Type of Submission
Podium Presentation
Keywords
Conducting
Abstract
When one thinks of a symphony orchestra they think of strings, brass, woodwinds and percussion. However, there is a very important component to that image that is missing and that is the conductor. Conducting has evolved through the years from someone keeping a beat to an actual profession. My presentation will be diving into how conducting evolved from the very beginning. What is the history of conducting? Where did conducting come from? How did conducting evolve into a job? These are all questions that will be answered in this presentation.
I will first address the primary question of the history of conducting. Conducting did not just come to be, it first came about in the form of time beating. Early Sumerian findings of time beating were in the form of cave and tomb paintings of a person appearing to be clapping in the midst of a song. Further that I move into the presentation I will discuss how it evolved from cave painting time beating to a physical action used in the church called cheironomy. Cheironomy is the hand motions that a person would use to establish a beat and make sure that each singer was on pitch. There were many different hand signs ranging from strictly pitches to actual durations of notes. Each hand sign meant a different action that the singers were suppose to follow. The more advanced the hand motions became the more they resemble the conducting that is used today. Conducting today is a job that includes teaching music by not only keeping the musical group in time, but on pitch as well. Being a conductor today has two different sides. There are the professional conductors that are well known and their faces are all over billboards. Then there are the conductors that are the teachers in the classroom. Both kinds of conductors have the joys of sharing their love for music that was developed so long ago and has turned into a wonderful gift that can be given to the specific group or class. This presentation will conclude with a overview of the transition from time beating to how conducting is today.
Faculty Sponsor or Advisor’s Name
Dr. Sandra Yang
Campus Venue
Stevens Student Center, Room 246
Location
Cedarville, OH
Start Date
4-1-2015 2:00 PM
End Date
4-1-2015 2:20 PM
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
PowerPoint
Conducting: How It Came to Be
Cedarville, OH
When one thinks of a symphony orchestra they think of strings, brass, woodwinds and percussion. However, there is a very important component to that image that is missing and that is the conductor. Conducting has evolved through the years from someone keeping a beat to an actual profession. My presentation will be diving into how conducting evolved from the very beginning. What is the history of conducting? Where did conducting come from? How did conducting evolve into a job? These are all questions that will be answered in this presentation.
I will first address the primary question of the history of conducting. Conducting did not just come to be, it first came about in the form of time beating. Early Sumerian findings of time beating were in the form of cave and tomb paintings of a person appearing to be clapping in the midst of a song. Further that I move into the presentation I will discuss how it evolved from cave painting time beating to a physical action used in the church called cheironomy. Cheironomy is the hand motions that a person would use to establish a beat and make sure that each singer was on pitch. There were many different hand signs ranging from strictly pitches to actual durations of notes. Each hand sign meant a different action that the singers were suppose to follow. The more advanced the hand motions became the more they resemble the conducting that is used today. Conducting today is a job that includes teaching music by not only keeping the musical group in time, but on pitch as well. Being a conductor today has two different sides. There are the professional conductors that are well known and their faces are all over billboards. Then there are the conductors that are the teachers in the classroom. Both kinds of conductors have the joys of sharing their love for music that was developed so long ago and has turned into a wonderful gift that can be given to the specific group or class. This presentation will conclude with a overview of the transition from time beating to how conducting is today.
