Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit: Extra-musical subtext, and its role within interpretive performance

Few works within the realm of the piano repertoire have amassed a reputation as formidable as Gaspard de la Nuit. These three pieces, each unique in character and pianistic requirements, arguably represent a pinnacle of early 20th-century French piano music. This paper seeks to illuminate points for consideration for the pianist who wishes to embark upon studying the work for performance, and for the musicologist.

I shall first consider the three character poems of Aloysius Bertrand that inspired the suite, as an understanding of these Diabolic creations is essential to understanding the piece analytically and programmatically. I shall then explore the subtitle of Bertrand’s Gaspard de la Nuit: ‘Fantaisies À La Manière De Rembrandt Et De Callot’, as an acknowledgement of these artists helps us better to engage with Bertrand’s poetry, and provides us with a direct link to the visual stimuli for Ravel’s compositions.

Finally, using Ondine as a case study, I shall explore how the composer unifies his inspirations to paint a musical portrait of both the character and the content of Bertrand’s poem. I shall focus on three particular aspects of Ravel’s style: the refined textures that create washes of watery colour, subtle rhythmic variations that imply the ‘deep, rolling currents of the sleeping lake’, and the simple melodic lines sung by the water nymph in the manner of a French air. Each element plays its part in the thematic development that illustrates Ondine’s seductive powers.

Architecture as Pedagogy: Alive and Kicking

This workshop draws on an emerging collaborative body of research by Lovett, Morrow and McClean that aims to understand architecture and its processes as a form of pedagogical practice: a civic pedagogy.

Architectural education can be valued not only as a process that delivers architecture-specific skills and knowledges, but also as a process that transforms people into critically active contributors to society. We are keen to examine how and where those skills are developed in architectural education and trace their existence and/or application within practice. We intend to examine whether some architectural and spatial practices are intrinsically pedagogical in their nature and how the level of involvement of clients, users and communities can mimic the project-based learning of architectural education – in particularly in the context of ‘live project learning’

1. This workshop begins with a brief discussion paper from Morrow that sets out the arguments behind why and how architecture can be understood as pedagogy. It will do so by presenting firstly the relationship between architectural practice and pedagogy, drawing out both contemporary and historical examples of architecture and architects acting pedagogically. It will also consider some other forms of creative practice that explicitly frame themselves pedagogically, and focus on participatory approaches in architectural practice that overlap with inclusive and live pedagogies, concluding with a draft and tentative abstracted pedagogical framework for architectural practice.

2. Lovett will examine practices of architectural operation that have a pedagogical approach, or which recognise within themselves an educational subtext/current. He is most interested in a 'liveness' beyond the 'Architectural Education' of university institutions. The presentation will question the scope for both spatial empowerment / agency and a greater understanding and awareness of the value of good design when operating as architects with participant-clients younger than 18, older than 25 or across varied parts of society. Positing that the learning might be greatest when there are no prescribed 'Learning Outcomes' and that such work might depend on risk-taking and playfulness, the presentation will be a curated showcase drawing on his own ongoing work.

Both brief presentations will inform the basis of the workshop’s discussion which hopes to draw on participants views and expereinces to enrich the research process. The intention is that the overall workshop will lead to a call for contributors and respondents to a forthcoming publication on ‘Architecture as Pedagogy’.