'Together' in Shaw-speak

A truly remarkable insight from Andrew Gee, sent out this morning.  

Mr. Stanley Romanstein, President

Atlanta Symphony Orchestra

1280 Peachtree Street, NE

Atlanta, GA 30309

Dear Mr. Romanstein:

I think it was the spring of 2008 during some free time before our performance of Theofanidis' "The Here and Now" at Carnegie Hall, I was browsing the museum display room adjacent to the gift shop. In a glass case alongside directors' batons of Bernstein, Ormandy, and Toscanini, I saw a worn baton donated to Carnegie by Robert Shaw, loosely wrapped in string down near the base. I wondered, "What's that about? Was he trying to hold together a faithful old baton? Or, what?" 

Then my musing drifted back to my first rehearsal in Carnegie Hall for Gustav Mahler's 8th Symphony in May of 1995. . . .

With 560 choral singers deployed on stage (148), and filling the two tiers of box seats circling the hall (412), awaiting Robert Shaw's marching orders from the podium upon which he faced the farthest reaches of the hall, Shaw greeted the assembled multitude and remarked on the privilege of performing Mahler's 8th in this space. Briefly interrupting his remarks, he asked his assistant and our Choral Administrator, Nola Frink, to bring him a 30-inch length of string and resumed his discourse. When she returned to hand him the string, he somewhat gruffly said, "This is not 30 inches!" Nola retorted, "Oh yes it is! . . . I measured it!" Grumpily thanking her for the string, he tied it to his pocket tempo watch and began swinging it from side to side. Some of us wondered if he intended to hypnotize us!

As he continued swinging the watch, he explained that when Stravinsky (yes, Stravinsky) composed, he didn't start with a melody or other elements of composition, he started with a tempo.

Still swinging: "Get this tempo inside you.  Following the leader got us Hitler and the Third Reich."  (A muffled gasp arose.)

"We will never be able to maintain a unified ensemble if you try to follow me. The distances are too great.  Close your eyes. We're going to do this TOGETHER.  The Hall will develop its own tempo, its own voice."

He counted us off, and nearly 600 singers on stage and around the two tiers of boxes sang an unimaginable stretch of the march-like setting of the 9th century hymn together  -  with our eyes closed:

Veni! Veni, Creator Spiritus,

Mentes tuorum visita.

Imple superna gratia,

Quae tu creasti pectora.

Qui diceris Paraclitus,

Altissimi donum Dei,

Fons vivus, ignis, caritas

Et spiritualis unctio.

Infirma nostri corporis

Virtute firmans perpeti,

Accende lumen sensibus,

Infunde amorem cordibus. . . .

Come, creative Spirit,

Visit the minds of Your followers.

Fill with celestial grace

Those hearts which you created.

You who are called the Paraclete,

Gift of God the most high,

Living fountain, fire, charitable love

And spiritual balm.

Strengthening with lasting vigor

The weaknesses of our body,

Kindle a light of our senses,

Infuse love in our hearts. . . .

When it came to making music, Robert Shaw eschewed the privileges and perquisites of money, power, and fame of which, I suppose, he had plenty. He devoted his time, attention, energy and passion to the musical and choral disciplines in service of the music. He subordinated himself to the creativity and intentions of the composer. 

He respected and loved musicians. He stated outright that he did not make the music, that MUSICIANS make the music. He admonished us during the labor dispute of 1996 that we must NEVER do ANYTHING that would "dim the stars in their eyes!"

It was clear to me at the benefit concert on Friday evening that the musicians eyes are dimmed with disillusionment, disappointment, distress, and yes, tears. There is no excuse for that.

It is of little to no benefit to seek to allocate blame for "the fix we's in," as Mr. Shaw might say. In fact, I would want to affirm that all parties, audiences, donors, board (s), management, fund-raisers, administrative staff, conductors, players, fellow choristers, other volunteers, janitors, security, etc., have been doing everything necessary to have achieved a world-class level of artistic/musical/spiritual expression and the building of a wonderful, musical, symphonic, choral, artistic organization. 

I cannot thank these people (THIS MEANS YOU !!!) enough for contributing to the deeply moving, healing, growth-producing, joyful experience I have had for the past 19 seasons as an ASO Chorister— -- an experience not only for ourselves but to be offered to our community and society at large.

We could argue from now until Doomsday about what would be a fair allocation of the burden of discharging a 10-year debt of $20 million, of how to re-structure a balanced-budget future. We should pursue some reasonable form of fairness—which is not yet evident. We must transcend the simplistic thinking that this is just another labor-union vs. management dispute. God help us, it is not! This is about providing ourselves, each other, our community, our society, and our world access to a living fountain, fire, charitable love, and spiritual balm. We will all have to shoulder the burden. We must do so without damaging the exquisite quality of expression and artistic/musical community that we cherish. The stakes are too high to do otherwise.

Ultimately, whatever we do to extricate ourselves from this disastrous situation, and as Mr. Shaw said:  we must do it TOGETHER.

With the help of the creative Spirit, (living fountain, fire, charitable love, and spiritual balm), our minds visited and hearts filled with grace, our weaknesses strengthened, light kindling our senses, and our hearts infused with Love ...

. . . we should be able to do it with our eyes closed.

Sincerely,

Andrew Gee

ASO Chorus

Bass II, #118

1993-Present