Seminar: Raising the Invisible Curtain: How Can We (and Why Do We) Bring Listeners Further Inside the Music?
Workshop: Hands On: How to Enhance the Interactivity of Your Program

Thursday, October 28, 2004

For the second year in a row, PMP invited Eric Booth to hold a seminar and workshop at the Curtis Institute of Music on audience participation and engagement in musical performances. Mr. Booth, an innovative arts educator on staff at The Juilliard School, has also enjoyed careers as an actor, a market researcher, and a teacher, and combines these fields in his approaches to improving the experience of concertgoers. Last October, Booth’s event focused on language that might be used before, during, or after a public performance to enhance the listening experience.

Mr. Booth included a great deal of interactivity in his morning seminar, Raising the Invisible Curtain: How Can We (and Why Do We) Bring Listeners Further Inside the Music? He asked the audience to brainstorm the qualities of a successful musical experience and demonstrated different ways of framing performances of William Carlos William’s poem “The Red Wheel Barrow” – with no introduction, with a lengthy biographical introduction, and with an illuminating detail regarding the composition of the poem – concluding the demonstration by asking for feedback on which frame was most helpful to listeners.

Booth went on to articulate the task of engaging audiences and delivering a rewarding experience. The aim, he suggested, is to “tap [the audience’s] competence” and to provide them with an “entry point” to the performance. His rule, he said, is “engagement before information” – the expressive and interpretive experience begins only after the line of communication has been established. He encouraged performers to prioritize the piece’s personal relevance for the audience and to “be the thing,” to find a way to portray or embody crucial aspects of what will be performed. Elucidating the structure of a piece before it is played, he argued, can help maintain audience members’ attention and give them more opportunities to connect with the music.

For the afternoon workshop, Hands On: How to Enhance the Interactivity of Your Program, a number of local artists presented introductory remarks that they might make for a piece. Example introductions were given by Alan Harler, Artistic Director of Mendelssohn Club; Linda Reichert and Jan Krzywicki of Network for New Music; Mogauwane Mahloele, a South African musician and instrument maker, and Diane Monroe, a composer and violinist who performs in both jazz and classical idioms. Each performer, with unique styles, spoke boldly before the group and received feedback both from the audience and from Mr. Booth.