Pitch Approximation and the Piano

I have learned a great deal about pitch approximation from Beethoven's Sonata for (Natural) Horn and Piano, Op. 17, which I performed the other evening for the 5th time with my son on horn.  There would be no reason to compose such a duo if there were not the possibility of revealing something about the mutual resonance of both instruments.

Using that as the starting point, and reading Beethoven's phrasing and dynamic indications with insight, I find my instincts about the piano once more affirmed:  i.e., that, contrary to what we are told, the piano is not a pitch-specific instrument.  Rather, it is an instrument capable of taking into its resonating chamber, via the damper pedal, vibrations from any source and allowing them to clarify by a physical process over which we have little control, but which is ours to savor and respond to.

With this as the definition of a sonata all playing is transformed.  This piece in particular, with all its danger and unpredictability, becomes highly engaging.  On a modern horn it would be simplistic, a piece of cake; it would have no inherent interest.

Many years ago I began thinking of the piano as a "translating" instrument, one that speaks with and for other instruments, that takes them into itself and transforms them.  That doesn't include the piano that Chopin had in mind, of course; his music is the piano.

A New Association: Musicians Against Piano Recitals

Last night after another of my home concerts a musician who was there for the first time told me that she hates piano recitals and never goes to them.  But she loved this one.  What a compliment!

I admitted to her that I walk out of piano recitals more than out of any other kind of event I have paid good money to hear.  Why?

My first feeling is lack of attention on the part of the player.  Having been trained to not notice vibrations,  since every piano is different from every other, pianists are notoriously terrified of the disconnect between what they are used to hearing and what will come forth from the strange beast they confront upon that specific occasion.  Their detachment communicates.

I used to make it a strict rule whenever I had a public performance (i.e., on a strange instrument) not to touch any other instrument that entire day.  Call it the piano du jour.

Playing by Ear: But Whose Ear?

Looking again at the "Moonlight" Sonata:  I am astonished at how tempting it is to play it the way it is played by "everyone" rather than read the score with all of Beethoven's meticulous indications.

More is going on than is revealed by the sumptuous surface of the first movement.  Phrases begin and end in strange places, not always at the four-bar mark so prevalent in Germanic music.  And there are stunning instances of fives and threes in this overwhelmingly four-beat environment.  Where do they come from?  What do to with them?

The piece gets better and better as resolution sounds elide with upbeat phrase beginnings.

It's all about paying attention.

The Beat, Refreshed not Subdivided

One-y-and-a Two-y-and-a

So goes the standard solution to figuring out complicated dotted rhythms, ties, etc.  I strongly advise you not to do it and, in case you had it dunned into you at some point early on in life, do your best to drown it out.

A good way to accomplish that is through the Alberti bass, a repetitive figure that mostly bores, rarely stimulates the imagination.

Listen to it this way:  You are probably sustaining a quarter note over the sixteenth-note Alberti figure in the left hand:  Listen closely to the quarter note as you play the Alberti and you will hear it change, at times getting stronger, at times clouded.  These are overtones in action, an action that has great influence on how we feel the internal rhythms of the tones we play.

A masterfully composed Alberti will enliven overtones in successive quarter-note beats at different times during the beat.  For example, in beat 1, it may be the 2nd and 4th sixteenths that receive maximum reinforcement, while in beat 2 it may be the first and third, and so on.

In music in which the Alberti figure appears only some of the time it has a double function: First, as described above.  Second, to alert us to the possibility of our own internal involvement at that rate of potential variation within each quarter note.

This would do away with those uniform "-y-and-a"s .  What a relief! 

Swimming in Sound

Being a swimmer, the analogy between water and sound has always seemed obvious to me.  I work out in a pool in which the difference of one foot in depth alters completely the efficacy of my exercise routine.

The analogy came up this morning in introducing a student to the sound world of Chopin, whose complete immersion in the sound of the piano is so unique and so compelling. We were beginning work on the F# major Prelude.  Immediately the subtle connection between the first two eighth notes in the left hand determines the tempo and the timing of many subsequent bars.

Slow is necessary in order to savor the connection, to allow it to affect the precise timing of what comes next or rather, of what gets added into it.  It is amazing how physical and how natural that "slow" feels when the ear is fully involved.

Beethoven's Awakening in 1800-2

This is my favorite period of Beethoven's work: during that brief time span he composed some two dozen sonatas, either for piano solo or with violin, starting probably with the Op. 17 Sonata for Piano and Valveless Horn, and continuing through the Opus 33 sonatas for piano.  During this period he discovered the infinite variability of beats and repetitions.

Discerning this variability does not come easily to people schooled in reading first, feeling later.  My need for variability is inborn.  It infuriates some people.  My son, a gourmet baker, cannot fathom my baking habits of throwing in a handful of this, a dash of that.  He does, however, enjoy eating the result.

He and I have been collaborating on the Op. 17.  Schooled as an orchestral hornist, he is in the at first uncomfortable position of having to measure things in handfuls and dashes, as a solo player has no choice but to fool around with the exactitude of beats -- when they begin and end -- and of runs -- taking command of them at every successive sixteenth note.

Until composing this post I had not noticed the parallel.  But before working on this piece, with which until now I was so unfamiliar that I didn't consider it real,  I had not been so aware of this conflict so explicitly treated.  I now consider Op. 17 the starting point of this most fascinating period in Beethoven's development.

Who knows?  It might have been the horn, the instrument and its traditional role, that triggered the train of thought. 

Why, Though a Scholar, I am Not a Music Theorist

By calling myself a scholar I refer to my curiosity about connections of the music I play to more than my own experience, conditioned as it is by the era in which I live, the prejudices of my training, technical parameters, and so on.

I am interested in historical influences as implied or revealed in the music itself, rather than based on written records, which are often guesswork or simply woefully beside the point.

Similarly, the structural use of basic musical elements is paramount to my interest  I discern this on the basis of what I hear, not by virtue of analysis.  If my attention is not riveted at this level I simply do not play the piece; I prefer to mash potatoes.  But here I have to specify that by attention I mean not simply mental attentiveness but also that of the ear, the touch--in other words, by the physicality of the music.

It is that physicality that I seek to bring to life when I play.  It is not an argument; it is not subject to question on the spot: I simply want your attention to be held as mine is.

You are invited to go home and play the music for yourself to see whether or not you "agree" with my rendering of it on that particular occasion.