Teddy Abrams

Hello, how are you?

So, when I got to Louisville 10 years ago, there had been a real period of—of challenging situations that, that actually were the reasons that I was brought there in the first place. But the circumstances were, uh, a bankruptcy, and a strike, and work stoppage. I mean, basically all of the—the most, um, you know, upsetting and—and difficult, uh, circumstances that an orchestra could face. And they were just coming out of this period and—and had found a way to restore the orchestra and—and done that under some—some very severe, um, and—and dire circumstances. But they were up and playing by the time that I got there, but again with—with these really, um, significant restrictions and—and, and limitations and—and contractions. The orchestra had—had, um, shrunk in size and—and many players, uh, had—had left. Um, there'd been a void in—in artistic leadership, to—to say the least, for a—a—a very long time at that point. Um, and so, I was 25 when I got the job, uh, which is, you know, a—it's actually a—a good time to do something like that because you're—you're—you're just young enough, um, to—to be, well, somewhere between naive and quixotic and all these—

Yes. Yeah, I was brought in for—for an audition, or—or actually it was—it was an initial reading session where I was just conducting the orchestra to see if there was any chemistry, uh, and then—then I was brought in to do an actual concert, um, a little while later.

Oh, yeah. Uh, I mean, and—and it can be developed. Also, it's just like any relationship between people. I mean, it take—sometimes takes some time for people to trust each other and—and find each other. Of course, in—in, in our profession, so much of the element of trust is—is built up in reputation, too, um, which is one of the really tough things about—about the—the art of conducting and about classical music and about symphonic organizations in general. That, if you are a conductor who is unknown, or even unknown to a specific orchestra, um, then you're—you're truly building from zero. Every single thing that you say and do is amplified and—and judged in a way that's very different than if you're coming in with a certain reputation and—and, uh, a—a respect, and a—, um, and—and perhaps just an understanding of who you are before you—you stand on the podium. And—and as a young conductor, you're hyper-aware of those sensitivities. And you're—you also are—are hyper-aware of the scrutiny and the—the magnifying glass that's—that's placed, uh, over you. But, and—and rightly so. I mean, you have to—you have to prove yourself and you have to navigate really tough waters. Remember that—that whether you're a young conductor or a very established conductor, if you're coming in to work with an orchestra, you're given the same schedule. You all have four rehearsals to go from the beginning of the week to the—the level of preparation needed to—to perform. And it doesn't matter. So, it doesn't matter if you've—you've, uh, you know, um, you—what, you've put out a gazillion recordings and are, are, you know, a world-famous conductor, or you've—you're doing this for the very first time. You have the same exact schedule, the same circumstances.

You feel that right away. Now—now, I have also been in situations where, over the course of a week, the, um—the relationship and the dynamic grows. Because a lot of it, too, is—is extra-musical. You know, much of the—the judgment process and the evaluation process from the orchestra, uh, that you're working with, i—is about who you are as—as a person, and—and as a musician. So, you have these—these competing things. You have like the, um, the element of charismatic leadership, you have the element of psychology, you have the element of pure musicianship. And those are three things that are separate from the—the physical act of conducting. And so, those—I would say those are the four, um, kind of components that—that build, uh, you know, a—a complete picture of who somebody is as a conductor.

Yeah.

Oh, certainly. Uh, I—I, I mean, I think that conducting has to be an extension of who you are as a broader person and a broader musician. I mean, if conducting is the end-all, like the—the whole, you know, kind of point of conducting is to get on the podium and wave your arms, then you have kind of a limited, um, relationship with—with artistry in general. Um, I—I, I see that as—as an expression of—of a—of a much more kind of developed picture of musicianship. The—the, the—the act of getting on the podium and waving your arms is a beautiful thing in and of itself, but I think it's only poignant and meaningful in the context of a greater sense of purpose and—and a bigger life as—as an artist overall. You know what I mean? Like, that cannot be the finished point. That can't be the singular purpose in life. There—there—that—that has to be, you know, one way of expressing something that—that, um, relates to who you are as a—as a musician.

Oh.

We did it with the, uh—the Scherzo second. Yeah, we did it the original. Yeah, and and, I'm not a, um, an ideologue about this. That—that just feels balanced to me. It also—it also seems like in terms of key structure—

—that is what's called for, because if you look at the relationship of the end of the slow movement to the beginning of the last movement—

—there—there's a particularly odd, you know, tritone relationship right there, that—that's—that's quite important in the—in the overarching counterpoint of the piece. Um, and you actually need to hear that tritone relationship for the—for the beginning of the last movement to make sense. It doesn't work if you come out of the—the Scherzo in the same way. But—but again, I'm not, um, a hardliner on the—on this stuff. I mean, I've—I've heard it both ways and—and if—I mean, if there are convincing performances, they're going to be convincing performances. But for me, structurally, the—the slow movement needs to sit in the—the position just before the last movement, and it—

We only do the two. We—we, we—we do that.

Yeah. And, you know, it's—it's—I think it actually is the right amount, because of course it was five originally, then three, and then two, um, but the, you know—it's, it's what, like, like any—I mean, it's not a gimmick. I don't want to say it's a gimmick, but—but of course, like Mahler, it's—it's a thing that he takes to a—to an extreme, and it—and it can—it can be, um, you know, comedic or gimmicky if it's—if it's not done well and—and, and with total commitment. And I think, like in comedy, two times just is off—off-putting and—and, and leaves you on guard, right? It's strange, and it leaves you wondering when the third time's going to come and then it doesn't. But three times is predictable.

That's—that's interesting. I had—I had not thought about phrasing Mahler differently from the way I look at—the, at all music. I mean, I, I, I think that there are—it—it might be less about the phrasing for me than the inflection that's—that's unique to Mahler. For me, with—the way—the way I think about phrasing in general, and—and this comes from a—a variety of teachers that I—that I had, um, is that you're—you're trying to conceive of the—the phrasing structure in the—the largest and longest possible terms. So, you're trying to think about, if this is a six-bar phrase, it's a five-bar phrase, it's a four-bar phrase—and there are many off-kilter, strange, you know, odd-numbered phrase—phrasings in, um—in Mahler in general, but in particular in the Sixth Symphony. You're—you're trying to think about, okay, if you are planning a destination from the beginning of the phrase to the last bit of the phrase, where can you peak in such a way that the phrase maintains its integrity and captures attention from beginning to end? And—and so much of the training that I got, especially at Curtis—this is a very Otto-Werner Mueller thing, who was my teacher there—is about getting to the last possible moment. And—and I think there's a lot of—of truth in that, that, that—that, that oftentimes people peak like in the first or second bar of a four-bar phrase, or a longer phrase, and while the music continues, the—the tension that pulls you into listening to that phrase recedes. And that's why—it's a little bit like people who drive by pressing on the gas and then releasing, and pressing on the gas and then releasing. You're—you're going forward, it's true, but you're doing it in a way that's—that's not terribly comfortable and doesn't feel like the driver understands—

—um, what it takes to get to the next destination.

Oh, yeah. It's, yeah, it's phenomenal.

Yeah.

I—I think it comes from whatever process you're going to use to study this music to a level where your expression of it is natural. And I think that, that—that's my goal in studying it, to feel like I have a compositional voice in the—in the production then of that piece. Like, I—I want to feel as close as possible to the sense that I wrote it. Not—not to say that I did write it and—and, and then, you know, have—have a certain ownership over it—not, not in a—an authoritarian way, I'm not talking about that—but I, I do want the feeling of authority that—that makes it feel like the expression is as free-flowing as if I'd improvised it or composed it myself.

And when—when you get to that point, which is very hard, I mean—and, and just being totally transparent, that, that—that's something of a rarity. I mean, that's—that's the peak right there, if you can get to a point of fluency with—with any piece of music, either as a performer or conductor, that you feel like you could have written it, it—it, it—it's suddenly a sense of like not being tethered to the ground anymore. You, you're—you're lifted off and you, you—you have this overview effect that you—that you get. Like, you can—it's almost like being in The Matrix, too, where you're not bound by the laws of gravity anymore. And—and, you know, I, there are—there are certain pieces where—where I've come, I think, close to that, and the act of performing it is a—is both a recreation and a creation process—

—as opposed to a recreation process exclusively, which is what it is for I think most people under most circumstances.

Yes, yes, yes, exactly. And—and, you know, of course, the other element to consider is that the stronger the orchestra, the more every individual player in that orchestra is also doing this simultaneously.

They're trying not to gunk up the system. They're actually trying to let them do that same thing and give them permission to—to do it to the greatest extent possible, while still, you know, making sure that the whole machine is building one thing, you know? And this is—this is the art of it. This is where it gets really, really complex. It both gets simpler and more complex, right, you know? You know what I mean?

This might be a deep cut, I don't know, you know, for, for your average, you know—

Wow.

Yes, yes.

So, the Ali musical that I'm writing right now is a totally new incarnation, um, of—of the—the work that I've been doing about Ali now for eight and a half years, basically. So, the original piece that I wrote is—is completely unrelated to—to the—the Broadway musical that's happening. Um, the Broadway musical is still a result of this original piece, but musically they—they are not connected. The original thing that I did, um, was what I call an immersive musical. Eh, it's a—it's a genre—I don't think I've invented it because it basically is oratorio; that's—that's, that's—that's its closest relative in—in real life—to kind of staged oratorios. Um, but I've done this now a couple of times with different subject matter. And, I'm—I'm interested in things that have significance historically or culturally, and finding a way to venerate and celebrate them on the orchestral stage, but in a more dramatic context than—than simply, you know, saying your—your big orchestral piece is about something and then, you know, leaving audiences to draw their own conclusions. And of course, this is exactly what composers like—like Handel were doing in—in their, you know, passion oratorios and—and, uh, you know, and, and Haydn and Mozart wrote along these lines, too, you know, but it was more, um, liturgical in nature. So I was really interested in this. I think also Bernstein does this in Mass, that it's—it's a—it's a combination of theater, of oratorio, and of, of pure music. And—and, so I—I, I hit upon this idea to tell Ali's story through that lens. So rather than—than having it be acted out in a—in a, um—in a purely theatrical sense, I was interested in, in, in creating a piece of music that uses Ali's own words, that uses the words of poets from three or four thousand years of history as a kind of Greek chorus, and then uses some light staging with a little bit of choreography, some video elements, things like that, to—to bring his story to life. But—but the music was center, that's why I called it a, you know, immersive music or, or, or an immersive musical, because it wasn't about putting the music in service to the theater, it was about bringing theatrical and, and, uh, you know, more, uh, kind of Gesamtkunstwerk elements to a—a musical primary form.

And—and also worked on Mass, too, as a—you know, it's great.

Well, and—and that's—that's what I mean, like, so this original piece that I wrote, that was an orchestral production. That was something for the local orchestra's main series, our Classics series. That—that was a limited, uh, production that was never intended to—to go to Broadway and run eight times a week for years, and then have multiple tours in—in different regions globally. That was not what that was. That—that was a—an art piece. I was really proud of it. I—I, I, I loved writing it. It allowed me to take, you know, ancient Greek poetry and—and ancient Chinese philosophy, and Sufi, uh, musical strands and mix that together with Ali's life. We had Rhiannon Giddens as one of the—the, the, the soloists. It was a—it was a such a fun project.

That's—that's a totally new piece. So, what I'm writing for Broadway, yeah, has to have mass appeal, and—and it has to be influenced by the elements of popular music that—that serve as the engine for most Broadway today. I mean, most Broadway today is a mixture of the things that have made film music successful and the things that have made popular music successful in varying degrees. So, some will be more oriented towards one or the other. You still get, you know, some—some more classic kind of Broadway that—that veers towards the, you know, the—the, the, the big kind of classic Broadway, the big kind of classic Hollywood sound. That's less and less common. Most of it is—is, you know, driven by, uh, the energy that fuels popular music today. Now, that's a broad spectrum, of course, so you'll get things that are more R&B focused, things that are more, uh, you know, country focused, uh, things that—that, that—that maybe, um, you know, re—reference rock, um, which, which of course was extremely popular, you know, you know, 20, 30 years ago, but—but still has its moments. Anyway, the—the music that I'm using as the kind of generative influence for the Ali musical, primarily circulates around Black music that Ali would have, uh, listened to or understood or would have been the—the kind of soundtrack for his own life. So, as we're telling Ali's story, I'm reference—referencing things like, you know, soul and Motown, um, and, uh, you know, uh, uh, uh, funk, all the way through hip-hop in—in the '80s to '90s, which would have been the, you know, the—the kind of Black-oriented musical portrait of—of his own life. And I'm lucky that I have a great team of people, um, you know, who specialize in—in this kind of music, and it's also music that I've loved and played, uh, since I was a kid. You know, I—I fell in love with jazz and—and funk early on, and that was my entry point into—to, um—you know, improvisational technique and popular music. So, so I—I love this music, but—but this is music that is universally appealing, you know, it's—it's, it's universally understood, and—and, um, I think it does a great job of representing Ali's life. But, you know, it's weird as a classical composer to be, you know, squarely in that world. Usually, I dipped my foot into it compositionally, but now I'm squarely in it.

You can't predict these things, but that—that's one of the—the things. I mean, I think people know when they have something special, but also a lot of very special things have not gotten universal recognition, so it's—you—you, you have to do it for the love of the genre. And I do think musical theater is—it, you know, like, like this is—who, what's the point of trying to rank these things? But, when musical theater lands, it's the most extraordinary form for—for expression, actually for artistic expression. When—when the theatrical elements combine with the musical elements, um, combine with the storytelling, combine with the effects departments, I mean, there—there is nothing more spectacular than seeing great musical theater, because it, you know, it—it's like all the greatest things of Hollywood and all the greatest things of live musical performance—

—combined, and it's—and it's real. But also, there's nothing more, you know, uh, disturbing and, uh, unfortunate than bad musical theater, too. Like the nadir is extremely low. It's—it's real—it can be incredibly banal.

We're workshopping it. We— we do have an incredible team. What's so fascinating is that—that the team that the producer has put together is a combination of real, real Broadway veterans, people that have won tons of Tonys and—and, and, and they know this world inside and out and—and live and breathe Broadway, with people like me, who—who are doing this for the first time. Um, I mean, the skill set hopefully is very compatible with what I normally do, but I think one of the joys of working in this way is that you get a lot of people that are fresh and—and are, like, I'm coming into this world wide-eyed. I'm so excited at age 36, and now 37, to be entering a—a, you know, a part of the music world that's totally new to me.

I mean, I know classical—I know the classical world. It's not to say that there aren't new wonders to be discovered, but like I know how the industry works, and—and the—and the industry is a little small, myopic, and—and, and limited. And this is like a brand-new universe that I've entered, and—and it's so fun. And, and I'm sure the Broadway people feel the same way, that like they—they have their own things that get tiring and—and exhausting, but it—for me, it's new, and it's—it's so—it's so cool to be a part of that.

Yes, Schubert could write wonderful, dramatic songs in and of themselves, but to make theater is different. I mean, one of—one of the things that I find so interesting is that even when you're firing on all cylinders and you have great melodic work and a great song structure, and—and you feel like you—you have a song that's really landing, if the song doesn't support the storytelling and doesn't tell the—the story in a way that gets the action from point A to point B by the end of the song, then it—it very well may be wasted time on—on the stage in context. And so—so much of what you're doing is combining all of the musical skill that you have with a sense for the—the drama and narrative, um, elements that—that, you know, you don't have to think about that when you're writing a song cycle for a singer and a pianist, but you do have to think about that all the time when you're—when you're dealing with the stage.

Well, and there are—there—there are very few people who've—who've gone back and forth in the world of Broadway specifically. Ob—obviously opera is a—is a totally different situation, although there—there are overlapping things, but—but Broadway is surprisingly lacking in people who've crossed over from the—from the classical world. Like, I'm—I'm on my own here. There— it's not like there are a lot of other, you know, um, world—and I'm not saying I'm world-renowned—but I'm saying of the world-renowned composers in the classical world, people like John Adams, Steve Reich, um, Philip Glass, uh, Andrew Norman, you know, of these people, there's—no one's writing for Broadway. And so there—there's—it's not that there's no compatibility, but it just doesn't happen. There's more of an overlap with film. You'll find these—these folks writing for film more often than you find them writing for Broadway. So, it's really interesting. I'm—I'm kind of alone in this—this world, and, uh, it—it—I, I love that—that, you know, slight, um, discomfort that comes from—from feeling a little like a pioneer, even though, of course, this is what Bernstein did and Blitzstein did—

Thank you so much for having me. What a—what a wonderful time to—to spend together and—and chat about so many different things. We covered a lot.

Thank you very much.