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Apr. 8th, 2021 01:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hoisinsauce posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
secretfanspaceA space to chat fandom! Anon!
Got a WIP you're excited about? Want to rave about your fave? Or is your fandom absolutely in love with a character who detracts from every scene they bumble into, and you need somewhere to vent? You're in the right place!
(start a comment thread by replying to this post)
Got a WIP you're excited about? Want to rave about your fave? Or is your fandom absolutely in love with a character who detracts from every scene they bumble into, and you need somewhere to vent? You're in the right place!
(start a comment thread by replying to this post)
Re: How's it going?
Date: 2021-07-07 10:27 am (UTC)(By Shostakovich, composer, about Toscanini, a well-respected conductor infamous for being abusive toward the orchestras he worked with)
"I hate Toscanini. I’ve never heard him in a concert hall, but I’ve heard enough of his recordings. What he does to music is terrible in my opinion. He chops it up into a hash and then pours a disgusting sauce over it. Toscanini ‘honoured’ me by conducting my symphonies. I heard those records, too, and they’re worthless. I’ve read about Toscanini’s conducting style and his manner of conducting a rehearsal. The people who describe this disgraceful behaviour are for some reason delighted by it. I simply can’t understand what they find delightful. I think it’s outrageous, not delightful. He screams and curses the musicians and makes scenes in the most shameless manner. The poor musicians have to put up with all this nonsense or be sacked. And they even begin to see ‘something in it’. (…) Toscanini sent me his recording of my Seventh Symphony and hearing it made me very angry. Everything is wrong. The spirit and the character and the tempi. It’s a sloppy, hack job. I wrote him a letter expressing my views. I don’t know if he ever got it; maybe he did and pretended not to – that would be completely in keeping with his vain and egoistic style. Why do I think that Toscanini didn’t let it be known that I wrote to him? Because much later I received a letter from America: I was elected to the Toscanini Society! They must have thought that I was a great fan of the maestro’s. I began receiving records on a regular basis: all new recordings by Toscanini. My only comfort is that at least I always have a birthday present handy. Naturally, I wouldn’t give something like that to a friend. But to an acquaintance-why not? It pleases them and it’s less trouble for me. That’s one of life’s most difficult problems- what to give for a birthday or anniversary to a person you don’t particularly like, don’t know very well, and don’t respect. Conductors are too often rude and conceited tyrants. And in my youth I often had to fight fierce battles with them, battles for my music and my dignity."
Re: How's it going?
Date: 2021-07-07 03:42 pm (UTC)Incidentally, cognitive dissonance is a major psychological phenomenon. If you take enough shit while doing X or a part of Y, you start believing even more fervently in X/Y. It MUST be awesome, or else why else would you have put up with so much shit? Explains a lot of hazing rituals. In two words: they work.
Re: How's it going?
Date: 2021-07-08 12:24 am (UTC)Toscanini shouting at a bass section (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-1KtSOwLXE) reminds me of Fletcher from Whiplash. I was surprised so many people thought the ending of that movie was unambiguously triumphant. Always wondered how many of them had gone through similar training and found it useful (woohoo cognitive dissonance), vs how many had never been obsessively devoted to learning a skill and romanticized the thought of someone else making them do it.
Re: How's it going?
Date: 2021-07-08 11:09 pm (UTC)