aarongreen -> RE: Grisha blows their minds in Texas (Jun. 29 2010 2:00:01)
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quote:
It has to be asked – what is the purpose of a review in the first place. Historically the purpose was so that before people spend both their time and their money to see a performance, or exhibit, etc., they could be given an idea of whether or not it is worth spending their time and money, and also to give the general public a comprehensive sense of an artist's talent. And for centuries, in every civilized country, a critic with expertise on the particular art is sent to give his or her expert opinion. If all that the editor wanted was just any old opinion, he could have picked any one of the first hundred people in the telephone directory, or better yet, just grabbed the first person he sees off the street, and send him to do the review. But that is not – and never has been – what is done. A critic reviewing a pianist is almost always an accomplished pianist himself, who has the knowledge and expertise of both piano technique and piano repertoire to enable him or her to make a critical judgment based on something more than merely whether he "likes it" or "doesn't like it." Pianists have "flying fingers" also, but I have never read a review of a pianist that used such a generic term in place of a specific comment on technique. Nor have I ever read any review of any instrumentalist where the critic did not discuss the artist's interpretation of specific pieces that had been played. An art critic sent to review an exhibit of paintings is invariably someone with training in painting, and frequently in art history as well, and can comment on the various aspects of the paintings – brushwork, composition, perspective, color, etc. The editor would not send me to review an exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, any more than he would send the average person on the street, because neither of us has any expertise in art. If he did send me, all I could do would be to look at the paintings and say in some vague general sense that "Well, I kind of like that one," or "I'm not too wild about that one," etc. That's not a review, any more than someone talking about "flying fingers" without ever even discussing the actual palos, and how well Grisha revealed the essence each individual palo, or any specific aspects of his technique, constitutes a review. It is clear that if Michael May is not a flamenco aficionado, than his opinion of Grisha's playing, including his ridiculous assessment to the effect that Grisha is not quite ready yet, is exactly the same in every respect as grabbing the first person you find off the street to go listen to Grisha and tell us what kind of flamenco guitarist he thinks Grisha is. In regard to critics I can only say I wouldn't trust editors to know enough to pick well educated critics, or really, critics with independent artistic sensibilities. It's easy to learn enough about a subject to parrot what you read or the opinions that pass for the standard. That doesn't make a good critic though, in fact it makes the worst type, the one who is always three steps behind whats going on and therefore doesn't understand it and doesn't like it. There is a great book called the History of Musical Invective. It contains a few hundred years worth of reviews of major composers works, from Beethoven to Schoenberg. What it shows is how creative critics are at saying something sucks. These guys all aced creative writing thats for sure. A friend was at a Sabicas concert in the early 80's and happened to notice the critic from the NY Times a few seats away. He watched the guy through out the concert. Sabicas was in top form, played an magical, inspired concert and this guy looks bored to tears. Then at the beginning of the segurias, Sabicas does the snare drum effect thing and this guy jumps out of his seat. The review was glowing. In terms of this review of Grisha I think the reviewer was just trying to make himself sound more discerning than he is. It's a pretty obvious attempt considering how blown away he apparently was. Dennis Koster told me recently that he heard Grisha's recording of Sabicas' material and said it blew his mind, so you know I don't think less of the critic in Austin for simply saying the concert rocked his world.
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