Magic or Arithmetic?

I happened to meet a mother accompanying her six-year-old to music class this morning. 

The mother's parting words to me were: "Whole note, half note, quarter note!"

I winced.  Starting with arithmetic dumbs down every aspect that distinguishes music from everything else.  It merely reinforces the child's ability to count and, by connecting it to a printed symbol, locks up rhythm once and for all in a tidy concrete container.

Why not start with a finger cymbal or a traingle?  A bell? 

Give a kid magic any day, every day.

Personal vs. Vocal

The NYTimes critic reviewing Anderszewski's Dec. 6 performance gave it high praise noting, among other qualities, that his Bach was "personal."

I think I know what she was referring to, but I would have preferred "vocal."   The difference is that personal connotes idiosyncratic, self-indulgent, while vocal in relation to Bach describes a rich understanding of Bach's music for all instruments.

Vocal art was arguably the most highly developed musical art of the Baroque era.  The essence of great vocal composition lies in astute knowledge of the human voice, its registers, timbres, and specific intonation.  Instrument building of that time was spurred by the desire to evoke human vocal qualities with strings, winds, organs.  Bach died in 1750; the piano was invented in 1727.  Its astonishing vocal characteristics might have inspired a new approach to keyboard composition had Bach had a piano at his disposal.

It was Haydn who picked up on the vocal qualities of the instrument, using them as source material for many of his piano sonatas and chamber music

It was masterful of Anderszewski to find the vocal qualities in every movement he played, making it sound as if Bach had composed for the modern piano.  Most modern pianists are tempted to neutralize the vocal colors of the instrument for Bach, turning his music into a neither-here-nor-there abstraction. 

Having studied a great deal of Bach on the organ for the critical early adult years when I had "given up" the piano, I have found it problematic to play his work on the piano.  That began to change last summer, when I performed the Two- and Three-part Inventions in a series called Classics of Childhood.  Anderszewski's brilliant work inspires further exploration on my part.

Schubert's 18+ Operas

Recently ruminating on the G major Sonata,  Op 79, I was struck by its operatic essence.  Performing it recently for the first time in my life I was astonished at its operatic power.

One listener asked who the characters are in this opera.  Good question.  Fantastic creatures, surely: sprites and demons, not your regular heroines and bad guys.  Another listener, wanting to know whether it was really true that Schubert composed operas, prompted me to consult my Grove Dictionary.  I counted more than 18, including sketches and unfinished works.

Whether or not they made it onto the stage and into history Schubert's operas must have been very much on his mind. 

They were all there in my playing that remarkable work last night.

Memory good and bad

Having quit "serious" piano study at 15, not to resume it until 22 (and even then with physical limitations that precluded immersion in the big repertoire) there were many years during which conventional piano instruction involves learning the standard repertoire, including sonatas by Beethoven and Schubert, and works by Chopin, Schumann, and Brahms.  These years imprint the repertoire on the ear and muscle memory in such a way as to make them easy to recall later in life.

Too easy.  When I have revisited the classics I learned before quitting I find it very difficult to approach the works afresh, without the prejudices of premature exposure.

I think it is wrong to have young people play masterworks before they possess the ear to discern content on their own terms.  Going through the motions--playing Beethoven sonatas because, like Himalayas, they are there to be climbed--does great disservice to the works and to the student.

Music in the Name

Inspired by the wealth of attention being paid to Charles Dickens during 2012, the 200th anniversary of his death, I have been enjoying revisiting his novels, currently  David Copperfield.

It is striking how musical Dickens was in his naming of the characters: sound, association, image, tonality, all conjured up by Miss Murdstone, Mr. Creaker, Uriah Heep, Betsy Trotwell.
.

Anderszewski plays Bach

Not since the days of Artur Rubinstein have I enjoyed an evening in and around Carnegie Hall as I did on December 6 when Piotr Anderszewski played an all-Bach program.  What made it so special was that total strangers conversed about the playing, about his artistry, about the music, the conversation not restricted to the hall but extending also to fellow riders on the uptown bus.

Anderszewski stands out among pianists because of his commitment to his own joy, his growing depth.  I need not agree with him on all points musical, but that is enough to make me a firm fan.  His standards are the highest in every department; he puts himself on the line, fearlessly.

This enables him to exceed all limits: He plays faster, slower, louder and, most notably, softer than almost anyone around.  The place was all ears even into the remarkable silences.

A great artist.

Boom! The Theory Canon Goes Off Again!

The young composer  recounts his musical background: How he quit piano lessons as a young child because of mandatory enrollment in the theory curriculum.  His playing and his subsequent persistence in following his ear indicate auditory sensitivity of the highest order--the only order there is, actually, because it is his own, matched only by its own intensity and integrity. 

The theory canon persists because it makes music easier to teach.  The mere existence of the piano makes it obsolete and irrelevant. 

How many children quit piano (as I also did) because the sound does not match either the notation or the simplified concepts of tonal theory?