Add to that the string tension. A normal violin, when in tune, has to withstand about 90lbs of tension from its 4 strings. A concert grand has (IIRC) 213 strings and the bigger the piano, the tighter they have to be to stay in tune. That's a lot of tonnes.
I saw a performance of Ravel's Piano Concerto for the Left Hand at the w/e. I was unaware that such a piece existed but what an amazing experience it was. Jean-Efflam Bavouzet was at the piano with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra.
Horowitz's hand position was unusual in that the palm was often below the level of the key surface. He frequently played chords with straight fingers, and the little finger of his right hand was often curled up until it needed to play a note; to Harold C. Schonberg, "it was like a strike of a cobra."[1] For all the excitement of his playing, Horowitz rarely raised his hands higher than the piano's fallboard. One of his students, Byron Janis, said that he had tried to teach him that technique but it didn't work for him.[25] His body was immobile, and his face seldom reflected anything other than intense concentration.
I have just been listening to tonight's Prom: Martha Argerich playing Tchaikovsky's 1st piano concerto, under the baton of Daniel Barenboim. Wonderful performance - and it's great to think that these two septuagenarians grew up together in Buenos Aires.And here they are playing Mozart, with a piano each.
Talking of C#, should be doing some work
I think at work you are meant to B#, although if you are a marksman, sure, you need to C#.
I do like that Bach composed the 8th prelude and fugue to be enharmonic (E flat and D sharp).
@Wow, have you taken ABRSM (or similar) exams?
I do like that Bach composed the 8th prelude and fugue to be enharmonic (E flat and D sharp).
Sorry, just spotted my error; that should be E flat minor and D sharp minor; 6 flats and 6 sharps - the point at which one normally switches key signatures from one to the other...
Dear Peter,
Thanks for your email.
The issue you raise is at the very centre of performing - whether in front of an audience or a microphone etc. It is a problem with which I can truly empathise.
The issues may be connected with security of notes, technique, concentration and focus and, of course, your own confidence and nerves.
Obviously, if you have any insecurity, whether it be of the notes, the fingering or other technical matters, then that passage is going to be particularly vulnerable under pressure. I remember reading in some book on piano playing ( I cannot recall its author) that his approach involved playing through a section at the beginning of the practice and noting all the places where there were any kind of “fracture”, however slight. He would then play each of those sections 25 times without a mistake at a comfortable speed. If my memory serves me he used an abacus to keep count. If there was a mistake he would move a bead back. You repeat the procedure each day until the passage is secure at speed and you are confident that it is secure.
I remember as a student being told that if you could play a piece 50 times without a mistake you stood a good chance of being able to emulate that in performance. I believe some American psychologists suggest 35 times!
The other big issue is concentration - particularly allowing stray thoughts to interrupt your playing. Letting the process of the recording intrude into your thoughts puts incredible pressure on you and you immediately lose focus. I have been watching the Moscow Music School piano completion for outstanding young players very recently. The players are all taught how to focus their complete attention on what they are doing. Each one spends a few moments before starting, almost in self hypnosis, focusing their thoughts. I suppose the trick is to maintain that focus throughout the programme - but they all start with an immaculate playing technique and complete security of notes.
I don’t know if any of those thoughts are of any use. It has always seemed to me if there is a passage that might go wrong, it usually would go wrong because it is a major distraction in my mind as I get nearer and nearer to it in performance. I am no piano performer but I have always found that playing from memory increases my accuracy because I do not have the distraction of the page.
Ultimately, I think you have got it right - keep working at it.
All the very best,
Colin
I think I've taken my own thread off topic - nothing virtuosic about my playing!
I've re-recorded the C# major prelude for a friend's birthday - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0EUwWInSRg&ab_channel=PeterWalker . She was in my music group at college and although we lost touch for about 40 years, thanks to Facebook we are back in touch again. Her birthday is tomorrow.
I was hoping to record the fugue as well, but although I can play it reasonably when it's just me, when I've got a recording device switched on, I go to pieces. It really is a lovely piece - one of the most exhilaratingly joyful pieces of Bach it has been my pleasure to listen to and play. I'm still planning to record it, but sadly there are no short cuts here. I think I'm going to have to aim for a higher standard than I ever have before.
Just over a week ago, it was my good friend Ruth Mercer's birthday. I like to try to record pieces of music for such occasions and I really wanted to record the C# major prelude and fugue from Book 1 of Bach's 48 Preludes and Fugues. I recorded the prelude in time, but I didn't have the fugue ready so I've been working at it and this is my best effort.
Bach's "48" tend to have a reputation as being a bit dry and unapproachable, but they are unquestionably one of the great masterpieces of the musical repertoire. It really takes a lot of effort for a mediocre pianist like me to play something like this, but I hope it's worth it. It leaves me in awe of such great pianists as Andras Schiff or Angela Hewitt, that they seem to be able to rattle pieces like this off with little apparent effort or stress (of course, we don't see behind the scenes!)
I actually think this fugue is really joyful - I almost imagine that if Winnie-the-Pooh had written a Bach fugue, this would be it (tra-tiddle-iddle-rom-pom-pom-tiddle-rom-pom-rom-pom-pom) and you can imagine him humming through pale fawn fluff on a warm, sunny morning as though twice 19 didn't matter a bit.
Anyway Ruth, I hope you like it! I've really enjoyed working on it.
Oh, a mention for my wife Janet who has behaved with great forbearance as I've played this piece repeatedly, for days on end, for the best part of a month. She has failed to injure or murder me, and for that I'm eternally grateful.
A noble effort, Wow!
Agreed!
As my wife is a piano teacher I showed her your video and she was suitably impressed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FfzIAFMe5Q&ab_channel=PeterWalkerPeterWalker
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FfzIAFMe5Q&ab_channel=PeterWalkerPeterWalker
The legato seems nice and clean, would I be right in thinking you're not using much pedal?
I was lucky enough to see Marc-Andre Hamelin perform Op109 and Op111 at the Anvil in Basingstoke. What struck me was that the playing was so effortless that I could focus completely on the music.
But the performance that sticks in my mind more than any other, was watching Steven Osborne performing Messaien's Vingt Regards at Wigmore Hall, around the time he was completing his acclaimed recording of the piece for Hyperion.
I was blown away by a Schiff assertion about the slow movement of the 31st Beethoven sonata. He reckoned that Beethoven was quoting the Bach St. John Passion "Es ist vollbracht" - Christ's last words - "It is finished" and it was a reference to Beethoven's state of health and that he knew he was dying. He still hung around for another 5 years after writing that sonata. There's no question - the two passages are very similar.
But musical history maintains that none of Bach's choral works were performed after he died until Mendelssohn resurrected them with a performance of the St. Matthew Passion in 1829 - 2 years after Beethoven died.
If Schiff is right, then Beethoven must have had at least a sight of the score at some point.
Fascinating stuff.
Thanks, Andrew. I've just ordered the sheet music for the Organ Sonata no 4 Andante. Not heard it before and it doesn't sound impossibly difficult.
There was something about the quality of the sound in that video which I thought was especially striking: whether it was down to the voicing of the piano, the acoustics of the hall, or some jiggery-pokery in the recording/editing studio, I think the piano sounded more bell-like than any I've heard.