Monday, May 25, 2009
“The output of symphonies in Europe in the fifty years between 1750 and 1800 was prodigious; it has been estimated that the number was well in excess of twenty thousand. It was customary to order a symphony for a specific occasion, as one might order a new coat or wig; one would no more play an old symphony at a special occasion than one would wear an old suit of clothes. The musicians who composed these pieces to order regarded themselves more as skilled craftsmen producing for a market than as artists in the modern sense.
Symphonies were generally played at sight or after a single rehearsal; typically, they would receive one or at most a handful of performances, and then the score and parts would be put away to gather dust in a cupboard or used to light the fire. The demand for new symphonies was as insatiable as the demand for new pop songs in our own time, and last year’s symphonies were as stale as last year’s songs.”
Christopher Small, “Musicking: The Meanings of Performing and Listening“