The first concert with the virtual conductor was in Japan
The Tokyo Symphony orchestra began a series of concerts with the performance of "Heroic" third Symphony of Beethoven with a virtual conductor. Such a solution was found due to the fact that the main conductor of the orchestra and its music Director, the Englishman Jonathan Nott for a pandemic for several months can not come to Japan.
"An orchestra with a virtual conductor is for the first time. And the world might be too. At least I have not heard of such a thing. The chief conductor of our orchestra cannot come to Japan due to restrictions imposed following the spread of coronavirus in the world. Nott's last performance with the orchestra was in December. In addition, the orchestra missed, for musicians its method of creation of music – main", - told RIA Novosti the General Manager of the orchestra Tsutomu Tsuji.
At first, the idea was to conduct online. But there is a problem of asynchronous due to the delay of the broadcast. From the idea was ready to give up, when Jonathan Knott invited the band to play under his video. The leadership of the orchestra decided that it was a joke. But Knott reminded of the famous legend that when Beethoven conducted his Ninth Symphony, he was deaf and did not hear the applause, and only after one of the singers turned him around to face the room, he could see the applause.
However, after the first rehearsal it turned out that this method is extremely difficult for performers. The conductor, making a video can't hear or see the orchestra, he works as "deaf", and therefore cannot adapt to the orchestra, to go on some compromises.
"Within the same phrase (at Knott's) changing the pace. If you adjust the game to fit the tempo as a metronome, it does not coincide with the picture. And just when the band started to create music, it all came together. It was a very unexpected discovery. I think it happened because the conductor – it is Nott. We are working with him for the seventh season. During this time, a lot of works we did together. We know his manner of conduct. Remember when he gave instructions. Plus there's video and his comments," explained General Manager.
Comments from notta after rehearsal with a request to correct a particular nuance in the performance deserve special mention. It's six pages of fine print, which most often occurs in the word colour – color.
"He doesn't write about the pace he writes is that the kind of color that needs to be done. Everywhere – color, color, color. This is the tone. The sound was softer or darker. If you understand this, the bow moves differently, and that explains why he's in this place is conducted. And then the execution coincides with the image," explained Tsutomu Tsuji.
Concertmaster of the orchestra, its concertmaster, Gleb Nikitin believes that the mention of color is absolutely justified and speaks to the level of the orchestra.
"This is the level where the usual problem of the orchestra already solved a priori, that phase has already passed. And at the next level when there is no conversation about the rhythm, about the "musical life", then we can talk about the color. In his time at the Conservatory with our wonderful conductor Christmas also mostly talked about the color. Is a certain level. And Scriabin in the score included a color line," - said Nikitin.
Due to security measures in connection with the spread of the coronavirus in the hall and foyer are sprays with disinfectant, inspectors do not tear off the ticket stubs and distribute programs is the spectator himself does. The hall on 2 thousand places you could sell less than one third of tickets – 600, they were all sold out. But this is an additional burden on the musicians – they play two concerts a day. Between the audience in the interval one or two chairs. The orchestra also had to play in a reduced composition.
Before the execution the waiter brought four large screens, one of them was facing to the auditorium, the other three musicians. After the completion of the Symphony and re-calls the orchestra on stage the audience was in for a surprise – appeared on the screen conductor Jonathan Nott, who has been in contact with his cellular, too, to applaud the band.