Editor's Note: Mr. DeBolt is the solo bassoonist of the Kansas City Philharmonic Orchestra.
When setting about to review the bassoon aspects of the IDRS convention it is difficult for me to recall any event on the schedule that was not interesting and applicable to the bassoonist. Especially I was impressed with the warm atmosphere of colleagues sharing performances, interests, problems, and solutions. One comes away with ideas to stimulate thinking and to lead to better playing and teaching in the year ahead.
Three bassoonists were featured in solo and chamber works on two of the three evening recitals. These performances, along with the shorter ones heard, made it clear to me that if there is an American school of bassoon playing, it is a living, developing art embodying diversity of tone, style, and expression.
Gerald Corey appeared on the first half of Tuesday's program playing Two Arias for wind ensemble by Handel, Sonata No. 5 for oboes, bassoon, and continuo by Zelenka, and Willard Elliot's Suite of Six French Songs for oboe, bassoon, and piano. Corey's is a cool, clear style of playing with unusually accurate intonation. Especially memorable were his soaring lyric phrases with oboist Daniel Stolper in the grateful Elliot work and the brilliant virtuosic bassoon solos which were the high point of the repetitious Zelenka Sonata.
After intermission Arthur Grossman and pianist Gertrude Kuehefuhs presented a model of sensitive solo-recital collaboration. Grossman played with a resonant and smoothly floating tone and Kuehefuhs complemented it with her well controlled and warmly expressive accompaniment. Noël-Gallon's Récit et Allegro and Tansman's Suite pour Basson offered both lyricism and technical fluency, but they were eclipsed by the show-stopping pyrotechnics of Watterson's Souvenir de Donizetti. This piece is filled with amusing cliches, but the polished elegance of the performance raised it above its essential triviality. Anyone who missed Watterson's subtle humor surely got his/her bellylaughs in William O. Smith's Tribute to the Bassoon, a sort of stunt-night piece for bassoon with taped narration which had Grossman add singing and foot-work to his already copious bag of tricks.
On Wednesday evening Leonard Hindell, ably assisted by Mikael Eliasen at the keyboards, offered a recital featuring Vivaldi, French music, and a contemporary piece. In the Vivaldi Concerto F. VIII, No. 17 Hindell disclosed a tone of sturdy and robust attractiveness, the lyric passages having an operatic bass-baritone character as contrasted with Grossman's lieder-singer quality. This approach constructed as a balanced sequence of short sections, and in the Saint-Saëns Sonata, which featured a scherzo crisp and lively all the way to the E. Bozza's Fantaisie and Jancourt's Napolitan, Air Varie were also smoothly and attractively played, but my favorite, along with the Saint-Saëns, was Vivaldi's Trio in A Minor for recorder, bassoon, and harpsichord. I questioned balancing a recorder with a modern bassoon, but Daniel Waitzman played the recorder with unusual richness and intensity of expression, and Hindell switched to a more covered and gentle sounding reed, producing together some of the loveliest moments of the evening.
The IDRS prize-winning compositions were a mixed bag. The first prize winner (Daniel Perlongo-Trio: Oboe, clar., bsn.) was too difficult to present. (It will be performed at a future conference). Fantasy for Woodwind Quintet by William Billingsley sounded appealing and flowed expressively as played by our fine hosts William Baker and Robert Cochran along with their Ohio State Quintet colleagues. Brooke Halpin's Solo, an oboe and bassoon duet played by Eric Ohlsson and Carole Mason, resembles the quintet only in its serial conception. Despite a solid performance its effect was halting and incoherent on first hearing.
The Ohio College Teachers' Bassoon Ensemble made a good case for the artistic merits of the medium, and the student Wisconsin Bassoon Ensemble demonstrated their excellent training on a shared program of varied pieces.
Sanford Berry's presentation of Mihalovici's Sonata, Op. 76 disappointed me, for the piece seemed rather dry, and the pianist with lid up obscured much of the very capable bassoon playing.
Harold Robison tackled a potentially more difficult balance problem in programming works for bassoon and organ: Raynor Brown's Sonata (1973) and Richard Wetzel's Fantasy on a Jongleur Theme (1979). Careful scoring by the composers and the sensitive registration and playing of organist Janice Robison contributed to his creating a fine musical result.
Robert H. Olson introduced his arrangements of some attractive light early romantic works originally for the Ophicleide (a keyed brass bass), and was joined by bassoonist Ann Obenour in duets from Solfège Method for Ophicleide by Caussinus. His fluent performance of a Demersseman quintet for bassoon and strings (originally Ophicleide and piano) was marred only by an uneven string group.
Ronald Tyree's lecture on making bassoon shapers offered courage to players entering the workshop. I was interested by his ideas on dimensions, proportions, and use of the shaper as well as the manufacturing technique, the details of which may be obtained from him.
Courage was also offered by Stanley Maret's contrabassoon presentation, this time to players and teachers encountering the beautiful beast. He suggested a wedge tapered reed with somewhat less heart than used for the bassoon, and numerous resonance and intonation fingerings, all of which contributed to the polished standard of playing he demonstrated.
Thanks to Christopher Weait and Dr. John B. Shea I now have the courage to admit something I have long felt: my vibrato comes from the throat rather than from the diaphragm, with variations controlled by impulses similar to those producing voice inflections. Weait and Shea demonstrated with a fluoroscopic video tape that the larynx (voice box), not the diaphragm or any abdominal muscle, is indeed where the action is. Confirming this with other players as subjects and developing teaching techniques based upon the information are areas for future work.
The new soft maple bassoon presented by Alan Fox impressed me as a big step forward by his team in the areas of resonance, response, and tuning. When he can assure its consistent production and durability it should make a significant contribution to the future of bassoon playing in this country, especially in the light of recent international monetary trends.
The "Alexander Technique for Musicians" as demonstrated by Prof. and Mrs. William Conable is a means of facilitating movement throughout the body by developing a free relationship between the head and the neck. Those interested are referred to Frank Jones' Body Awareness in Movement (pub. Schocken).
Oboists John de Lancie and Stevens Hewitt also offered advice that is applicable to players of any instrument, thus compensating for the lack of a general bassoon master class. Hewitt's session was so marvelously filled with practice procedures for achieving a highly polished and accurate standard of performance that its coverage would require at least another complete article.
John de Lancie, Director of the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia, called for teachers to be honest with students aspiring to become professionals by demanding the exacting technical standards required for professional success and by counseling individuals about their prospects for a livelihood in today's tight job market. It is hoped that these steps will relieve the regrettable oversupply of less-than-outstanding players and permit the best to find more opportunities for experience. Still unresolved is the dilemma of the teacher who must recruit in order to maintain his position. Those in attendance seemed to agree that Mr. de Lancie tells it like it is.
And on that note we descend the mountain and return to work.