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A great deal of baroque keyboard music (suites, partitas, sonatas) is based on dance. In many of his sonatas, however, Scarlatti seems to have found a way to stay clear of dancelike music. T
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What does one of the most slapsticky finales of a Mozart piano concerto have in common with his most anguished ones? For one, both take the form of a theme and variations, an unusual choice for the final movement of a piano concerto.
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We are accustomed to highly lyrical and singable slow movements of Mozart piano concertos, like the popularly known Elvira Madigan andante from the C major concerto, K. 467.
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Beethoven's relatively late piano sonata, no. 27, from 1814, has often been called "Schubertian." What is it that associates this two-part sonata with the style of Schubert? One possible answer is the strophic meter of the music, which is characteristic of song writing but rarely appears in Beethoven's later works. Schubert, by contrast, whose "core genre" was the Lieder, naturally imparts strophic rhythm to his music. In Beethoven's sonata Op. 90, the strophic meter can be heard throughout the work, without the rhythmic irregularities characteristic of Beethoven's writing.
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Where do Debussy's "Footprints in the snow" lead? This is the question I try to answer in this blog. Since the title of this prelude provides no clue, we must look for the answer in the music itself. Is the music leading in any particular direction, or is it mostly circling in one place?
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Benjamin Franklin invented the glass harmonica when Mozart was a small child. The instrument was immensely popular in the 18th and 19th centuries, and many composers included it in their works. The Adagio by Mozart, which I discuss in this blog, is one of the many pieces written for it.
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The fascinating points of intersection and divergence between Debussy and Albéniz are strongly present in two pieces I discuss in this blog: La sérénade interrompue and El Albaicín. The difference I find most glaring is that while Debussy seems to observe the music happen, Albéniz experiences it. This is most poignant in the ending, where Albéniz's spontaneousness is in stark contrast with Debussy's calculatedness.
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Scarlatti, an exact contemporary of Bach and Handel (all three were born in 1685), spent much of his life in Spain and Portugal, away from the main centers of baroque music in Germany and Italy. In his isolation, he developed his own baroque style, which is often wild and uncouth, by learned standards.
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20th century atonal music can be opaque and often fierce. The works of Schönberg and his contemporaries are often impenetrable to the naked ear.
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Implied harmony in Bartók's Unisons
A melodic line can have an "implied" harmony, even if no other notes are sounding at the same time, because the melody is constructed in such a way that it strongly "suggests" a harmony that could accompany it. The listener's ears fill in the missing notes, so that they can "hear" the implied harmony in their mind. In this way, an unaccompanied melody can imply a harmonic accompaniment, that is, the chords that are missing.
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Mikrokosmos contains 153 graduated piano pieces, assembled in 6 volumes. The first ones can be played by students in their first year (indeed, week) of piano tuition. The pieces in the last two volumes Bartók himself played in concert. All of them are witty, surprising, and instructive.
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"Repetitio est mater studiorum" (repetition is the mother of learning), so goes the Latin adage. Repetition in music, however, is a horse of a different color. Repeated phrases, even entire sections, are common and have special significance.
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When the septuagenarian Liszt was invited to Windsor Castle to play before his slightly younger contemporary, Queen Victoria, he launched into some of his compositions of recent vintage, of an austere, non-virtuosic style. The Queen demanded to hear the old works that had swept Europe off its feet 30-40 years earlier, but Liszt refused to oblige: "We don't play that kind of music anymore."
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One of the wiles that 20th century composers are great at is throwing us off guard. Whenever we feel that we have figured them out, Stravinsky, Bartok, and yes, Shostakovich, will throw a curve ball and disorient us, harmonically or rhythmically.
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The orchestral nature of music written for keyboard is one of the first things young pianists learn about the music they play as they use their ten fingers to imitate various sections of the orchestra.
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Albéniz and Debussy were exact contemporaries, and they intensely influenced each other.
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When one mentions the “Diabelli Variations,” the first thing that comes to mind is of course Beethoven’s set of 33 variations on Diabelli’s simple waltz, in response to his commission to Beethoven for one variation.
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On what can we base the interpretation of a baroque work for the keyboard in the absence of any clues from the composer? Unlike an oratorio or an opera, there is no underlying text to guide us. There are no indications of dynamics, and the instrument for which it was intended, the harpsichord, has zero dynamic range.
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Janáček and the art of conciseness
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The dilemma posed by Barber's Pas de deux
