What is so Special about G minor?

In the days when I tuned my harpsichord I became deeply respectful of the singular problem posed by the black keys we call F# and B-flat.  Properly tuned in a version of mean-tone temperament, they sound absolutely horrible together. 

Even on a modern piano tuned to equal temperament, this combination of keys will inevitably sound like a major third, never a plausible diminished fourth.

That probably explains why Mozart stayed away from the key of G minor on the piano, as did Beethoven,  with some notable exceptions: The Piano Quartet K. 478, for example, on which my book is forthcoming.

Haydn, on the other hand, has written in that key, and has taken on the problem in highly creative ways, bless his heart.  His trick is to use the ordinarily F# key as a G-flat, thus relishing the major third produced by those particular black keys.

It makes for remarkable tonal passion.

Haydn and Jazz

My "oldest living" adult amateur student is an extraordinary world-class scientist, mindful of the vast chasm that separates her work from what she once referred to as "the music part" of music.  Needless to say, she is deeply insightful into the workings of the elements in music as in science.

Today, working on her Haydn D major sonata, the issue arose of note values in relation to improvisation, lee-way, variability.  Without a strong element of those free elements the note values in Haydn have the power to kill the music.

It is ironic that Haydn's sonatas are as free-form as they are while jazz improvisations are based on what seem to me, in contrast, to be quite tight structures.  Of course Haydn was faced with a real dilemma: how to evoke orchestral sounds from a newly invented keyboard instrument whose sound was unlike any previously possible from black and white keys played by two hands with the addition of foot or knee-controlled dampers.

It would have been accepted harpsichord technique to sustain some tones beyond their notated value in order to foster what little sympathetic vibration was possible with harpsichords. 

Modern pianists are taught to obey the printed text as if it were the music; sustaining a note beyond its prescribed value is a no-no.  But it all depends on the function of the note.  Sometimes eighth notes have to function as quarters in disguise, sometimes as tied whole notes in disguise.  At other times it is clear that they are eighths and must be released promptly.  How do I know?

I pay a lot of attention when I listen whether to amateurs or professionals.   Listening has taught me the power of the release and the corresponding power of the urge to sustain.

Do I Let On That It's My Favorite?

The question of secrecy in music is very important.  Just think of the number of situations in which composers have found themselves unable to spell out exactly what they want to say in the manner in which they want to say it: in other words, having to be cryptic about it. 

Who comes to mind? 

• William Byrd, a crypto-Catholic during a time when that meant you ran the risk of the state cutting off your head, literally.
• Dmitri Shostakovich, an independent thinker stuck under Stalin's thumb
• Lutoslawski, setting Polish folk songs for school children in such a way that they would learn freedom from within

These are just the first ones who come to mind; surely there are many more.

What about the performer?  How do we know about the performer's deepest identity when playing?  It is a compelling question that I can best address from my work with children and with amateurs.  If one plays so as to call attention to the parts one loves most everyone seems to "get it."

My dilemma of the moment is how to announce the repertoire for an upcoming recital that will include two of my all-time most beloved pieces.  I want the listeners to know but if I tell them it will probably only distract them.  

Standout Moments with Other People's Children

"There are two kinds of children, your own and someone else's."  I found this sentence in an essay on teaching that I wrote  a while back, and which will soon appear in a new book of essays on various musical subjects (rather like this blog, in fact).

Every parent recalls particular moments in their own children's lives.  But I find it stunning that specific moments stand out in my work with other people's children.  I take this to be an indication that there is such a thing as in-depth communication even in a classroom encounter.

It is particularly special when the wonder gets expressed two ways.

Once on an M-104 bus riding uptown I received a tap on the shoulder.  It was a young boy: "You play the piano in my class every week!"    I do not recall his name and would undoubtedly not recognize him if I ran into him again but that tap on the shoulder stays with me.  He is probably a musician of some sort.

Elise is Not Therese

I once asked a group of 12-year-olds what they would do if they were going to hide the spelling of someone's name in a composition.  "I certainly wouldn't put it at the beginning," declared one wise young man.

The principle sticking factor of Fuer Elise is the maddening repetition of the E - D# tones of the opening:  How many times do they repeat?  Why?  And why are they specifically articulated in rising pairs on page 2 while they had clearly begun on the upper note at the beginning?

To begin with a spelling lesson: In German "Th" functions as a single letter, and E-flat is called "Ess."
So we get, on page 2, (Th) E / (r) E / Ess (enharmonically D#) / E, her name.  Would she have noticed?

Have you noticed?

Doesn't it explain why so much of the piece has to be played softly?

At any rate, the young man was right: the name is not at the beginning.

Specificity Forever!

What a treat to run into a familiar face completely by chance, to realize that I know the face, then to recall a day in a 5th-grade classroom more than 20 years ago when that young person and I had an unforgettable exchange about Fuer Elise.  Of course I remember her;  I have thought about her often.

I was volunteering in a school on Manhattan's upper West side.  Once a week I would come play something on the piano and integrate the experience somehow with their work in Language Arts--fancy word for English class.  The project that week involved the class writing reviews of my performance that day.  (I think we were working on different types of adjectives: descriptive, qualitative, etc.)

This young woman found my playing lacking in expressivity and said so in no uncertain terms, pointing out specifically the absence of dynamics in my playing.

I had the score with me, an Urtext edition, i.e., with no editorial additions.  Most of the piece is, in fact pianissimo, which makes perfect sense once you realize that it is a love letter and probably a secret one, to someone named, not Elise, but Therese. (Beethoven had notoriously terrible handwriting and the misreading has stuck.)

This girl had learned the piece from a typically overedited children's book in which it is assumed that dynamic change is the only thing a child will get interested in.

My question: How come her attention was drawn to this aspect of my playing?  Was she recalling her teacher's insistent "louder!" or was she expecting some surge to manifest itself in my rendering corresponding to a malaise she felt while playing?  Who knows?

What Good Is a Dictionary?

I was more than a little shocked today researching the term "moderato" in scholarly works about Haydn at the extent to which the word is accepted as meaning something like "medium."  Come on...  really?  Medium what?

I want to know who used the term first to mean what I think it means, which is lyrical rather than metric.  What a later era might have called "tempo rubato." 

It seems fairly clear to me that written music in the 18th century had to conform pretty much to standard practice; if there were to be deviations in terms of timing they had somehow to be hinted at but not made so explicit as to turn everybody off.

The trouble is that we are still being taught that the standard practice corresponds to real content when I think that has to be questioned as often as not.