10/5/2018 Score Marking | Kenneth Woods - conductor

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Score Marking RECENT POSTS

 By Kenneth Woods  Oct 31, 2006 

Listener’s Guide-
 A view from the podium, Nuts and bolts
 gerhard samuel, ivan fischer, library, penderecki, score marking ESO Schumann, Liszt
and Sibelius, 7
I thought I might wade in and try to slightly de-mystify the question of score October 2018
marking by conductors. Orchestral players and audiences alike can often be Shirehall
quite overwhelmed by, and even suspicious of, the complex systems of red and
blue, circles, highlights and so on that appear in many conductors scores. CD review – Musical
Opinion on Brahms
Score marking has grown out of a simple fact- a page of a score for full Piano Quartet no. 2
orchestra is an incredibly dense and complicated set of symbols, and very, very orch. Kenneth Woods
few human beings can actually take all of that in simply from looking at it once.
BBC Music Magazine
That said, not everyone does mark their scores. Leonard Slatkin told me that he on Briggs Trio Gál
used to as a young conductor, but that he now prefers to work from clean and Shostakovich on
scores. Erich Leinsdorf was completely against marking of any kind- he felt that Avie Records
anything put into the text of the score by the conductor was a defilement of what
Gramophone Editor’s
had already been put there by the composer. My own teacher, Gerhard Samuel
had conflicting feelings about marking. On seeing some of my heavily marked Choice for Piano Trios

scores, he told me (rather emphatically) that I shouldn’t need all those marks if I by Gál and
actually learned the music well enough, but I later discovered he himself often Shostakovich
marked his scores almost as thoroughly. On the other hand, I’ve known
BBC Music Magazine
conductors who wouldn’t know how to study if you took their red and blue
on Ken’s
pencils away from them- for them, marking is studying.
Orchestration of

There are a few reasons why one puts a marking in a score. Brahms’s Piano
Quartet in A Major
One, and certainly the rarest, is to make a non-performable approach to notation
performable. Gerhard did many of the earliest performances of Penderecki’s
pre-1970 orchestral works in the US, and later told he that he often went through CATEGORIES
score and parts adding bar lines, rehearsal numbers and so on. This used to
make Penderecki quite annoyed- he always felt that his music could and should  A future for music
be performed as he’d written it. However, back in the late 60s/early 70s, when
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Penderecki was finally starting his own conducting career I understand he sent
 A view from the
an SOS to Gerhard requesting that he send copies of all his edited and
podium
annotated Penderecki scores, and the composer ended up using all of those
“spurious” bar lines to facilitate his own rehearsals and recordings. Once he was  Bobby and Hans
working as a conductor, Penderecki radically changed his whole approach to
 cello
notation, becoming much more “mainstream.” He learned from his own
experience what musicians had been trying to tell him for years. There are quite  Explore the Score
a few mid-20th century works that need a bit of help along these lines, but this
otherwise is a rare situation.
 Favorite posts

 Haydn
A second reason for marking a score is somewhat similar: this is to create a
performing edition which captures as vividly as possible a given conductor’s  Headlines
approach to a piece. This is not just a matter of score marking- this process also
 Lists
extends to detailed editing and marking of the parts. The Mahler “versions” of
the Schumann and Beethoven symphonies are famous examples of this  Mahler
approach- these were not made for publication but for his own performance.
Beecham was famous for not needing rehearsal- this is largely because
 Mahler 2 Notes

(according to myth) his long-suffering wife had put all of his performance  Mahler-
instructions carefully into each part. Certain composers almost beg for this Performer's
approach, especially Beethoven, and to a lesser extent Haydn and Mozart. I’d Perspective
say many busy conductors have their own sets of parts and matching score to
some or all of the Beethoven symphonies. Most of what goes into the parts is  Music and Media
detailed marking of what would have been assumed practice of the day- brass
 News and Reviews
releases on long notes and so on, but some conductors go much farther. David
Zinman got a lot of great press for being one of the first conductors to record the  Not quite the news
Beethovens with the new Del Mar critical edition, but he told our conductor’s
class at Aspen that his parts looked like “a fucking Mahler symphony.” Chances
 Nuts and bolts

are, if you’re hearing tons and tons of very specific detail in a performance,  Performing Life
especially in terms of articulations and dynamics, you can guess that the players
are working from the conductor’s parts, which are quite marked up. Schumann is  Repertoire Reports

another composer that many conductors feel they need to have their own parts
 Satire
for. Szell and Toscanini (both known for their fidelity to the score!) used to use
their own parts full of small textural tweaks. Some conductors go way too far  Study with Ken
with this, really crossing the line into re-orchestrating works of the masters (and
really, Stokowski was not that bad- a few of today’s big names are bolder), but
the vast majority of conductors use this resource not to change but to clarify, and RECENT COMMENTS
to save time. Why explain this, this and this, when you can write it in the music?
Scott Howe on Explore
The third reason for marking a score is really the most common, and that is to
the Score- Shostakovich
facilitate the conductor’s study, mastery and performance of a score. There have
(arr. Barshai): Chamber
been some very famous conducting teachers who insisted on a very rigorous
Symphony, opus 110a
and inflexible marking method (you can tell their students from a mile away by

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looking at their scores for a second “hey, purple highlighter for the secondary Tristan on Leonard
thematic material! How did you like studying with Bob?”), but most conductors, Bernstein- The Mahler
over time, develop their own personal marking technique. One early teacher of Conductor Turns 100
mine insisted that you could use any system you liked, but that you should
Kenneth Woods on
never, ever change it once you develop it, but that is advice I continue to ignore.
Guest Blog- Foster
Beyers on the 5
My own approach has changed a lot over the years, although perhaps not in
ways that would be obvious to others, and I often do conduct without any Essential Sibelius 7

markings at all. Leonard Slatkin suggested that a young conductor might learn recordings
all the standard works with lots of markings as a young man, then later return to Foster (via FB) on Guest
clean scores when he or she has more experience, and this makes lots of Blog- Foster Beyers on
sense. On the other hand, in recent years, I’ve tried the opposite, which is to the 5 Essential Sibelius 7
learn, rehearse and perform a piece without any marking at all, but then to take recordings
a couple of days after the performance to mark in everything I’ve learned and
Michael Ormandy on
discovered about the piece.
Haydn- more talented
than Mozart
In any case, there are two kinds of marks you might make. One is analytical-
things you mark to clarify your understanding of what is going on. The other is
practical- things you mark to remind yourself of what you need to be showing ARCHIVES
when in front of the band. Analytical marks might include harmonic analysis.
Symbols showing the actual sonority (G7) or the function (V7 in C Major) of a
Select Month
chord in the score are useful, as are markings of overall key areas (A minor-
relative minor), pedal points and so on. You might also mark certain key notes
that have long term formal importance. KENNETH WOODS ON
TWITTER
Motivic analysis is also useful to mark. I’ll often bracket motives and their
constituent parts in a very systematic way, and then I can trace their
development by showing when a new idea is actually and inversion or a mirror
or an extension of an earlier motive. In large structures, I’ll often make notes to
myself showing where an idea has come from (Last movement theme e-d-f is
mirror of first movement theme f-d-e).

I find it very helpful to mark the lengths of each phrase or sub-phrase. So much
music falls into four-bar units it is helpful to know exactly where those patterns
are, as well as where they change. I’ll also then extend that analysis up in levels,
so that I can easily see the phrase structure of an entire section of a work in a
glance. We often do mark entrances (I use capital letters for thematic entrances
and lower case for non thematic ones), which we can then use in connection
with the motivic marks. This means you can quickly see that the bassoon is
entering with the cellos on the third beat of the bar on an e half-diminished
chord, playing the second half of the second theme in augmentation over a b
pedal.

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Also important to some, especially in 20th century music, is marking how you
are beating things- is this 5/8 2+3 or 3+2? You don’t want to run the risk of doing
Tweets by
it differently each time. Some conductors highlight every meter change- I was @kennethwoods
taught to do this, but rarely do it at all anymore unless I find the score hard to
read because of small or shoddy print. However, if there is a choice between Kenneth Woods
Retweeted
putting in a big, ugly, yellow highlighter mark or fucking up a concert, I find that is
an easy choice. Avie Records
@avierec
New video from
One well-known teacher, who’s not known as a subjective guy, suggested
#DonaldFraser's
conductors should try actually writing in descriptive words. One might cringe at #SongsForStrings
the thought of what is written in his score of Tristan, but it is a powerful tool, as #beautiful #arrangements
long as you keep it to yourself- these are not things you shout at the players vimeo.com/293228908?
utm_…
(“Transcendent, people!”)(never say “people!” when addressing people), but
things you might think of when conceptualizing your gestures. I rarely do this,
which gives it quite a power when I turn the page and see a particularly vivid
word there waiting for me.

Some conductors, including Furtwangler, also do a lot of analysis off of the score
using charts and reductions. Furtwangler was a keen student of Schenkerian
analysis, and made extensive charts of everything he conducted. His perceived
spontaneity, and subjectivity was rooted in deep and careful study, as was that of 2h

Celibache.
Kenneth Wood
@kennethwoods
I think a conductor is wise to put his or her ego aside when deciding how to mark
Hi Mitch. So glad to hear
or whether to mark a score- you’re there to facilitate performance, not to show
you're spending time with
everyone how smart you are. If Solti and Bernstein needed to mark the crap out the glorious symphonies o
of their music, I think anyone can get away with it.
Embed View on Twit

At the end of the day, when you’re preparing a piece you are so involved in it, it
is easy to manage without much marking if you put the hours in, but it is so
helpful to have a written record of your ideas and discoveries when you come
back to the work many years later. Sometimes it is a life-saver, for instance
when you get called to do something last minute, those markings can save the
day. Sometimes, it is a matter of recording your whole experience with a piece:
I’ve also got years of notes from observations of other conductor’s rehearsals
and concerts (Ivan Fischer in two here, James Conlon in four, Gunter Wand
uses alternate version from 1905 for this movement, Jesus Lopez-Cobos all
down-bows).

Likewise, we can learn a lot from the way other conductors mark their music. At
the Cincinnati Symphony, I often had the chance to look at the markings of the
music director or of other guest conductors and study their markings. Richard
Hickox told me that when he was getting started, Colin Davis used to loan him
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his scores to major pieces so that Richard could study his markings, and
Richard has done the same for me. Gerhard’s collection is full of scores of
Milhaud, Copland and Stravinsky with ACTUAL COMMENTS FROM THE
COMPOSERS! How cool. These things need to be preserved.

If I have some time next month, I’ll post a follow up with some pdfs of different
kinds of markings from me and some other conductors.

UPDATE- Click here for a nice response from Steve Hicken at Listen.

c. 2006 Kenneth Woods

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

American conductor, composer and cellist Kenneth Woods is

Principal Conductor of the English Symphony Orchestra,
Artistic Director of the Colorado MahlerFest and cellist of the

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10/5/2018 Score Marking | Kenneth Woods - conductor

string trio Ensemble Epomeo. He records for the Avie, Somm,

Nimbus, Signum, MSR and Toccata labels.

Learn about Kenneth at www.kennethwoods.net

All material in these pages is protected by copyright.

8 COMMENTS ON “SCORE MARKING”

Steve Hicken November 1, 2006

Great stuff, Ken. Thanks.

Kenneth Woods November 1, 2006

Hi Steve- Thanks for the note!

Hope your concert went well the other day.

KW

Steve Hicken November 1, 2006

You’re welcome, Ken.

The concert is next week, and I’ll post somewhere about how it went. I
won’t be able to be there, but I hope to get a report quickly.

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Kindertotenleider 1- snapshots of a first rehearsal

Christine Andrews July 5, 2009

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10/5/2018 Score Marking | Kenneth Woods - conductor

Hey do you know anything about markings of conductors say from the
nineteenth-century…about red and blue pencils then? How was it
different from today- Looking at some conducting scores of Costa.
Christine

chitra April 8, 2010

Dear sir,

If you see a score marking (Publisher’s) of a lower case a and a 2 like this
(a2), what does that indicate? I have a conductor’s score with the a2
written above both the flute and the tuba parts. It isn’t in reference to the
A2 pitch on the piano as a Flute and Tuba can’t both be directed to play
that note. I have searched the net and score-reading books for the
answer and found no leads.

Thanks, and Best Regards,

Chitra

Kenneth Woods April 8, 2010

That marking usually refers to 2 players (ie flute 1 and 2 or tuba and 3rd
trombone) playing in unison.

KW

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