As Carlos knows, because he kindly helped me in another thread, I have to take the exam this very year for the AFAM Three-Year Degree in Composition.
In my opinion, the practice of score reading is not completely wretched and useless. First of all, we must ask ourselves the question "for what purpose am I reading a score?". I believe the main cliché surrounding this topic needs to be debunked: that reading as much as possible on the keyboard helps one understand better (or alternatively, reading as much as possible mentally while listening to the piece from a CD or live). Who cares about reading everything, really? Let me explain: at the moment I perform a reading of the written text, such an action will never return to me the totality of the aesthetic event; unless men are born with eyes composed like flies, the visual field is one and at most expands a little with practice, as demonstrated by speed-reading techniques applied to writing; therefore, reading ten or twenty staves one after another will always be a partial, selective act, through critical "glances," a core sample with specific analytical objectives. There will be moments when I am interested in evaluating how the author treated the accompaniment of double basses or contrabassoons; there will be times when I want to delve into how they use the brass, whether for harmonic pedals or if they bring them out in a figurative and more concerted way; there are times when it is important for me to analyze timbral combinations, doublings, the use of the extension of a particular instrument, instrumental sound emission techniques, harmonic choices, tonal paths, a dodecaphonic series, macro-formal aspects, structural elements, the use of the voice... the knowledge and perception of the totality of the piece will therefore derive from a process of successive steps that join one another in a mosaic of progressive awareness.
In short, I don't think there is even any sense in posing the problem of reading that sees everything, understands everything simultaneously in one single stroke, magically (hence the absurdity of the practical exam; I would understand more from a test where they asked me: "Listen, try to give us an idea of the harmonic treatment in these two pages", or "let us hear the opposition between the melodic parts of this passage and the lines that perform the function of harmonic support", or "which rhythmic elements do you think are important at this point? Use the keyboard to hint at the passages you consider characteristic of the writing adopted by the author", or even "Which transposing instruments are in this ensemble? Play their parts in real sounds" and so on, which is then the work one would do at home to study a piece, having to, for example, conduct it, analyze it, explain it to students in class, etc.). So, seen this way, the approach to the text via the keyboard has its own function; let's not forget that Score Reading is also about getting used to accompanying oneself by humming a sung part with the voice, something extremely useful for collaborative pianists, for anyone who wants to teach singing, wants to analyze opera and Lieder, but also needs to play in duos, trios, etc., with other instruments, because it opens the mind to listening to others and to listening to what one plays in relation to what others play or sing.
More generally, this path also helps to have that kind of musical "ease" in handling materials and the keyboard, that overall ability to "make music" which, together with improvisation and acoustic perception, should be a fundamental characteristic and objective of academic studies, so to speak, but which is not always valued in training paths; for this reason, one often hears light music or jazz musicians mocking classical musicians, accusing them of being musically clumsy and incapable of playing if they don't have their beautiful score written out line by line in front of them.
To Barbara, I would therefore say not to worry, do not live with the myth of a multi-level reading of a Mahlerian score that occurs in the sacred and unique instant of a single passage; think about maturing the cultural and critical tools necessary to be able to realize, and thus appreciate, and thus to be intelligently moved by the aesthetic content of a musical text through a process that happens over time, which is evolutionary, growing, moving forward, going back on itself, retracing and ruminating infinitely, deepening, discovering new things every time. A moment will come when finally, reading a score perhaps while listening to its performance, you will have the perception of a whole that is unitary and at the same time articulated, but because you will have discovered it through a fascinating composite journey.
As for academic courses, given what the Ministry has messed up in recent decades, I don't think there is much to be happy about and we will have to"}
continuing to take somewhat silly exams on debatable study programs...
