An Interview with Margaret Hillis

on Score Study

by Dennis Shrock

hrock: Serious musicians

take the activity of score
study as one of their most
important responsibilities.
Consequently, many of us
look for ways of study to make our

missed if one doesn't follow a

procedure to get all the information
that is on a score. Also, it's amazing
how many mistakes can be found in
scores-accents left out or symbols
used indiscriminately. And, there are

Something like a Sousa march is

almost always eight bars-four plus
four and then a repeat; after that is a
similar symmetrical structure of
different musical material. Doing this
barline analysis is a little bit like

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possible. Since you've been noted for

your dedication and approach to
scores, r d like you to tell us about
your philosophies and procedures.

Hillis: When I teach conducting I

always start with score study. It is
what determines everything the
conductor will do-from rehearsal
procedures to gestural technique.
First, I have the student make sure he
or she sees everything on the page. It's
amazing how many things can be

on musically identical material.

After the information-gathering
exercise, I structure the process to
focus on certain elements of the score.
The first of these is harmonic
rhythm-the writing down of chord
roots as they progress, and then later
the assignment of functions: tonic,
subdominant, and dominant. With
this you know where you are going
when it comes to cadences. The next
thing is to do a barline analysis to
determine how phrase groupings fall.

have to work to discover what's there,

especially irregular groupings: three
bars and the like. O<:)casionally you get
stuck on a section, maybe 23 bars or a
section that's difficult to comprehend.
Then like a croSsword puzzle, you go
on to something else. You do as much
as you possibly can. Don't worry
about those few measures; you walk
away, go get a drink of water or
something. Often, when you come
back and look at it you see the
structure; it reveals itself eventually.
February 1991 I Page 7

After the barline analysis, which is

done with a black pencil and using a
transparent ruler, I use a color-coding
system to mark dynamics and other
principal material. I use red for
anything that's strong-forte,
fortissimo, triple forte-and I put a
series of red arrows above the score
for an accelerando. I use blue for the
opposite-for piano or mezzo piano.
Usually I use a squiggly line for ritard;
a slower tempo will be a line through
the score. I reserve green for
pianissimo. Otherwise, I use brown

From Miss Hillis' Score of the Bruckner Symphony #8.

60

variety of colors is used to indicate

tempi. I use blue for anything up to
80. For instance, I put J = 63 above
the first bar. From 80-100 I use a
brown pencil; . it might beJ =84-or-something. For 100 and above I use
the red, because that's the strongest
tempo. If the meter is in four, I put

When I teach conducting I

always start with score
study. It is what determines
everything the conductor
will do - from rehearsal
procedures to gestural
technique.
an X or a cross above it. If it's in
three; I put a triangle above it (rather
than putting % because then you
have to translate it to the directions
your arm goes). If it's in two, I put a
V. fve got a nice squiggle for 6/8 and
12/8. That squiggle follows the
direction of the arm.
Then, I have a lot of different
colors in markers-the watercolor
highlighting variety. I use these to
mark melodic material, score
divisions, and all sorts of other
important elements of the music. I
mark an alto soloist part in purple, for
instance, or I draw a yellow line
through the clefs of the choral staves.
This helps me see divisions in the
score. Sometimes the chorus is placed
above the strings; sometimes the
strings aren't playing and the chorus is
at the bottom. The same situation
happens with solo instruments. It's
very important to see clearly and
know where all the parts are.
I also use yellow to highlight
principal melodic material. If there's a
very strong first subject, fll usually
Page 8 I CHORAL JOURNAL

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use a yellow that verges on orange; a

countei: melody would be in a lighter
yellow. As I mentioned, the stronger
the material, generally, the stronger
the color. Always, wherever those
times reappear, whether vocal or
instrumental, they'll be highlighted in
the same color. I consider the voices
part of the instrumentation. If they
are marked as such, you can recognize
relationships - for instance, an
augmentation or diminution of a
melody (augmentation will be marked
in a stronger shade of the color
because augmentation is, in a way, a
strengthening compositional device).

Before I mark anything, however, I

take what I call three excursions
through the score. After these
excursions, fm ready to study-to
make sure fve not only seen
everything on the page, but fm able
to hear everything on the page. As an
example, in the second movement of
the Brahms Requiem, there are two
pairs of horns, two in B flat and two
in C. One pair functions as
woodwinds, the other as brass. The
brass pair is always scored with the
trumpets and timpani while the wind
pair is always with the winds. A
conductor needs to know this.

Hillis: I guess so. fm not sure. I was

introduced to the process by Otto
Werner Mueller, who is teaching
conducting at Juilliard now. I found
that it serves very well for
understanding the harmonic designs of
many scores. The opening, for
instance, of the Sixth Movement of the
Brahms Requiem cannot be analyzed
any other way; there is no key center.
The text is "Here we have no
continuing place," and you don't
know for about lOO measures that
you're in c minor which later evolves
into C Major. The only way you can
discover this is by chord function.

From Miss Hillis' Score of the Bruckner Symphony #8.

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p- - - - - - - - - I've worked with nearly all

the leading orchestral
conductors in the world and
they all do score study that
results in marking their
scores.

Vc.

Shrock: How much time do you set

aside for score study?

ft.

Once a score has been totally

marked- signifying your thorough
study-it is basically memorized. You
have your score in front of you, but
you don't have to look at it. I always

Part II. I started with a clean score

and after studying and marking it, I
had it memorized.
Shrock: Do you color-mark all scores

Hillis: First of all, let me say that fve

worked with nearly all the leading
orchestral conductors in the world and
they all do score study that results in
marking their scores. They might not
do exactly what I do, but, for
instance, fve seen Solti scores with
barline divisions in them. His scores
have so many pencil markings, he
hardly can find the notes. He doesn't
use the color coding system I use, but
he analyzes phrasing and harmonic
rhythm. It's all there. fve seen it in
many a conductor's score. They all do
it. Those who are not topnotch are
the ones who don't do it.
Now, as for time spent at score
study, I budget it according to what's

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and orchestra or soloists and orchestra

because everybody gets a little "antsy"
if they think you have no score on
which to rely. The reality is that I
conduct from memory with the score
in front of me.
Several years ago when I stepped in
for Solti and conducted the Mahler
Eighth, I had to think to turn pages in
the score because I had it memorized.
I knew Part I, of course, because it
involves the chorus so much. But, I
only had a day and a half to learn

choral! orchestral?

Hillis: Yes, I certainly do. I do it for

the study of music no matter the
scoring. I do it with symphonies,
choral and orchestral works, and
a cappella pieces.
Shrock: You mentioned that you
analyze harmonies according to three
functions: tonic, dominant, and
subdominant. Is this based on
Schenker theory?

scores on my desk in different stages of

preparation. As I get closer to the
performance I concentrate more and
more on a particular one. If certain
scores are unfamiliar, they take more
time. Others may take less because I
am at least knowledgeable about the
style. I did the Puccini Messi di Gloria
recently. It's an easy piece to hear. If
you know Puccini at all, you've
already got sounds in your ear.
A major factor, regarding time of
preparation and study, is the
February 1991 I Page 9

involvement in preparation of
instrumental parts. I remember, for
instance, doing a cut version of Hansel
and Gretel. Of course, because it was
cut, I had to go through and set up
the cuts. Having played in orchestras,
I mow what a mess it is when you
have to go from one place to four
pages later-even if pages are taped
together. So, I had an assistant help
me photocopy the parts, then cut
them up and piece them together. We
did the same thing to the score. I
think it took about a hundred hours.
But it was necessary in order to save
rehearsal time and to make the
performance better.
The marking of instrumental parts
is the fifth activity (after analyzing
phrasing, harmonic function,
expression marks, and melodic
material). Knowing the orchestra
parts is part of your learning. If your
_parts are prepared properly, you
already have five rehearsals out of
your way the first time you step out
on the podium. And, besides, you
mow what the players are doing or
not doing. You mow, for instance,
that the timpanist doesn't play for a
long, long time, and if he has those
bars accounted for-if he has letters,
or has "tacet" marked to a certain
point. While fm marking parts I may
add rehearsal numbers if I think they
may save time in a rehearsal. In the

Hillis: You should never, never

conduct your rehearsals from piano
vocal scores. Always conduct from a
full orchestra score whether you're
preparing for somebody else or
whether you're preparing for yourself.
The vocal score may really lead you
astray. For instance, you may see a
piano reduction with a D above middle C marked fortissimo and think
that the chorus has to be very loud. If
that fortissimo is scored for a flute it's
A marking by itself means
different than for a trombon~. You
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score you must hear not just sopranos are doubled by oboes, as in
the naked color of the sound the opening of the last movement of

Ilf
the Brahms ReqUiem, that's a
but th e J.f..unctwn.
you
different kind of color than if they are
don't hear it, it will never
doubled by three trumpets. It makes
come out.
an enormo?S difference. . ,
In studymg the score, It s not
enough to mow that the clarinet plays
something; you have to mow its
function. Is it coloring the violas, or is
Second Piano Concerto; the strings
had 27 bars out. The piece started
it a solo? In the Brahms Requiem, you
mow, Brahms used the open hbrn
with one measure, and then the next
and the open trumpet. He had valved
one was the first of four. The strings
instruments available, but he didn't
miscounted and came in wrong. I told
use them. So, because the horns didn't
them to mark their parts, one measure
have certain notes in their range,
out and then 26. After that there was
Brahms substituted bassoons. The
no problem.
bassoons then function as horns and
carry the harmony over the barline.
Shrock: Do you conduct from piano
The trombones in the Brahms
vocal scores as well as full orchestral
Requiem often function as wind
scores?

last movement of the Beethoven

Ninth, for instance, there is one place
with 84 measures between letters. I
put in rehearsal numbers or letters at
structural points. If you put them in
at points that are not structural, then
the instrumentalists have to count
against the music and they make
mistakes. I once did the Brahms

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Page 10 I CHORAL JOURNAL

Percussion

instruments. You have to understand

this so you know how to treat the
dynamic markings. A marking by
itself means nothing. In the study of
the score you must hear not just the
naked color of the sound but the
function. If you don't hear it, it will
never come out.
The conductor must have
considerable knowledge about
instruments-that a flute player is
always trying to get air while an oboe
player always has too much and is
trying to get rid of it-that an oboe
gets softer as its pitch ascends while a
flute gets louder. Brass instruments .are
in a sense like voices, the higher they
go the more tension there is in their
sound. If you have an F trumpet
(which transposes up) play, say, the C
above middle C, there's not going to
be a lot of tension in that sound. If a
B flat trumpet plays that C, there's
going to be more tension in the sound.
As with voices, that C is a fairly low
note for a coloratura soprano. For a
lyric, it's middle territory .. It begins to
get high for a mezzo. And, for a
contralto, it has a lot of tension. You
can't know what the score is going to
sound like unless you know that the
piccolo sounds an octave higher than
what's written, etc.

Shrock: What are your views

regarding performance
practice- different style periods?

Hillis: Well, I think there are as many

different approaches as there are
musicians-all the way from Joshua
Rifkin, who performs Bach with one
singer per part, to conductors who use
huge choruses. Each conductor is
under. obligation to investigate
performance styles. My speciality is
not Baroque music, although I've
done a lot of Bach. When I do a new
work, Handel, for instance, I go as far
as I possibly can with my own study.
I make a list of questions and call an
expert and discuss them. As a
conductor, you don't have time to be
a musicologist. So, you have to find a
reliable person in the field. About five
or six years ago, I was studying a
Rameau opera. I called around and
found the leading scholar in the
United States to tell me about trills
and other embellishments,
instrumentation, and what have you.
You have to get as near as you
possibly can to what the composer
had in his ear. That's the whole point
of all score study.

Shrock: Do you ever change choral

parts? Do you ever have one voice
part help out on another voice part?

Hillis: All the time. Some vocal parts,

for instance, are reruly too low for the
tenors or altos. Or, sometimes the
orchestration is so heavy, you have to
put the whole chorus on one note, like
on the opening bass note of the "Tuba
mirum" in the Verdi Requiem .. When
I do this, I always tell the women to
sing their own fortissimo, not to try to
get or match the sound of the men
who obviously have a lot of tension in
the S0und because it's high for them.
I remember doing some works for a
recording with Daniel Barenboim that
called for the tenors to sing one
passage from high B flat all the way
down to'the low B flat-two octaves.
A friend of mine heard the recording
and called me asking how I got the
tenors to sing so low. He hadn't been
able to detect the joining of the
baritones as the passage descended.
Shrock: How does your process of
study integrate to your process of
planning rehearsals?

Shrock: Can conductors pick up any

of this information from recordings, or
do you suggest they attend live
performances?

Hillis: They should get intd as many

rehearsals with good orchestra
conductors as they possibly can, and
they should attend live performances.
Occasionally, after I've learned a
score, I will listen to a recording. This
is just to confirm my ear-to make
sure I've heard everything. If you try
to learn from a recording, you are
going to learn a conductor's mistakes.
I've often prepared a score and then
listened to a recording to discover that
the conductor has been naughty. He's
pili mosso, etc. On the other hand,
I've rethought a score after I've
listened to a conductor I admire very
much.

PAR.A@LETIE
.
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February 1991 I Page 11

Hillis: As a part of my score study I

study, I prepare what I call a "home
general, my score study is none of the
make an instrumental chart. In one
study chart." It lists all the choral
choir's business. Their singing, on the
movements, their pages in the full and
column I list all the movements and
other hand, is my business. I'll tell you
sections of movements if the
. piano vocal scores, and their relative
that! I don't do a long warmup with
orchestration changes (as in, for
difficulty. This difficulty is marked in
the singers, but I am concerned about
the quality of their vocal production.
X's-the more of them, the harder the
instance, the second and sixth
movements of the Brahms Requiem).
music. If I put one X, that's easy. If
The warmup doesn't last more than
In another column I list the keys. I
there are 12 of them, it's impossible. I
five minutes. I usually start, say, on
then can immediately see relationships
then work on those that are 12's at
the A above middle C and take a
major scale down to D and vary the
between movements. In a third and
every rehearsal. Also, I plan rehearsals
according to how many sectionals are
vowels-usually ending on an "oh" or
fourth column I list choral and solo
an "ah" just to make sure there is
needed. If fm doing something wild
participation. After that I make notice
of each instrument of the orchestra,
like Schoenberg's Moses and Aaron, I
adequate resonance. In the rehearsals
from=the=top=ofAhe=score=down.=With- .starLwith=sec.tiQual=r.eheai"sals andl
. prop~jLW!:Lget into. intonation
this instrumental analysis, I can plan
plan to accomplish certain specific
problems-which often are in
my rehearsals. In the Brahms
melodically descending passages and
goals.
which are sung back in the throat-I
Requiem I can begin With the second
may have the choir sing on vowels
Shrock: How much of the score study
movement. When I finish the piece I
only, keeping the vowels forward all
can let first and second fiddles,the.
do you divulge to the chorus?
the way. Nearly everybody in this
timpanist, and the trombonists go,
and rehearse the first movement. In
Hillis: Very little. I may give the
chorus studies voice. There are only
chorus what will help their reading, '
Messiah I usually rehearse the
two or three who don't, and that
like a barline analysis for the
makes a big difference. Good voices,
movements that involve the trumpet
orchestral fugue in the "Agnus Dei" of
and timpani. Then I let them go and
of course, help in accomplishing the
rehearse the other movements. There's
the Missa solemnis because it's so
demands or requirements of scores,
irregular (The chorus has to come in
but good voices can't take the place of
nothing that makes an orchestra
player more impatient (and fve been
on the second half of the fourth bar in
score study and the conductor's
phrase groupings difficult to hear.
responsibility for learning all he or she
an orchestra player so I know about
. There are 11 groups of three bars and . can about voices and instruments, etc.
it), than to have to just sit and wait.
All music starts from score study. C]
Once I finish my chart and my score
then one group of four). But in
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