This morning was one of those unforgettable teaching mornings. It started with my young adult who is coming to grips with the difference between notation and actual sound--one of music's more complex dilemmas. We were working on the Andante movement of Clementi's famous C major Sonatina, a movement in 3/4, full of repetitive Alberti figures and ultra-boring predictabilities.
Aha! Not so, she pointed out.
When listened to, the overtone interplay between the sustained melody tones and the fluctuating resonance of the Alberti figure infuses the music with a variability that defies description, much less notation.
Add to that the many ambiguous hemiolas that permeate the movement, both in right and left hand passages and not always in the same way in each hand and you have plenty to keep mind, body, and spirit occupied regardless of how "easy" the music sounds.
