We’ve tried a little bit of blitz chess around here – 3 minutes total per player. Go.
The thing is, it’s really a completely different game. With the massive time restraints, your advance planning must be simple at best, and generally you’re mostly reacting, not acting. Compare that to a traditional game of chess, building careful structures and making strategic plans moves in advance.
I think this is perhaps my biggest concern with the many ad-hoc professional vocal/choral ensembles performing around the country (this includes many a cappella pop groups, too). With limited paid rehearsal time leading up to performances, these ensembles lean heavily on reading skills and high-level music learning skills.
They can put on beautiful performances, enriched by mature and sophisticated musicians. But compare them to the typical collegiate choir, rehearsing four or five days a week for bi-semester performances. The college choir might not learn the music as quickly as pros, but the music has time to grow, evolve, and mature as they learn it. Like a traditional chess game, the college choir gains several levels of sophistication.
I don’t know the solution – a large-scale full-time professional choir seems hard to imagine, despite professional orchestras in most mid-sized and large cities in the US.
But consider this quote from Robert Shaw, early in his career, reflecting on a 65-performance US Tour of the Mozart Requiem.
Music comes hard.
Sixty-four performances under every conceivable condition of fatigue and tension, a growing technical mastery, a deepening understanding. On the sixty-fifth performance it happens. Now they know – and without notable exception, fifty professional musicians break down and shed tears.
Being great at Blitz Chess is a great skill to have, but it doesn’t replace traditional chess.