Beethoven, Brahms, Bach. These composers are synonymous with great classical music that has been performed from the 1600s to modern times.
Cellist for the Milwaukee-based Fine Arts Quartet, Robert Cohen, discusses the intricate dance that occurs between musician and composer - starting with the requirement that a musician respect the composer's work.
"A composer has to have extraordinary imagination, absolutely breathtaking, to do something that's completely original," explains Cohen. "A new composer writing a piece of music is going to have to think of all sorts of things and have conceptions in their mind, and after everything is written, you as a musician have to work it all out."
"So the awe, this kind of complete reverence for every note, I think is essential," continues Cohen, "because without it, you're taking too much for granted."
Cohen explains that sometimes there can be a tension between this awe and the musician's need for independence. On one hand it's an instrumentalist's dream to have dinner with the composer and extract his or her take on the piece; yet "that brings up yet more challenges, because what you see in the music isn't necessarily what the composer sees in it," he explains.
Cohen further discusses his experience interpreting everything from newer composers to Beethoven's Opus 131:
