By chance I came on the site of the label Divine Art and saw some quotations from various reviews of the disc with motets from 1614 by Alessandro Grandi as performed by the ensemble Musica Secreta. One of the quotations was from a review I wrote for MusicWeb.
But I was surprised by the quotations: they had just selected some phrases from my review which suggest that I was recommending the disc. But I most definitely was not.
This is what the website quotes: "Grandi's music is of excellent quality and shows the features of so much of the sacred music of the time. Musica Secreta is a very fine ensemble, and the five singers on this disc - Deborah Roberts, Tessa Bonner, Katharine Hawnt (soprano), Catherine King (mezzo) and Caroline Trevor (contralto) - have very nice voices which blend excellently. The booklet contains informative programme notes and all the lyrics with an English translation.” (http://www.brandon-music.net/DA/CD/25062info.htm)
This is what I wrote: "Don't get me wrong: Musica Secreta is a very fine ensemble, and the five singers on this disc - Deborah Roberts, Tessa Bonner, Katharine Hawnt (soprano), Catherine King (mezzo) and Caroline Trevor (contralto) - have very nice voices which blend excellently. The problem is that the singing is rather bland. As the programme notes in the booklet state Grandi's motets are a mixture of 'prima prattica' and 'seconda prattica'. The latter aspect is reflected not only by the use of the basso continuo, but also by elements like contrast, text expression and ornamentation. In all these aspects this recording falls short of what one may expect to hear in music of this period. The text expression is limited as is the addition of ornamentation, and there are hardly any dynamic shades." And this was followed by more critical remarks. (http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2008/May08/Grandi_DDA25062.htm)
Does this happen often? And is it acceptable? It is nice if reviews from MusicWeb are quoted, but here the tenor of the review is completely turned around. I would like to hear from others what they think and if they know other cases like this.
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It's like those spotlit quotes outside theatres: 'GLORIOUS' (Daily Mail)
ReplyDeleteWhen the original was something more like:
'Florence Foster Jenkins' participation can only be described as a glorious failure...'
Such is life - a world of spin!
It happens all the time; it's typical for PR agents to thus parse reviews of their clients' work for the 'good words'. If by "acceptable" you mean: standard practice, then: Yes.
ReplyDeleteStandard practice it may be, acceptable (to everyone other than PR agents and those they promote)it most certainly is NOT. An accurate adjective might be "dishonest", and a more accurate but less diplomatic adjective might be "fraudulent".
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, I've also noticed that some artists' and labels' sites actually quote reviews IN FULL, even where they are not entirely favourable.
This thread prompted me to seek out my review of a Divine Art disc called From Wonderland to Heaven. They have chosen two very selective quotes which, in themselves, are positive. That said, they don't reflect my overall view, which was lukewarm to say the least.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how many punters buy on the basis of these 'capsule comments'? I usually decide on the basis of a more in-depth asessment, but perhaps I am in a minority here.
I once had a long argument with Klaus Heyman when Naxos did the same with one of our reviews. I lost.
ReplyDeleteIf they send us a disc we can say what we want in a review but equally they can pick what they want from the review. There's nowt we can do about it
Len
Well, I suppose the full reviews will always be available for anyone prepared to seek them out.
ReplyDeleteLen,
ReplyDeleteHow odd! I assume a record company expects the reviewer to do justice to the recording and take it seriously. Is it too much to expect record companies treating reviews likewise?
To idealistic. Record labels do not like bad reviews. They want to sell discs and will do anything to maximise that
ReplyDeleteLen
Nobody LIKES a bad review! However, neither does anybody like being conned, and in plenty of countries it is illegal. Moreover, if the reviewer or publication is named (which they generally are, because there's little point in quoting anonymous opinion), they are misrepresenting copyrighted critical opinion, and that is arguably defamation.
ReplyDeleteThese strikes me as none too idealistic reasons why they should exercise the honest option of not quoting from bad reviews.
Puh-lease. Selective quoting has yet to be made illegal in any country... if it ever was, then probably in a fascist one. Going so far as claiming defamation is, to be blunt, absurd.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, it usually does not happen that a review is cut-and-pasted to say the opposite of what it meant to say... even gross distortion is rare. The best reason for this is that were such a blatant attempt at manipulation to come to light, the negative blow-back would far exceed any positives gained. Social regulation takes care of blips like that.
And the specific case of Johan van Veen is pretty harmless, actually. They quoted what he said, minus some context. Any review that feels reluctant to take a stance and 'buffers' a negative judgement with a laundry list of positive statements is asking for those, not the timidly negative ones, to be quoted.
The riposte by "jfl" to my previous post just goes to show that, even if a reviewer's true opinion is quoted, utterly unedited, the reader can still misinterpret his words.
ReplyDeleteI was actually pointing out that conning - in the sense of fraud, i.e. "telling fibs to get money out of people" - was illegal. A selective quotation may or may not come under this heading, depending entirely on how inventively it is edited. We can use Dan's pithy example to illustrates this: the selective quotation "Glorious" is, as Dan suggests, a con, whilst "Glorious failure" is not.
Equally, I made no "claim", but simply suggested that misrepresentation was ARGUABLY defamation. Misleading selective quotation is inevitably, to some degree, "damaging to the [reviewer's] good reputation". How many punters, emerging from Dan's dismal fiasco, will be thinking, "Obviously, the publicists must have misquoted that man's review"? And how many of them will be thinking, "That reviewer needs his bumps testing," or something even less polite?
There is nothing absurd about this. In degree, as an act of fraud or defamation (or both), misrepresentation by selective quotation may not aspire to the dizzy heights (or should that be depths?) of "The Crime of the Century", but in kind it is nevertheless identical. That most cases of misrepresentation are relatively inocuous in no way absolves the act of its inherent dishonesty.
"jfl" suggested that "any review that . . . buffers a negative judgement with a laundry list of positive statements is asking for those, not the timidly negative ones, to be quoted." This sounds shockingly similar to the view, widely held for many, many years, that a woman who dressed provocatively and sat alone at a bar was "asking for it" (regardless of whether she wanted "it").
Well, Johan's laundry list contained but one item, "a fine ensemble with nice voices that blend excellently", which is hardly "asking for it"! This single item had been divorced from a whole string of unequivocally adverse observations. Hence, it strikes me that, if anything, it's the other way round - Johan's single-entry laundry list set the context, against which the failings of the performance were stacked. Are we to take it that, if a reviewer concludes adversely, then his review must be damning in EVERY respect? Will reviewing henceforth be governed by the principle of "Hurwitzism"?
Perish the thought. There are plenty of genuine good opinions sculling around, not to mention reviewers, operating out of dinghy back-street premises, who will sell their words of praise for thirty pieces of silver. So, we have to wonder just why the PR folk feel this irresistible urge to go dishonestly and disrespectfully doctoring adverse reviews, don't we?
""jfl" suggested that "any review that . . . buffers a negative judgement with a laundry list of positive statements is asking for those, not the timidly negative ones, to be quoted." This sounds shockingly similar to the view, widely held for many, many years, that a woman who dressed provocatively and sat alone at a bar was "asking for it" (regardless of whether she wanted "it"). "
ReplyDeleteI emphatically reject the notion that there is--at least on my part--any validity to this misbegotten analogy. Just in case... since I assume that he did actually not wish to imply that I hold the latter view.
And on the notion of a negative conclusion not meaning that every aspect was damned we agree. Is it therefor not perfectly fine that a press clipping isolates a positive element? "Has great intonation", if part of a review, still applies, even if the reviewer were to go on and say: "...but can't hit a note".
Keep your hair on, jfl - nobody's implying anything about anyone! I was shocked, not because I thought that believing the one implied belief in the other, but simply by the very close similarity of the reasoning. The analogy is not "misbegotten", because it is entirely valid - in both cases the logic is: "if A has outward attributes AA, and B infers that AA can only mean A's consent to action C, then B may perform C on A." However, the logic is flawed, because "A's consent to C" is not a necessary and unique consequent of AA.
ReplyDeleteThis has been sorted out in the case of a woman's apparent "provocation", which does not (and never did) add up to explicit consent, but not in the case of reviewers. This is because, as jfl tells us, a review that "shows a bit of leg" (by including "positive statements") is fair game for any predatory publicity agent, who can do what he likes with the review regardless of whether the reviewer objects.
But surely, if it's right in the former instance, it should be right in the latter. It's high time that "fair game" was supplanted by "fair play", then honest reviewers like Johan can feel safe without having to expunge all complimentary incidentals from their adverse reviews.
Finally, has anybody any opinions on how they'd feel if they spent money to hear "great intonation", only to find that the notes so beautifully intoned are all WRONG notes?
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ReplyDelete