By Don Bailey
for the New York Flute Club Newsletter February 1999
Carol and I met in the faculty lounge at the
Juilliard School where she teaches. She was all relaxed and composed, whereas I
was distracted for having left my notes strategically placed by my printer at
home - all ready to go. (Yes, I do prepare for these talks.) It didn’t matter,
though. Carol is a wonderful conversationalist and we had a great time. Her
career is so multifaceted we found all kinds of interesting things to talk
about. You’ll see!
You had an incredible
environment as a child. Your mother was a pianist and your father a professor of
music and orchestra conductor! What was it like?
You know, it’s so interesting trying to
recall all of that because my husband and I are going through it now. The script
is basically continuing here with my son’s starting piano at age 5. I started
violin at age 4. Those first impressions with the violin are indelible - working
with the bow as my dad accompanied me. He was a natural teacher - very
charismatic. He’s the same age as Julie Baker, and they’re very similar in
many ways.
You’re the youngest
of three children? Any other musicians in the family?
Yes, there were three of us. My sisters didn’t
go into music professionally, although one is a programmer for young audiences
in Boston. She works with Jill Ma, YoYo’s wife, and they do wonderful things
for children. My oldest sister is a child psychologist/therapist, sings in a
chorus, and listens to music all the time. While they’re both involved in
music, they chose other professions.
Did you have a normal
suburban school environment?
I did. I picked the flute at 9 because I
wanted to play in the band. We began with group instruction and soon after, my
parents arranged private lessons. I remember bursting into tears the day I had
to tell my band director I was going to study privately. I felt I was betraying
the group but they were all thrilled for me!
Was this a
professional teacher?
Oh yes, I studied in Buffalo with Edna
Karmachero, who was a pupil of Moyse. She started me with Moyse’s de la
Sonorité right away. Other Buffalo teachers were Robert Moles and Anton Wolf.
Then, for my high school senior year I lived in Italy where I studied with
Gazzeloni before returning to start college at Oberlin. I found my outlets in
the drama departments as well as in music. I was also a serious actress, and I
studied ballet and had master classes with Maria Tallchief, Jacques Dambois, and
Melissa Hayden - dance world giants. (Laughs) I was a spirited child, that’s
for sure; and I have one myself now.
Gazzeloni is known
for contemporary music; you must have felt his influence.
Yes, there I was living on my own - fully
immersed in the world of new music. I was only seventeen and already playing in
contemporary ensembles. It was a great experience, and I couldn’t wait to
return to the states and go immediately to Juilliard.
But you detoured by
way of Ohio…
Yes, my parents wanted me to have a normal
campus life, and since they both graduated from Oberlin, the decision was made.
It was an adjustment, but I stayed for two years and then came to New York. I
had fabulous training at Oberlin. I studied with Robert Willoughby who was
wonderful. My Dalcroze eurythmics teacher was Inda Howland, who was a giant, and
I sang in Bob Fountain’s Oberlin College choir, which performed and toured
extensively.
Who were your
teachers at Juilliard?
I studied flute with Arthur Lora (of the
Italian tradition that I was used to) and Sam Baron was my woodwind quintet
coach.
What was the
Juilliard experience for you?
It was great. As you know, there were so many
good flutists there at that time. Let’s see, my classmates were Nadine Asin,
Michael Parloff, Trudy Kane, Renée Siebert, Ransom Wilson, Rebecca Troxler, and
Christine Neal. I thrived at Juilliard and was finally where the action was. I
felt very much "at home".
Weren’t all of the
flute students at each other’s throats?
Well, it was definitely competitive! Everybody
was off doing his or her own things. Nadine and I bonded right away and would
take our solace by going off to play duets. It’s so different with the
students now. I think it’s more like a little family.
Was the course of
study geared towards taking auditions?
Absolutely! It was all geared towards an
orchestral career - no question about it. In our own prayers, of course, we all
wanted to be like Jean-Pierre Rampal!
Did you do much
freelancing before going to St. Paul?
Yes, I did things with John Nelson and PDQ
Bach.
Well, those are
awfully nice freelance gigs. Did you ever play in the shoe department of
Bloomingdale’s?
No! But what a great idea! I never played in
the subway either, although some of my students have. About the time I was
finishing my Master’s and before I left for Minnesota, I played in an opera
orchestra with Ransom Wilson in New Jersey, and with the National Orchestral
Institute with Leon Barzin. All of our concerts were at Carnegie Hall. David
Shifrin was playing clarinet; Trudy Kane and I played flute. I also played in a
woodwind quintet that got performances through the school.
It must have been
difficult to leave New York for the St. Paul job.
Yes, it was a tough decision. So many people
were telling me that I shouldn’t be leaving NY because I was getting such a
good toehold here. But, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra was my first seriously
offered job - with a contract and benefits. I would be on my own, independent,
learn how to drive, have my own car… And thank goodness I went, because it was
the catalyst for my wanting to become a soloist.
How is that? Did you
leave to be a soloist?
Well, the actual reason I left was to do the
Naumburg competition. The orchestra started to tour in the last two seasons, and
I just felt I wasn’t working hard enough with all the repetition of the
programs. So, I took a leave of absence and did the competition.
What did winning the
Naumburg do for your career?
It was instant credibility back in those days.
I was heavily under Moyse’s influence at the time, and the recording that came
about is still one of my favorites. They’ve not had another flute competition
since.
Have you had any
other orchestral jobs?
Through those summers in St. Paul, I also
played the Grand Teton Festival for four seasons - big orchestra repertoire.
Then when I came back to NY, I played with Orpheus and St. Luke’s Chamber
Ensemble until I started getting engagements as a soloist through my manager,
Charles Hamlen. I didn’t play again in an orchestra until I played in the
Boston Symphony one summer for two weeks when they were looking for a principal
flute. It was like getting back on a bicycle.
Was the Boston job of
interest to you?
You know, it was. I flirted with it; my son
was little and my family lives in Boston. But it just wasn’t meant to be. I
need diversification; I thrive on different kinds of projects and venues. Not
that you can’t have that in a symphony orchestra, because you can, but for me,
maybe it’s too much music all the time. Now I teach, I have chamber music, I
play concertos and travel.
You’ve commissioned
numerous new pieces for the flute repertoire. How did you meet Lukas Foss?
Lukas Foss was a mentor to me as I was growing
up in Buffalo. He was the Music Director. One day while I was still a student at
Juilliard, he called me out of the blue and asked if I would collaborate with
him at a concert at Kennedy Center. I nearly fainted. Imagine!. He’s a
masterful artist. He wrote his "Renaissance Concerto" for me in 1985.
I’ve performed it over fifty times now and still love it.
You have quite a
roster of composers you’ve worked with. I read somewhere that for you it’s
just a matter of asking?
Well, I had established friendships with
several composers. Joan Tower and I are real buddies, Paul Shoenfield and I
spent summers together at Chatauqua, Lukas and I had the Buffalo connection.
Gorecki was introduced to me, and I went to his home in Poland, and I’m from a
Slovak family, so it was like two peas in a pod. He loves folk music, and I
adore it. I met Rochberg through the Naumburg, and Ezra Laderman and I have the
same birthday! I knew Peter Schickele from all those years doing PDQ Bach. He’s
the one who said, "People wondered, how did she get me to write a piece for
her? Well, she just asked."
Do you think flute
playing has changed since you were a student at Juilliard?
Hmmm, interesting question. Well, Julie’s
still here. I mean, the Baker tradition is like a bloodline - the royal
bloodline. Hearing him play was an amazing thing. Then there was the French
tradition, through Rampal and Moyse which I identified with also. To answer your
question, I would say that today you will hear lots of diversity among the
students. You might not be able to tell who’s studied with whom, whereas back
in the old days you could probably guess.
What about national
styles in flute playing?
I don’t think there are national styles so
much anymore. Galway had such an influence for years and everyone wanted to
imitate him. I don’t think you can tell by someone’s playing what country
they’re from. People are becoming more themselves as far as styles go.
(Laughing) With
your varied past in so many phases of the arts, you must sound like a real
hybrid…
AND, it depends on whom I’m playing with. My
sun sign is cancer, the moonchild, so we adapt…. For example, when Nadine and
I play together on the concert coming up, we’ll have to mix and match that
way. But it’s true, many people say they can pick out my sound. I think it’s
the amalgam of all the experiences I had in music and dance and theatre and
singing….. I still think, though, that it goes back to my dad and the violin;
I still try to imitate the sound of the fiddle. The choice of
vibrato/non-vibrato - I see it now, because they have open strings….I tried to
imitate that.
Where do you teach
now?
I teach here at Juilliard and at Stony Brook.
I’ve taught at Indiana University, and I taught at Rice University in Houston
for eleven years altogether. I was offered the Rice job full-time, but there was
such a pull to come back to New York. There’s a way of life here. It’s a
wonderful city.
What are your
students be expected to accomplish by the time they graduate?
It’s so selective here that I have to
formulate things on an individual basis. I’m a confrontational teacher and
might not be the ideal for some students - I’ll get them on the floor or
dancing a gigue if they’re having physical problems. Of course, I don’t
force anyone, but I do place a big premium on what’s happening physiologically
with a player. Etude-wise, we try to get the Andersen etudes in, but these kids
are so busy very professionally minded. They have rehearsals for productions and
chamber music obligations, so I find that I cover a lot of repertoire with them.
Of course, we do scales and warm-ups together. I’m a firm believer that
everyone has to do the Taffanel Exercise No. 4 in every imaginable way by the
time they leave. Everybody’s style is different. Some students want to give a
recital right away to stay motivated, others don’t - they may prefer to take
their time and branch out. And most of the students who come here are
competitors, so they’re always getting ready for some kind of competition.
Their lessons reflect their needs at the time.
It’s also my hope that the students who
leave Juilliard will be good teachers as well as flute players. I think their
becoming educators is critical. Very often in master classes, or in my chamber
music classes, I’ll have the students get up and teach each other to get them
thinking more that way.
Orchestral excerpts?
Yes, I adore orchestral excerpts. The students
are required to study them, and they have routine auditions twice a year behind
a screen.
What’s your
teaching load like?
At the moment I have 12 individual students,
and I have two chamber music courses - The NY Woodwind Quintet Seminar and my
own chamber music class, which is for winds, harp, and guitar. I also take part
in a freshman course called Colloquium, which is a study of all the disciplines,
dance, drama, and music. This class gives them a feel for what everybody’s
doing all day long here at Juilliard.
Are you still
involved with the International Flute Festival you started?
Not at the moment. I would love to resurrect
the festival, but I’m glad the NFA took the ball and ran with it. There’s a
lot of ethnic music at the conventions now, which is as it should be, because it’s
the common thread among us all. Carlos Nakai and I will be collaborating this
summer at the Santa Fe Festival. Carlos attended my International festival when
he was just emerging. Now, he’s world famous.
What’s your view of
the state of the arts?
Each year we hear 100 flute players here at
Juilliard for three or four openings, which is a shame because there will be at
least 25 who are totally eligible. It just breaks our hearts that we can’t
accommodate them. These days musicians have to be creative. There are many
wonderful careers out there in music. Look at all the flute choirs and ensembles
like the Three Flute Moms with Laura Gilbert, Linda Chesis, and myself. These
ideas of enjoying music make a real statement.
What kind of flute do
you play?
I have a silver Brannen body and a Powell
platinum head that Lillian Burkhart cut while she and Jim were still at the
company. I’ve played silver all my life except for a period when I played Tom
Nyfenger’s 9K Brannen. I recorded the Mozart Quartets with the Emerson Quartet
on the gold flute.
Can you hear a
difference on your recordings between the silver and gold flutes?
(Very long pause)…..Isn’t that
interesting? I’ll have to go back and listen. However, it’s very individual.
Many of my students play gold and sound great! For me, though, playing as a
soloist with orchestras, I could never get that "zing" that I love so
much with the silver flute. I don’t think the flute has to sound pretty all
the time. I mean, it may need to sound gritty, ugly or grotesque, as well as
scintillating and beautiful. My platinum headjoint is great. I enjoy getting
lots of colors in the sound.
What’s a typical
warm-up for you?
I start with Taffanel & Gaubert’s No. 5,
the chromatic scale. I have this whole system of breathing through my nose; it’s
like a walking meditation. I start the scale and walk around the room slowly. I
play non-vibrato, breathing through my nose, taking as much time as I want. This
is something I got from Alexander Murray, and it changed me forever because it
slows me down and gets me focused. Then I do my T&G No. 4 - all legato, then
all staccato, then changing the articulations. After that, I take out the Boehm
octave exercise, and then, if there’s time, I’ll do the de la Sonorité. It’s
interesting - I don’t do the Moyse first. I like to slowly get my fingers
going and the air and the movement of the air. Then, if I’m really luxuriating
and I have the time, I’ll do some orchestra excerpts like A Midsummer Night’s
Dream or the St. Saens Voliere. You see, I feel my big weakness is fast-moving
things so I’m always on the lookout for that. Others may not perceive my
technique as weaker, but we all have our "zones." I think there is
real merit to playing those tricky orchestral passages.
Speaking of the
Voliere, do you use the real fingerings?
No, I use the D-E trill fingering at the
start.
What are your views
about auxiliary fingers in general?
Oh, use them constantly! I hate being out of
tune, so I’ll try everything possible to get it right, and I won’t let my
students get lazy about pitch. Also, I might use harmonics in fast passages -
like in the Joan Tower Concerto. What matters is the finished product. Be
creative if you need to, but don’t cheat in order to avoid a correct
fingering.
Let’s talk about
your concert with Nadine on the 28th..
First of all, this is a reunion of sorts with
Nadine. We were close at Juilliard but were out of touch when I went away to
Minnesota. We’ve always enjoyed playing together, and we wanted to plan a
concert with some interesting colors and effects. As far as repertoire is
concerned, it was a mutual decision to do the Debussy Chanson de Bilitis. I’ve
coached it and I love it, but I’ve never played it. And we’ve chosen some
flute favorites with harp - the Berlioz was a must. There’s a variety among
the Rigoletto , the Bach G major, the Hindemith, and Takemitsu. And we’ll each
do something solo. We hope that the duo performance concept will encourage other
flutists to program non-solo events. In fact, I think two flutes sound better
than one in many ways.
How would you define
yourself?
I don’t really think of myself as a flute
player, although my name, Carol, comes from Old French, which is Carole (to
sing) and aulos, which in Greek means the reed flute. Together it means a song
of joy. I picked the flute because it was lightweight, had a feminine quality
and was portable! Actually, I could have gone in any number of directions - I’m
sort of an airborne dreamer... And because I love all forms of art from painting
to movement and sound. I picked the flute to convey the images from all these
mediums. I’m a channeler, so to speak!
