ing a level then all per­formers would be artists.  But it is not about choos­ing it is about grow­ing, listen­ing, and sur­round­ing one­self with great music, great books, great art and great people.  It is about informed intu­ition.  It is about learn­ing the­ory, so the archi­tec­ture and har­monic lan­guage can be heard in every melody.  It is about know­ing per­form­ance prac­tice and style of music of all peri­ods.  It is about listen­ing to chal­len­ging pieces by ima­gin­at­ive and ori­ginal com­posers and push­ing the envel­ope of per­sonal pref­er­ence.  It is about reflec­tion on life, death, pain, cel­eb­ra­tion, pas­sion, grief, and nature to under­stand and exper­i­ence those things that inspire mean­ing in art.  It is about learn­ing to be at home in solitude and seek­ing it out.  It is about beauty and spon­taneity and ima­gin­a­tion and spir­itu­al­ity.  It is attempt­ing to approach every sound and every silence every day as if it mat­ters, because it does.  It is recog­niz­ing that the pur­suit of per­fec­tion is a lifelong goal and that it is unat­tain­able.  It is know­ing that the artist’s life is not about a des­tin­a­tion, it is about the journey.