Should the Conductor Talk to the Audience?

Unsplash.com: Jason Rosewell

It seems extremely "proper" for the conductor to lead the orchestra and ignore the audience. He (still almost always a he, unfortunately) literally turns his back to the crowd and focuses on the players.

But when I hear the New York Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Phil on my local NPR station, their conductors talk to the audience. It seems friendlier and "less stuffy" to me.

In the VCO (Volunteer Community Orchestra) I've played in the last several years, the conductor talked to the audience. Apparently, before I joined, he talked quite a bit, to the point the Board told him to cut it out. Yes, the conductor was honestly a bit weird and conversation with him could be "interesting" as his lack of awareness sometimes led to off-putting comments.

But Jason Heath, in his Double Bass Blog, tells the story of "The Babbling Conductor." Ouch. Things were so bad, when a microphone was grabbed, multiple musicians set their watches to time exactly how long the conductor covers the audience in words rather than music. The average? 30 minutes. Length of time he talked in one concert? 45 full minutes. Double ouch.

Does your conductor talk to the audience? Does he or she do it well, or do you pull out your phone and check your email? Let me know.

But most important, let me know what the conductor says and if it helps the concert or hurts it. I'm all for avoiding mistakes others have made before me.

In my defense, in my real life I have given many speeches and am pretty good with a microphone. I've been planning what to talk about during my audition concert, but my goals is to say all the important stuff in 2-3 minutes per verbal interlulde.

45 minutes of chat from a conductor? It's like you pay for a concert and a
podcast breaks out. Not for me.

Comments

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