Pianist Yuja Wang struck a chord at the Hollywood Bowl
this month and not just with her performance of Rachmaninoff's Third Piano
Concerto. The 24-year-old Chinese soloist had necks craning, tongues wagging and
flashbulbs popping when she walked on wearing an orange, thigh-grazing,
body-hugging dress atop sparkly gold strappy stiletto sandals.
In
particular, Wang's outfit was a hot topic at the concert and continued after
Times music critic Mark Swed's review appeared in print and online. While Swed
praised her delicacy, speed and grace at the piano, his fashion comments —
including the observation: "Her dress Tuesday was so short and tight that had
there been any less of it, the Bowl might have been forced to restrict admission
to any music lover under 18 not accompanied by an adult" — have touched off a
spirited debate among music critics and bloggers about what constitutes
appropriate concert attire and conversely, whether a critique of a performer's
clothes has any place in a music review.
It should be noted that while
the Los Angeles Philharmonic has a very specific dress code for members of its
orchestra (several ones, actually, depending on the time of day and season), it
does not apply to soloists. They, according to an L.A. Phil representative, are
informed what the orchestra will be wearing and can choose whatever they feel is
most appropriate. "For women that's traditionally an evening gown," the rep
said, "but that's not always the case."
Critic's Notebook: Yuja Wang, dressed to
kill
Although Wang declined, through her management company, to
discuss the dress, or why she chose to wear it for that particular performance,
others were quick to defend her wardrobe decision.
"I look at Yuja with
nothing but total sympathy," said Cameron Carpenter, a 30-year-old
Grammy-nominated musician whose often flamboyant attire while playing the organ
similarly cuts against expectations. "For one thing, she's a great artist and
for another, she looks like about a hundred million dollars in that
dress."
Carpenter refers to Wang's wardrobe preferences, like his own
(which include Chanel,
Valentino,
and Vivienne
Westwood pieces he's tweaked to his liking), as a performer's "sovereign
rights."
"A performer can do anything and everything to present their
music in any way they see fit. And therefore, what the performer presents has to
be regarded as a total whole. It's much more important that it's genuine self
expression.
"What people are missing here is that Yuja might want to be
seen to be making, as many of us do, a personal statement without having played
a note," Carpenter said. "After all, they see you before they hear
you."
That all-of-a-package notion is echoed by Gerald Klickstein, a
University of North Carolina School for the Arts faculty member and author of
"The Musician's Way: A Guide to Practice, Performance, and Wellness," a textbook
that advises undergraduate music students on all aspects of a music career —
including proper attire.
"The moment the audience catches sight of the
performer, the performance has begun — their mannerisms, their attire,
everything matters." (And as such, Klickstein says, it is fair game for mention
in a music review.)
Far from being inappropriate, Klickstein said, Wang's
wardrobe was a wholly authentic reflection of artist, set and setting. "She is a
magnificent pianist … She's playing in L.A., she's 24, she's a soloist, and
there's a lot of excitement in her playing that's being conveyed through her
attire. I think it's terrific that she's expressing herself from the stage, and
taking full advantage of the visual aspects of a live performance."
While
Klickstein (who was not at the concert) said it's hard to know exactly what
caused the current concert clothing kerfuffle, he offers one possibility: "If
you [look at] the problems facing major orchestras, there's a big challenge in
dealing with the major donors with the most conservative tastes and trying to
please them while trying to do the kind of innovative work that would draw a
younger audience. There's a tendency for audience members to want to have their
expectations met and not be surprised.
"Classical music culture is loaded
with conformity and obedience, and that's one reason we might see some of this
resistance."
Mary Davis, a music professor, chairwoman of the department
of music at Case Western Reserve University and author of several books
exploring the intersection of music and fashion (including "Ballets Russes
Style: Diaghilev's Dancers and Paris Fashion" in 2010 and "Classic Chic: Music,
Fashion, and Modernism" in 2006) also pointed to the confounding of
expectations. "It cuts against the expectation people usually have that classical
music is distant somehow from anything as frivolous or insubstantial as
fashion — when it's not at all."
And, while Davis says there's certainly
nothing new under the sun when it comes to a soloist dressing to stand out
against the black-and-white clad orchestral backdrop, "what is something totally
new is the kind of edge that it's testing," she said.
"It's one thing to
wear a couture gown that might be strapless but all the way to the ground with
whatever heels you want underneath, but to come out in a really, really bright
orange mini-dress with revealing cut-outs like that one is a different story. I
think that kind of cutting-edge, high-fashion modernity is what created the
stir. It doesn't go along with the aesthetic of the classical
performance."
Davis dismissed the argument that a soloist's outfit could
detract from the performance. "I think the idea that what somebody's wearing
will so distract you that you will not be able to pay attention to their
performance seems absurd. When she sits down at the piano and starts playing
like a maniac, you're going to pay attention to what she's playing. If you're
not, you probably shouldn't be there in the first place."
But at least
one recently published study suggests that wardrobe choice might well influence
audience perception. In her article "Posh Music Should Equal Posh Dress," which
appeared in the April 2010 issue of the journal Psychology
of Music, British researcher Noola Griffiths, who holds a doctorate in the
psychology of performance from the University of Sheffield, asked audience
members to rate the skills of female performers dressed in three outfits; jeans
and a T-shirt, a "night-clubbing" outfit (which Griffiths describes as a
body-conscious outfit consisting of a short skirt and halter-style top), and a
floor-length concert dress.
"In addition to being seen as inappropriate,"
Griffiths said, "the performers in the night-clubbing dress were seen as less
technically proficient and less musical than when they were wearing the concert
dress. Which told me that this kind of body-focused dressing seems to affect the
perception of musical skills."
But, as Davis pointed out, the 24-year-old
pianist is so skilled that could hardly qualify as an issue.
"She is one
of the stars that's ushering in a new era of technical perfection and polish,"
Davis said. "So how could you possibly be paying attention to the dress and not
hearing what she's doing? I just don't buy it."
And as long as the public
buys tickets to watch Yuja Wang play, she will almost assuredly be allowed free
rein to sit at the piano wearing whatever she pleases.
天才Pianist，Yuja Wang のドレスが物議 [音楽時評]
アメリカのLos Angeles Philharmonic のHollywood Bowl 公演で，Yuja Wang が最近若者の間で流行のミニドレスでステージに現れて，ラフマニノフのピアノ協奏曲第3番を好演したのですが，彼女のデザイナーが選んだウルトラ・ミニのドレスが大きな物議を醸し出したようです．
写真入りで，ごらんの通りのミニドレスなので，「今後はクラシック公演に18歳未満入場お断りとすべきだという過激な意見（Pianist はペダリングでよく足を使うので）がある一方，演奏者がどんなドレスで現れるか分からないのにそんな制限を課すのは困るといった慎重論まで，さまざまな意見が飛び交っています．
ネット上で記事を読んだ人から「ご意見」の選択投票を求めるモノまでありますが，ロック音楽で認められていることが何故いけないのかといった反論，あるいは，ミニがいけないというのは19世紀初めからクラシック音楽会が王侯貴族のサロンを出てから，サロンを引きずった男性音楽家のユニフォームは別格として，あとからクラシック界に参加してきた女性音楽家には，そうしたユニフォームが決まってこなかったのだから，自由にしても認められるべきではないか，女性のミニを批判するのは女性差別だ．．．といった議論が盛り上がっています．
その辺の内容は御自由にご渉猟いただくとして，ここでは写真入りの記事の他に，Anne Mdgette (WashingPost紙の女性評論家Anne Midgette の「Music critic は音楽を評価すべきで，ドレスを評価すべきではない」という批評を並列しておきます．
これが日本だったらどんな評価が現れるのでしょうか？
Classical gasp: Yuja Wang's dress at the Bowl causes a crescendo
Was the pianist's racy, form-fitting mini-dress more appropriate for rock or Rachmaninoff?
Chinese pianist Yuja Wang caused a stir in the classical world with her orange mini-dress when she played the Hollywood Bowl. (Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times) |
Which offends? Her short dress or critic’s narrow view?
Pianist Yuja Wang’s dress at a concert this month at the Hollywood Bowl has given rise to considerable attention.
Should critics review the dress? Should we comment on how classical stars look?
On the one hand, appearance has no bearing on how an artist sounds.
On the other hand, appearance sends a message. Christoph Eschenbach’s Nehru-style jackets are a deliberate step away from the tradition-bound formality of a conductor’s tails, and lots of younger conductors have followed suit, and it’s certainly fair to comment on that when it seems warranted.
And plenty of classical artists are now playing around, more and more deliberately, with the way they look.
There’s a third factor at play, though, when it comes to talking about women’s clothes in this field. Men have a uniform: They either don formal wear or daringly (sarcasm intended) eschew it.
Women do not have a comparable uniform, in part because women’s fashions are more varied and in part because women didn’t play a major role in classical performance in the years when these traditions were being codified. Yes, there were a handful of soloists. But for years, there were few women (if any) in major symphony orchestras, and virtually no female conductors. Female orchestra members and conductors still have to contend with the issue of what they should be wearing on a regular basis.
The criticism of women’s clothing onstage has been a red flag for me ever since Eve Queler said that when she started conducting in the late 1960s, her clothing so dominated her reviews that one critic complained that a zipper glinting on the back of her evening gown was distracting. This is obvious sexism. Unfortunately, the tenor of the discussion of women’s attire in this field has retained more than a hint of this sexist tone ever since.
What “should” women wear on the concert stage? What is “appropriate”? A general rule of thumb appears to be that if it’s sexy, it’s probably not good — indeed, it almost automatically falls into the realm of cheesy pop-style classical crossover. And if it’s revealing, it’s worthy of a lot of comment.
My particular beef is with Mark Swed in the Los Angeles Times, who was evidently shocked, or titillated, by the dress Wang wore for her Hollywood Bowl appearance Aug. 3.
“Her dress Tuesday was so short and tight,” he wrote, “that had there been any less of it, the Bowl might have been forced to restrict admission to any music lover under 18 not accompanied by an adult. Had her heels been any higher, walking, to say nothing of her sensitive pedaling, would have been unfeasible.”
This review and the dress that inspired it have prompted several responses, including a post on the blog Life's a Pitch that questions whether Wang should wear such a dress and equates her attire with the fashion choices of Lady Gaga and Madonna.
Let’s have a reality check for a minute. Yes, the dress is short, tight and revealing. But in the real world — the world outside classical music’s bubble — this is not unusual attire for a young rising starlet in the public eye.
For the sake of comparison — or education — go to the blog Tom and Lorenzo to observe what other young women about Yuja Wang’s age wore at a Hollywood event that took place a few days after Wang’s concert. You can criticize these women for their fashion choices. You can like or dislike what they’re wearing. But these dresses and shoes are not inherently shocking — let alone a cause for restricting admission for those younger than 18. (Some of the women might be younger than 18 themselves.)
Yuja Wang is simply working with designers, the way that other attractive stars her age do — and the way that plenty of opera divas always have, from Renee Fleming’s specially designed gowns by John Galliano, Christian Lacroix and Karl Lagerfeld for her Metropolitan Opera opening in 2008 to Anna Netrebko’s sometimes more unfortunate but often equally revealing options. This field should at least recognize this, rather than drawing up our skirts in horror as if she’s doing something patently unusual.
To Swed’s credit, his review went on to praise Wang’s playing. But he, and all of us, should understand that, rather than shutting the doors to the under-18 set, Wang’s manner (she’s a refreshingly normal, down-to-earth young woman) and attire — as well as her remarkable talent — represent some of the best chances we have of getting those under-18-year-olds into the concert hall to begin with.
8This article originally appeared on Anne Midgette’s blog The Classical Beat,
(Lawrence K. Ho/Los Angeles Times/LOS ANGELES TIMES) - Young Chinese pianist, Yuja Wang, is soloist in Rachmaninoff's Third Piano Concerto, at the Hollywood Bowl on Aug. 02, 2011.