The Teacher
A view from the orchestra
Teaching methods
Silvestri established the first-ever conducting class in Romania. The teaching methods he employed for developing the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and the phenomenally successful results these achieved, produced a corporate pride and endeared the Bournemouth players to their conductor.
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BSO Principal Clarinet Raymond Carpenter: Silvestri had a fabulous knowledge of instruments and what they were capable of doing. If a player had a problem he would come right to the desk and discuss it. Whether it was fingering or articulation he would make suggestions.
We were made to face up to our weaknesses and our possibilities. Each principal player underwent a searching analysis of his contribution as a soloist and as a part of an ensemble. There was a principal oboe who had been a very fine player but who was close to retirement and losing interest. By gentle persuasion and reminding him of his great days, Silvestri succeeded in getting him play his solos like an absolute star.
Rehearsing a passage in the Brahms Second Symphony where the wind and the strings are supposed to play together but the wind was lagging behind, Silvestri sent the whole of the wind section over to the far corner of the hall, as far away from the strings as possible. Then he ordered: ‘Now, you play in time with the strings!’ And after we’d been through it three or four times we went back and felt it was quite easy.
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BSO Assistant Conductor Nicholas Braithwaite: Silvestri was rehearsing a full orchestral chord and it just didn’t sound as he wanted to. So he treated it like erecting a flagpole: he played just the bass notes in each section – the double-bass, the tuba, the contrabassoon and so on – and made them pause on each note for ages. Then he made the second note in the chord – the cellos, the bass trombones - play as well, also pausing. In this way he gradually built up the chord from the bottom note upwards. Then he did it again, without pausing, one after the other. Gradually, he tilted the chord upright from being horizontal. Then, in the performance he didn’t do anything in particular with his hands at that moment, but the chord had a weight and gravity which it just didn’t have before – a fascinating technique!
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BSO Principal Bassoon Eric Butt: Unsatisfied with the way I played my solo at the beginning of Tchaikovsky Sixth, Silvestri left the rostrum and stood in front of me while I repeated it time and time again. That was good training. I was never afraid again of doing a solo.
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