I’ve published a couple of lessons at Connexions that cover the basics of how to conduct, so I regularly get questions about conductors who don’t seem to be following the rules. In particular, many very good (even great) conductors aren’t really giving a downbeat – I can think of no other way to say it – on the downbeat. It looks like they are “going up” instead of down when we hear the beat. To my mind, there are two parts to the answer to this question: Are they breaking the “rules for conducting” and if so, why?
So, first, are they breaking the rules? As far as I know, conducting is generally taught with the rule of “the baton ‘hits bottom’ on the beat, as if it is bouncing off of the bottom (on beat 1) or side (on other beats) of an invisible container.” If the moment of that bounce is both obvious and predictable, this gives the performers a nice clear beat to follow, making it easier for them to play together very precisely. (But it’s quite possible that there are other “schools of conducting” or “cultures of conducting” out there. If you have been taught differently at the level of basic conducting, please comment and let us know!)
But the more interesting question is: if that is the rule, why do many good conductors break it? (And perhaps, by extension, does that mean that it’s not a useful rule?) I would argue here that the rules of music are useful in a different way than, for example, the rules of engineering. Let’s say you want to design a bridge. There are certain engineering rules you need to follow in order to make the bridge safe. If you decide to ignore those rules in order to make the bridge prettier or cheaper, that makes you a bad engineer. But if you decide to “break a rule” in music, the results are not necessarily bad. The rules of music are not prescriptions that you must follow in order to keep people safe; they are simply descriptions of what good musicians tend to do. Their purpose is to help people become better musicians, but it is always the music that is important, not the rules. For example, violin teachers may notice that the violinists who play difficult pieces well tend to hold their instrument in a certain way, so that becomes the rule for how to hold a violin, but a great fiddle player may do things differently and still play brilliantly. Musicologists may notice that the most successful composers use harmony in a certain way, creating “rules for writing harmony.” Then along comes a great composer who breaks those rules in a persuasive way, and becomes so popular that the rules for writing harmony change.
My guess is that great music (and other great art, too) actually thrives in the space created by the tension between following and breaking rules. Strict rule-following gives results that are good enough but ordinary. But in order to create ground-breaking art, you have to break the rules in just the right way, inspired by a well-developed artistic intuition. Breaking the rules in any other way gives results that are not good enough, which is why it is generally a good idea for beginners to follow the rules.
Which brings me back to the conducting. Good conducting is also an art, not a science. When conducting a large group of musicians, structure is a very useful thing to have, but it is not the only thing. Great conductors don’t just keep their performers “together,” they also communicate in detail how they want done to create a powerful performance-by-many that is guided by a single “vision” of how the music should sound.
A beginning conductor should probably follow the rules. A competent conductor can keep a group of musicians together with a clear beat, and when the performers are young or inexperienced, or even simply unfamiliar with the conductor, that structure – the rules – may be the most important focus. But when conductor and performers share musical intuition and good communication, the conductor becomes free to decide that an upsweep is better than a downbeat to convey “how the beat should feel.” In fact, a simple nod or lift of the eyebrow may be enough to convey how and when to play. Then the conductor is free to do whatever it takes to create the desired performance, even if it means “breaking the rules.”
From my little experience singing in a choir, I definitely see the idea that conducting is an art and not a science, and I’m a bit surprised that people have the expectation that a good conductor uses those rules so precisely. I’ve always enjoyed watching the conductor during performances – they always get into the music so much, it doesn’t seem like they can physically confine themselves to rules! I don’t use the conductor a whole lot though (at least not consciously); I mostly listen to the people around me, so my impression on this is not really very educated…
I like to keep in mind something I read once: “know the rules and they will set you free.” Once you’ve learned them and ingrained them, you can break them deliberately and specifically, rather than by random accident, so it will be more aesthetically pleasing to the sensibilities of the audience.
Yes, know the rules and they will set you free; that is exactly what I was trying to say. But I also have some sympathy for people who want conducting that looks like what they have learned. If you are used to seeing a down-stroke on the beat (maybe that’s what your high school band director always did, and for good reason!), it can be quite disconcerting to see something different, because it looks like the conductor and the performers are not in sync with each other.