This volume is part of the Subseries of the Collected Writings of the Orpheus Institute. It contains four short chapters written by experienced performing musicians – one cellist and three pianists – who provide refreshing insights into different aspects of their private practice through individual or collaborative research. In accordance with the mission of the Orpheus Research Centre in Music (ORCiM), which is to develop ‘discipline-specific discourse in the field of artistic research in music’, these authors aim to ‘zoom in’ to the practice arena so as to address specific ‘questions and challenges’ about performance preparation. The differentiation of the British spelling of the noun ‘practice’ and verb ‘practise’ helps to define the central thesis, that practising is a ‘practice in itself’ (p. 6). Catherine Laws and Tânia Lisboa (Preface) claim that while existing music pedagogical and psychological research has emphasised efficiency and effectiveness of practice through study of its routines, methods and content, there is a need to embrace the process as an ‘embodied experience’, that is ‘understanding gained through doing’ (p. 5). The work exhibited in this volume is thus motivated by a desire for ‘moving beyond’ previous approaches by considering practice as exploratory and as a ‘collection of processes that determines musical creativity and significance’ (p. 6). Each contributor assumes a highly practical starting point; in fact, the work undertaken closely aligns action-research (see Stringer, Reference STRINGER1999, p. 6) with more formal interpretative research paradigms, including self-reflection or ‘systematic self-study’ (p. 29). Aside from the first chapter, which is largely driven from a psychological perspective, the remaining three chapters primarily focus on matters of interpretation using analytical commentary, effectively extending a strand of musicological discourse about performance and analysis that came to the fore during the last few decades of the 20th century. All of the chapters contribute towards pedagogical discourse on performance.

The first chapter (‘A Self-study of Learning the Prelude from Bach's Suite No. 6 for Cello Solo: Comparing Words and Actions’) is a collaborative study in which Tânia Lisboa, Roger Chaffin and Topher Logan provide an in-depth exploration of the practice journey undertaken by the first author in her preparation of Bach's Prelude. The empirical approach is both detailed and honest, demonstrating the importance of self-reflection as a research tool. Lisboa's practice is divided into five stages for the purpose of analysis – ‘exploration’, ‘smoothing-out’, ‘listening’, ‘re-working technique’ and ‘preparing for performance’ – whereby segments of uninterrupted playing (‘work’ and ‘runs’) are recorded to ascertain the geography of her work about the Prelude and verbal comments coded to identify her musical cues (‘structural’ and ‘performance’) and decisions (‘interpretative’ and ‘technical’). Lisboa acknowledges the challenge of assuming a dual role as subject and researcher, not least the difficulty of practising aloud, or ‘exteriorising feelings and intuitions about the music that normally remain tacit’ (p. 28). In fact, the tension between words and music has been recognised in previous musicological discourse: Joseph Kerman distinguishes ‘doers’ and ‘talkers’, noting that performer's thoughts are ‘not readily articulated to words’ (Reference KERMAN1985, p. 196). Nevertheless, these collaborators seem to enable understanding of the ‘doing’ in an enviably transparent way, scrutinising action via rigorous research, navigating through the words/music tension as best as possible (at one stage, Lisboa admits that ‘I did not talk much to the camera as it disrupted my concentration’ (p. 26); at other times, practice and commentary revealed concerns ‘in different ways and at different times’ (p. 17)). The success of this research seems to lie in the careful balance and cycle of input between the collaborators (a method adopted from a previous study; see Chaffin et al., Reference CHAFFIN, IMREH and CRAWFORD2002): the ‘performing’ author produces raw data for each practice session by recording and verbalising her preparation, while retaining focus and integrity as an expert practitioner (the material was prepared for ‘real’ concert performances); the collaborating authors undertake rigorous transcription and analysis of this data; the ‘performing’ author then objectively reviews the transcribed data through self- (and collaborative-) evaluation and, if necessary, adjusts her approach in accordance with the emerging findings.

As noted previously, the remaining chapters are more closely aligned through their analytical-cum-pedagogical perspectives, but also because they are carried out by individual performer–researchers. In Chapter 2 (‘Performer's Harmony: Towards a Performance of Elliott Carter's Piano Sonata’), Alessandro Cervino carefully details the early stages of learning Carter's Piano Sonata and, in particular, the way in which unlocking the harmony became central to his understanding. He argues, however, that it is the practical aspects of performing, such as articulation, quality of attacks and pedalling, which ultimately determine the performer's handling of chords in the piece. Different analytical tools, including the use of shapes and dashed boxes overlaid on the score, are used to explain multiple possibilities for determining the harmonic motions in the piece. This technique is similar to the idea of ‘renotation’ proposed by John Rink who suggested that graphing or renotating information in the score can enable musicians to ‘heighten their ability to articulate to themselves and others . . . what is happening in the music’ (Reference RINK2002, p. 41). To this end, Cervino is acutely aware of the potential overlap (or even arbitrary relationship) between a ‘descriptive interpretation’ and a ‘performative interpretation’ of Carter's Sonata (that is, ‘between any verbalized interpretation . . . and the way in which it is played’, p. 45), arguing that the former is ‘of more use for pedagogical purposes’ (p. 46).

In Chapter 3, Catherine Laws (‘Morton Feldman's Late Piano Music: Experimentalism in Practice’) assumes a more philosophical standpoint through examining the issues of sound quality and form in the context of Feldman's last piano piece, Palais de Mari. She explains how the process of Anatolean rug-making and Jasper Johns’ crosshatch works influenced Feldman's use of repetition and variation in his music, which linked to the composer's drive to create long works (and, consequently, works that are hard to commit to memory). She regards the practice process as experimental – with ‘unknown outcomes’ (p. 65) – thus reminding performers that the aim of practice is not ‘to pin things down’, rather, ‘to hone the ability to respond to the contingencies of sound in the moment of performance’ (p. 65). This chimes with previous authors who point out the ideological differences between analysing and performing: for instance, Janet Schmalfeldt (Reference SCHMALFELDT1985) remarks that performers cannot be denied their ‘creative ability to have moment-by-moment control over relationships in sound’ (p. 28). Laws is authoritative in her understanding both of the work concept and of the problem of interpretation, to which she surmises that the performer is ‘caught in a web of contradictions’ and claims that it is necessary to establish ‘what that [musical] object is’ (p. 66).

In Chapter 4 (‘Alfred Schnittke's Piano Trio: Learning and Performing’), Maria Lettberg provides insight into her preparation of the piano part for Schnittke's Piano Trio. She raises various questions to guide her research (albeit without the intention to fully answer them) and explains her ‘inner musical scheme’ (p. 78) by exposing a two-tiered ‘mapping’ or ‘marking’ system (both terms are used interchangeably). Initially, she maps her thoughts onto the score using a ‘coloured’ marking scheme (for example, red is used to indicate forte dynamics), which occurs during solo preparation (it is not possible to fully appreciate this approach because the example is reproduced in black and white). Next, she uses ordinary black-and-white markings to show changes made in the context of ensemble rehearsal (although she admits that these markings are minimal because ‘most are remembered’ (p. 78)). Interestingly, therefore, whereas Lisboa (Chapter 1) resolved to verbalise her performance cues and decisions, Lettberg (Chapter 4) tried to commit her perceptions about the music to paper, albeit minimally and in both solo and ensemble contexts. In fact, a combination of these two approaches might be considered in future studies, whereby the written markings on the scores made by each of the ensemble members are evaluated alongside transcriptions of verbal discourse made between co-performers during ensemble rehearsal, as undertaken in numerous recent studies on collaborative music-making (for example, see Ginsborg et al., Reference GINSBORG, CHAFFIN and NICHOLSON2006; King & Ginsborg Reference KING, GINSBORG, Gritten and King2011). Even though Lettberg's approach is less rigorous than typically evidenced in systematic research, it is ecological insofar as Western art performers often use the score like an aide-memoire, for securing expressive and technical detail during the practice process.

Various themes emerge across the volume, three of which merit attention. First, the authors recognise that there are multiple ways of interpreting and performing a piece of music. Lisboa exposes her changing understanding of Bach's Prelude across different stages of her practice; Cervino sets out to tackle the problem of establishing a ‘finite’ range of performance options from the ‘infinite possibilities available’ (pp. 33–34); Laws uncovers the ‘sheer variety’ of subtleties within Feldman's late piano music (p. 66); while Lettberg remarks that there are ‘unlimited possibilities’ for musical interpretation (p. 84). In effect, practice is seen as a process of negotiation about interpretative possibilities, such as in the use of dynamics as exemplified by both Laws and Cervino: Laws explains that ‘the performer has to decide how soft is soft’ (p. 61), while Cervino claims that ‘the only prescription the dynamic indication f provides beyond controversy is not to play as softly or as loudly as possible’ (p. 34).

The negotiation of musical parameters links to questions of how and why performers might make certain interpretative, technical, communicative or other choices. This process invariably involves some form of music analysis, and the important second theme running in this volume concerns the centrality of music-analytical activity in performance preparation, which is made both implicitly and explicitly: Lisboa refers to the way in which she made connections between different aspects of her playing, including musical structure, technique and expression (p. 21); Cervino tackles harmonic analysis overtly (‘when does one chord end and the next begin?’, p. 35); Laws concerns herself with ‘the connection between resonance and the perception of form’, or ‘sounds across time’ (p. 50); while Lettberg asserts that her learning process was ‘based exclusively on my practical experience of playing and my theoretical knowledge of music analysis’ (p. 74). Existing research about the relationship between performance and analysis also scrutinises the problem-solving and decision-making aspects of performance preparation via rigorous and/or pragmatic study of the score, sound and interpretation of musical works (for example, see Cone, Reference CONE1968; Bradshaw, Reference BRADSHAW and Thomas1998; Dunsby, Reference DUNSBY1995; Rink, Reference RINK1995, Reference RINK2002). The deliberate and intuitive application of analysis in the context of performance preparation is explored particularly closely by Rink, who argues that ‘performers often understand music along the same lines as those carrying out ‘rigorous analysis’, but in different terms’ (Reference RINK2002, p. 39). He outlines five principles underpinning a ‘performer's analysis’: the importance of understanding temporality in music; discovering musical shape; recognising that the score is not ‘the music’; using analysis to consider style, genre, tradition, technique, instrument and so on; and recognising that both ‘informed intuition’ and ‘deliberate’ analysis guide performers (2002, p. 39). In many ways, these principles are embodied in the research undertaken by Lisboa, Laws, Cervino and Lettberg as they reveal analytical thought (‘understanding gained’) about their practice (‘through doing’) through consideration of one or more of the above principles. Indeed, as Rink suggests, a performer's analysis ‘primarily takes place as an interpretation is being formulated and subsequently re-evaluated – that is, while one is practising rather than performing’ (2002, p. 39). These authors might have demonstrated stronger awareness of existing music-analytical discourse about performance in order to fully contextualise their research because each contribution relates closely to this terrain.

Third, the word ‘transformation’ appears in different guises across the volume, notably in terms of research process (Lisboa et al. claim that ‘the mysteries of performance were transformed . . . by the scrutiny of scientific method’ (p. 29)), physical performance process (Lettberg refers to the ‘transformation of the musician's imagination into action’ (p. 69)), and internal musical process (Cervino speaks of ‘transforming sound combinations’ (p. 37)). This theme might be explored more carefully in future studies, not least to build a link with the transformations taking place in the practice arena into and across the performance arena (see Dogantan-Dack, Reference DOGANTAN-DACK2008) as well as to expose other ways in which practice can be transformed by research activity.

Overall, this collection of articles is well worth reading – all of the material is written in a highly engaging way and provides useful insight into aspects of performance preparation. The dominant discourse is music-analytical with a pedagogical emphasis, while all of the contributions are led primarily by some form of self-reflection. If the practice of practising is about negotiating music-analytical and other types knowledge, then the practice of researching practice is surely about ‘transforming’ this information into a highly accessible discourse, which this volume certainly does.