Make the orchestra great again? JD Vance is unlikely to play the cello | music

eUS openings at Trumpland continue to reveal amazing new dimensions to the possibilities of orchestral music. Trump’s announcement that his Trump Kennedy Center is closing for renovation is a brilliantly ironic way to stop the noise when artists try to cancel appearances during the remainder of his presidential term: It’s already closed! Big losers, all of you!

But this is not the new dawn of the art form I am talking about. I mean the inspiring painting unveiled by Trump art professor John McNaughton (and stamped with the presidential stamp of approval — i.e. posted on Truth Social).

Maga Symphony depicts Trump as a conductor of politicians and cultural figures who make the orchestra great again. Who in this MAGA fever dream with an orchestra? Marco Rubio leads the violins, J.D. Vance plays the cello (Melania is relegated to the second desk), and his sons and Roger Stone play the double bass, the foundation of the orchestra’s ideological sound world. This oddly composed woodwind and brass ensemble features four flutes and no oboes – mind you, there are no violins either, those shape-shifting would-be democrats! – Plus Tom Homan on trumpet, with Tucker Carlson on cymbals. Where is Elon Musk, you ask? On electric guitar, of course: The Joker in the orchestral suite.

As McNaughton describes this image, “You can feel it—the music coming together—rising and stirring something deep within…And when Americans come together and trust in a shared vision, they create something powerful, lasting, and bigger than any one person.”

And that is the cultural trope that this ridiculous image shines through: the idea of ​​the all-powerful conductor, who inspires his musicians with total command and complete obedience, which has been inspirational catnip for dictators from Hitler to Stalin to Mussolini. As Elias Canetti wrote in his book Crowds and Power: “There is no clearer expression of power than the conductor’s performance… He has the power of life and death to the sounds of musical instruments.”

Orchestras can represent an ideal society, if you are a tyrannical tyrant. Imagine: a hundred musicians, working perfectly together to realize your vision, with no possibility of opposition, criticism or disagreement. Every little movement of your arms and facial expression is enchanted by pure willpower in the sounds of your deepest desires. What self-respecting autocrat wouldn’t want this kind of social control?

The McNaughton MAGA Orchestra takes the idea a step further. There are no music stands in front of the players, they perform through trumpet telepathy, a communication that is as mysterious as it is musical. It’s not so much a MAGA symphony as a political seance turned into sound.

The concept of an orchestra was not limited to the fevered imagination of autocrats in the 1930s and presidents in the 1920s. Words like MacNaughton’s are routinely used in less politically charged contexts to describe the potential social good that orchestras can achieve, from advocates of El Sistema in Venezuela – its “system” of music education, and its satellites around the world – to many of the leaders of orchestral culture here in the UK. The story goes that if society worked like an orchestra, our lives would be better, because in orchestras everyone gives up their individuality for the common good.

But this is a very problematic idea, because orchestras never work in absolute harmony. The orchestra is created through tensions between the individual will of the players and their contribution to the collective. The best orchestras do not operate like well-oiled instruments, trained to the finest margins of consensus. Instead, they are models of the controlled chaos of human emotions, desires, and virtues that are in tension, balance, and friction at the moment of performance. They are made of the experience of listening to each other. When orchestras truly fly, the conductor is not a powerful musical autocrat, but rather he or she inspires a dynamic culture in which everyone responds to where the musical discourse is going, and knows when to get a melody or an accompaniment, creating a constant state of flux, fluctuation and creative negotiation.

The image of Trump is both comic and troubling, because it reconstructs the idea of ​​the relationship between conductors and orchestras as populist shorthand for authoritarianism and demagoguery. There is no doubt that the annual conference of the Association of British Orchestras, taking place in London this week, will inspire a truer collective vision for the future of orchestras in this country. Or maybe a cowardly orchestra will hire Trump as its next music director. Strange things have happened. Perhaps this will be done by next week.

This week Tom was listening to: Emily Kevin Potts: No Prisoner, a Joyce DiDonato collaboration with Time for Three. It is communicative and urgently powerful in recording and performance. (Apple Classic | Spotify)