Pianist Magazine - October-November 2014

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No 80

Helping you become a better play er  er 

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PLUS TUTORIAL CD

FOCUS ON THE 

LEFT HAND  HISTORY OF LEFT-HAND REPERTOIRE TIPS FOR STRENGTHENING YOUR LEFT HAND

ALESSIO BAX on Beethoven, fine food and the  joy of pl playi aying ng du duets ets wit with h his his wif wife  e 

12 LEARN PIECES PIE CES TO TO

 ALL LEV LEVELS ELS AND ALL STY STYLES LES

3 LESSONS ON STEP-BY-STEP

Schubert Moment Musical No 1 Mozart Rondo from Sonata K545  The Doll’s Funeral  Tchaikovsky  The

PLUS TWO LEFT-HAND PIECES TO T O PLAY! PLAY!

Inside London’s famous jazz club

ronnie scott’s LEARN THE SINATRA SINA TRA CLASSIC ‘I’VE GOT YOU UNDER MY SKIN’ 

ON LOCATION

VERBIER FESTIVAL

For information on Steinway & Sons pianos or to arrange a private appointment to visit our London showroom, please call 0207 487 3391 or email [email protected] WWW.STEINWAYHALL.CO.UK  2• Pianist 77

For information on Steinway & Sons pianos or to arrange a private appointment to visit our London showroom, please call 0207 487 3391 or email [email protected] WWW.STEINWAYHALL.CO.UK  2• Pianist 77

Pianist 80

CONTENTS

October - November 2014 The next issue of Pianist goes on sale 28 November 2014

72 76

68

14 4

Editor’s Note

bo oks from 4  Competition  Win three books Faber’s Mastering Faber’s  Mastering the Piano series, Piano  series, signed personally by Lang Lang 

6

Readers’ Reade rs’ Letters

8

WIN! A Roland piano worth £2,299

9  News Learn the piano with Lang Lang, Beethoven concerts galore in London, going hands on with historic keyboards 10 Step into the spotlight Pianist  and  and Schott present a showcase in London this  January – your c hance to shine! s hine! 12   Expert Talk  Tim Stein on left-hand 12 leaps and Angela Hewitt on learning Bach’ss mammoth Bach’ m ammoth e Art of Fugue  14   Alessio Bax talks to Jessica Duchen 14 about his passion for Beethoven, good food and Lucille Chung (his wife and regular duet partner) 18 How to Play Masterclass 1 Mark Tanner on the left hand 20 How to Play Masterclass 2 Graham Fitch on making the piano sing 

24 How to Play Play 2 Lucy Parham on Schubert’s Moment Schubert’s  Moment Musical No 1 (Scores page 60) 26 How to Play Play 3 Janet Newman on the Rondo from Mozart’s Sonata K545 (Scores page 38) 27   The Scores  A pullout section of 40 27 pages of sheet music for all levels Plus read about our online lessons! 

45 Beginner Keyboard Keyboard Class Hans-Günter Heumann’s Lesson No 8: semiquavers (16th notes) 67 Pianists on show Photographer  Amy Zielinski discusses her exhibition of concert pianists at Turner Turner Sims – and her ongoing project to photograph their hands 68 Verbier Festival 2014 Erica Worth flies to the Swiss Alps to review some of the biggest names in the piano world, including Sokolov and Argerich 70 Rachmaninov 70  Rachmaninov rocks Behind the scenes at the LPO’s comprehensive Rachmaninov festival, launching this October at London’s Southbank Centre and featuring all the concertos – both versions of the First and the Fourth

Don’t Don ’t miss Graham’s online lesso ns! 

22 How to Play 1 Melanie Spanswick on Tchaikovsky’s ‘e Doll’s Funeral’ from  Album for the th e Young  Young  (Scores   (Scores page 30)

72 Ronnie 72  Ronnie Scott’s Nick Shave tells the story of one of the world’s greatest jazz clubs – from its founding days to the arrival of its latest piano

Cover photo: © Lisa-Marie Mazzucco. Images this page: © David Sinclair (Ronnie Scott’s); © Lisa-Marie Mazzucco (Bax); © Aline Paley (Argerich) Notice: Every effort has been made to secure permission for copyrighted material in this magazine, however, should copyrighted material inadvertently have been used, copyright acknowledgement will be made in a later issue of the magazine.

82 76 Left hand forward  A look at lefthand repertoire, its players and the  Austrian pianist pianis t Paul Wittgenstein, Wittgenst ein, who commissioned some of its greatest pieces 80   Subscribe  today for just £4.50 an issue 80 by Direct Debit and receive a FREE piano book worth £9.99 82 Before the piano Gez Kahan presents an in-depth look at keyboard development to uncover how we arrived at the modern instrument 86   CD Review Top marks 86 ma rks for fo r Barenboim’s Schubert, Pizarro’s Romantic Concertos,  Williams’s Wagner Wagner and Marshe v’ v’ss complete Mendelssohn 88 Sheet Music Review New piano syllabuses under scrutiny, plus British Isles folk tunes and a Chabrier classic 89 Classifieds 89  Classifieds

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Editor’s note

B

eing left-handed, I’m occasionally asked whether I have a particularly good left-hand technique. And at those rare moments, I scratch my head and say to myself, ‘Have I? I mean, shouldn’t both hands be equal?’ There are many right-handed pianists, though, who feel that that their right hand is definitely the stronger and they need help with their left. Here’s where  we step in, with articles, advice and Scores – all devoted to the left hand. First up is Mark Tanner’s Masterclass (page 18), where he presents two pages on the merits of strengthening your left-hand technique. In Scores, there are two left-hand pieces to try: the reflective  At Dawn by Frank Bridge and the tumultuously romantic Etude by Moritz Moszkowski. (You can listen to Chenyin Li play the Bridge on our Pianist TV channel.) There are other pieces in the Scores that require diligent left-hand study, such as the tender Jensen Lied. On page 76, Inge Kjemtrup looks at left-hand repertoire and talks to two concert pianists who play this repertoire (one out of choice, the other out of necessity). Both pianists come to the conclusion that there’s a wealth of beautiful lefthand piano music for all of us to discover. In fact, when I attended the Verbier Festival this summer (see my review of some world-class pianists on page 68), Spanish pianist Joaquín Achúcarro chose to play Scriabin’s Nocturne for the Left Hand as an encore. If focusing on the left hand isn’t what you want right now, then how about a multitude of hands? Turn to page 67 to read about Amy Zielinksi’s exhibition at Turner Sims concert hall of her images of concert pianists. She’s also photographed some 150 famous pianists’ hands to date (and she says she’s still got about ten more to snap). There’s more hands-on discussion in Gez Kahan’s illuminating article about the different types of keyboard instruments that came before the modern piano. You didn’t just run your fingers over these instruments – you blew them, squeezed them, pedalled them – you name it! Before I sign off, I’m hoping you have already noticed the great photo above of me with Lang Lang, which  was taken at the recent London launch of his new series of books for Faber (see below). I can’t resist a good photo with a knockout pianist! P.S. Don’ t forget to enter our fantastic competition on page 8 – it’s your chance to win a Roland piano worth £2,299! ERICA WORTH, EDITOR

 Make sure that you keep in touch with me  – what I’ve been up to, which pianists I’ve spoken to, exclusive extra articles and interviews – by registering for our FREE e-newsletter. All you need to do is go to  www.pianistmagazine.com

C O M P E T I T I O N ENTER ONLINE AT WWW.PIANISTMAGAZINE.COM

WIN BOOKS 1-3 OF LANG LANG’S SERIES ‘MASTERING THE PIANO’, SIGNED BY THE PIANIST HIMSELF  Answer the question below correctly, and you could be the lucky winner to receive books 1-3 of Faber Music’s new  series ‘Lang Lang Piano Academy: Mastering the Piano’, as written about in this issue’s News (page 9) In which countr y is the Verbier Festival located?  A: Switzerland B: Germany C: France    4    1    0    2    ©   y    h   p   a   r   g   o   t   o    h    P   n    i    f    f    i   r    G   y    d   n    A    ©

ENTER ONLINE AT WWW.PIANISTMAGAZINE.COM Postcard entries are also accepted. Please send to Erica Worth, Editor, COMP PIA0109, Pianist, 6 Warrington Crescent, London W9 1EL, UK. Competition closes 28 November. Quote PIA0109 and remember to put your name, address and telephone number on the postcard as well as your answer.

Answer to the page 4 competition in Pianist No 78: A: Images . Congratulations to the three lucky winners: Jodie Harvey (Staffordshire), Marc Smet (Ghent, Belgium), Jennie Tsai (Liverpool) 4• Pianist 64

Pianist

www.pianistmagazine.com PUBLISHER  Warners Group Publications plc Director: Stephen Warner  Publisher: Janet Davison EDITORIAL 6 Warrington Crescent, London, W9 1EL, UK  Tel: +44 (0)20 7266 0760 Fax: +44 (0)20 7286 0748 Editor: Erica Worth [email protected] Deputy editor: Inge Kjemtrup [email protected] Designer: Nathan Ward ADVERTISING Gareth Macfarlane, Advertising manager  [email protected]  Lottie Day, Advertising executive [email protected] Tel: +44 (0)845 226 0477 Fax: +44 (0)845 226 0377

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ISSN 1475 - 1348

Silence is

GOLDEN Turn your old piano into gold From 1st September 2014 to 15th January 2015 you can get as much as £2000 extra part exchange allowance when you trade in your old digital or acoustic piano for a beautiful new Yamaha Silent Piano.  All Yamaha Pianos are available with the Yamaha Silent System - Uprights and Grands.  Ask your dealer for more information.

5• Pianist 77

uk.yamaha.com/silentpiano

 Readers’    Letters Get in touch WRITE TO:The Editor, Pianist, 6 Warrington Crescent, London, W9 1EL, UK OR EMAIL: [email protected] STAR LETTER wins a surprise CD. Letters may be edited.

STAR LETTER

Northamptonshire and Rutland and am willing to travel a reasonable distance. Keith Folwell, Leicestershire

Stretching horizons  As a piano student in the UK in 1960, I had a lesson from a Hungarian teacher who was working in England for six months on a teacher exchange programme. After I played my scales and arpeggios for a warm-up, she stopped me and introduced me to a completely different exercise for  warming up, sugges ting that I do some finger stretching prior to any playing of scales or studies. My task was to stretch a full  octave between each finger, placing the thumb on middle C, and then stretching my forefinger up to the note C an octave higher. To my amazement I was successful. Stretching a full octave between the remaining fingers was the next step. Continuing with the forefinger (then third and remaining fingers), the hand must  be tilted to the left , with the side of the finger resting against the note D, then slide the th ird finger. I had considerable di fficulty between the fourth and fifth of course, but it could be done. is exercise was then repeated with the left hand (only turning the hand to the right ).  A word of warning: only s tretch as far as your finger allows. Michael Charles Scholfield, Calgary, Canada  anks for telling us about this unusual way of stretching the fingers. Our editor Erica Worth says she cannot imagine being able to do this with most of her fingers! (Readers will want to keep in mind  Michael’s word of warning before trying this for themselves.) A surprise CD is on its way to Michael.

More praise for exams Further to Joseph Laredo’s letter in Pianist  No 79 about piano exams, I was struck by the parallels  with my experience. Having started lessons at seven, I continued reluctantly until achieving a modest Grade 5 at 13. I started again in my mid-thirties, obtaining Grade 7 with Distinction, followed by Grade 8 with an ordinary pass. My teacher and I agreed that I should re-sit Grade 8 at the next opportunity and I managed to achieve a Distinction that time. I played for amusement until retiring from  work, when I decided to sit the Associated Board Performance Diploma, which I duly failed. However, I was awarded credits on three of the four sections, which I was able to carry forward so that I could just re-sit the Performance Section, changing two of the three pieces. To my amazement and elation, I passed and feel I really benefited from the experience.  At the age of 68, I have decided against trying for an LRSM, but we are very fortunate in this part of Lincolnshire in having a local concert group, Allegro Appassionato, which promotes free lunchtime concerts at which performers of all ages are welcome. Planning to play on a concert such as this gives an excellent incentive for practising and also allows one the freedom to choose a programme of varying degrees of technical difficulty which one can really enjoy playing.  As a footnote, I would like to dr aw readers’ attention to Alan Rusbridger’s excellent book Play it Again, which is an inspiration to all amateur pianists – especially those with busy  work schedules!  John Elliot, Lincolnshire

Congratulations on your pianistic achievements and your continuing musical ambitions. If you’re willing to travel to London on 23 January, you can take up another performing opportunity: the Pianist/Schott Piano Showcase (see page 10 of this issue for details). Alan Rusbridger’s book is indeed inspiring – in an interview in Pianist No 71 he talked about the story behind writing the book.

Pianists clubbing together I’m a new subscriber to Pianist  and I was thrilled to find in my first issue an inspiring article about setting up a piano club (issue 79). My duet partner and I have been trying to get a group of people together to play – we have mainly been accosting fellow adult competitors at music festivals, but without much success. Playing to other people is such an important part of learning any instrument, but pianists in particular can be very isolated. Piano clubs give us much encouragement and focus,  without the pres sure of public or competitive performance, as well as a group of new friends.  Your article has given me many ideas a nd a huge amount of encouragement. We will definitely set one up, and I would be delighted to hear from anyone in the Colchester/Chelmsford area interested in joining us.  Jane Bellingham, Colchester I found the article on piano clubs extremely interesting and I would like to join one. I have been online researching to try to locate a fairly local piano club but have been unsuccessful and wondered if you would be able to help me. I live in Leicestershire near to the borders of 6• Pianist 80

We had a lot of feedback on the piano clubs article, so it clearly hit a nerve with many readers. We don’t know of any clubs in the Leicestershire area, unfortunately. Keith might want to check with local teachers, other pianists, music shops and music societies – or he could set up his own club, as discussed in the article. Any pianist who would like to join a club in the Colchester/Chelmsford area please send an email to the Editor (editor@   pianistmagazine.com) who will forward it to Jane.

The elusive third pedal Can Pianist   include an article or demonstration (perhaps by Graham Fitch) on the third pedal [‘sostenuto’ middle pedal] and its special uses? For instance, I would suggest that the third pedal is essential when playing the Prelude opus 3 no 2 by Rachmaninov. In the second and third bars, for instance, the C sharp in both hands needs to be sustained until replaced by the A  while at the s ame time in bar 3 th e C sharp, E and D sharp chords – marked  ppp in my copy – need to be separate but with a touch of the right pedal on each. e short rest before those three right-hand chords is necessary to avoid the third pedal affecting the first one of them and seems to emphasise that the composer wished them to sound quite individually and entirely divorced from the action of the third pedal. e overall effect cannot be achieved by use of the right pedal only. Of course this third pedal has to be applied to each of those lower octave notes individually and correctly also sustains the corresponding single notes in the right hand. I am sure others can explain this more clearly but I am sure you see what I am trying to get across. An article on this topic would be very helpful to readers. Donald Delany, Suffolk 

Wrong note & wrong piano Two updates from Pianist No 79: Firstly, Inge Kjemtrup’s enthusiastic description of Yamaha’s Trans-Acoustic launch at Abbey Road Studios  was marred by the refe rence to the ne w piano being based on a ‘U2’ upright when it is based on the U1 upright, as was made clear in the main article. Secondly, our thanks to readers Roy Lewis and Margaret Dews for pointing out that on the covermount CD Chenyin Li played a D natural instead of a D sharp in bars 22 and 23 of the Mendelssohn Song without Words  opus 30 no 3. Chenyin apologises profusely, but in fact, the D natural sounded rather nice (even if Mendelssohn might beg to differ).

Marjan Kiepura Performs Chopin Mazurkas and more

“Tis CD makes a strong, individual and lasting impression”  Pianist Magazine Pianist Marjan Kiepura’s Chopin CD, entitled Images of a Homeland , is now released as MP3s and streaming. The CD, which has been previously issued, has been critically acclaimed in five countries and features 14 mazurkas. It also comprises the ‘Raindrop’ Prélude, ‘Military’ Polonaise, E flat Nocturne op 9 no 2 and three waltzes including the op 69 no 1 ‘L’Adieu’.

LISTEN Chopin Mazurka in A minor op 68 no 2

WATCH Chopin Mazurka in B flat op 7 no 1 Tap the buttons to start/stop playback

Visit www.patriamusic.com  for more information or tap one of the links below to purchase

READER COMPETITION

 WIN!

W OR   T   H    

A ROLAND PIANO

£ 2,  2 9  9 

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oland and Pianist  have teamed up to give one lucky Pianist  reader a Roland HPi-50. With a built in screen that displays digital sheet music and a host of interactive exercises, the HPi-50 is a truly unique instrument that takes the fun and enjoyment of making music to new levels.

is model, in elegant Rosewood, is a unique interactive piano that brings the fun and joy of piano playing to the whole family. First and foremost a piano, the HPi-50 combines Roland’s SuperNatural piano engine, Acoustic Projection speaker system and Ivory Feel keyboard action to replicate the sound and feel of a world-class concert grand piano. e HPi-50 integrates these grand piano attributes with a powerful built-in Digi-score system that offers both adults and children, whether beginners or advanced, an unparalleled music learning experience. Using the built in large colour screen, Digi-score displays the notation of nearly 400 built in songs – songs that can be downloaded, or even your own performances. Up to 48 measures of music can be displayed on a single screen at 32nd note resolution. Digi-score will even turn the page for you automatically. Children will love the video game-like feel of Wonderland. Games such as Flash Card (for developing a sense of tone) and DoReMi course (for

learning to read music and build finger skills) are all designed to help children have fun while learning about music.  A wide variety of not ation-based programs are built into the HPi-50 to help piano students improve their skills. e Visual Lesson course scores your performance and helps you identify the sections that need improvement, while the Finger Training course helps players develop dexterity and more even playing technique in both hands. e ‘Medal Collection’ provides virtual medals (gold, silver, or bronze) based on your accuracy while playing along with the built-in songs. From children to adults, students to performers, beginners to experts … the HPi-50 invites all family members to experience the joy and fun of playing the piano.

The HPi-50’s built in Digi-score screen

WIN THIS ROLAND PIANO FOR CHRISTMAS! To enter answer the question below Enter online at www.pianistmagazine.com/competitions QUESTION: How many measures of music can the HPi-50 display? A. 16

B. 32

C. 48

To enter by post , simply send a postcard to: Lauren Roberts, Roland Competition (PIA0108), Warners Group Publications, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds, LS1 5JD. Please include your full name and contact information. Please mark on the postcard if you do not wish to receive information from Pianist or Roland UK. Closing date 28 November 2014. UK entrants only  8• Pianist 80

News 

 All the latest news from the world of the piano

SHEEP THRILLS?

Angela Hewitt at the Two Moors Festival – plus Beethoven or bust in London

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For concert pianists, playing all of Beethoven’s sonatas in a cycle is a much-coveted goal, so they may well envy Welsh pianist Llyr Williams, who gets to perform the cycle at Wigmore Hall over three seasons. Williams, who received praise for a 2010 Beethoven cycle, starts on 3 October with the three opus 2 sonatas alongside the ‘Appassionata’. ‘I find some of his early sonatas are strikingly individual and very quirky, while the late piano pieces take so much more out of you emotionally Maria João Pires and physically,’ Williams commented in a Wigmore Hall announcement. He continues the cycle on 25 February (includes the ‘Moonlight’) and 30 May (with the three opus 31 sonatas and the opus 101).  Wigmore’s latest Portrait Series celebrates Maria  João Pires, who turns 70 this year, in three concerts throughout the season. With her frequent musical partners, violinist Augustin Dumay and cellist  Antonio Meneses, she’ll perform some of the Beethoven piano trios (27 & 28 October), and will Llˆ yr Williams return to Wigmore for a solo recital (20 Feb). More Beethoven, the opus 111 Sonata to be precise, from Pianist  No 79 cover artist Daniil Trifonov, who makes his debut at the International Piano Series at Southbank Centre on 30 September. Mitsuko Uchida presents the monumental Diabelli Variations in her ISP recital (16 Oct), while Russian star Arcadi Volodos serves up Brahms, Schubert and Schumann (28 Oct). The remaining early autumn ISP recitals come from Alexandre Tharaud (4 Nov) Imogen Cooper and Alexei Volodin (26 Nov). If you’d like to avoid the London autumn season crush and instead enjoy first-class music in a different environment, head for the Two Moors Festival (the two moors being Exmoor and Dartmoor), running this year from 15 to 25 October. Pianistic highlights include Angela Hewitt (see this issue’s Expert Talk) in a recital of Scarlatti and Granados (17 Oct) and Imogen Cooper (22 Oct) in works by Schumann and Schubert. For full concert details, go to wigmore-hall.org.uk, southbankcentre.co.uk and thetwomoorsfestival.co.uk 

LEARN WITH LANG LANG! Imagine taking a lesson with one of the most famous pianists in the world. That is now (almost) possible thanks to a new series from Faber Music called Lang Lang Piano Academy: Mastering the Piano, in which the charismatic pianist shares his ideas about basic piano technique, offering ‘a more creative  way to study the piano that appeals to the next generation of pianists.’  Mastering the Piano is made up of five progressive books, from elementary to intermediate level (Grades 1-5). Inside there are exercises, a range of repertoire (arrangements and original pieces), playing tips from the supers tar – plus close-up shots of him demonstrating on the keyboard. This new educational series was a ‘dream come true’, explained Lang Lang, who appeared at the London launch where he s pent a lot of time talking about the importance of scales. ‘When you do really well with scales, you can play incredibly because you have 100 pe r cent control. I always begin slowly, though! When I was a kid I practised scales every day, one hour and 30 minutes, in all different ways. I was really crazy about playing scales (even though I know my neighbours don’t like it so much).’ He also shared his thoughts on staccato (‘think of a pouncing cat’), legato (‘a lurking gecko’), how to hold your hand (‘feel an orange inside’) and the overall importance of inspiring kids to learn the piano. Of course, any personal appearance by Lang Lang wouldn’t be complete if he didn’t sit down to perform. He offered up three treats: Burgmüller’s  Arabesque opus 100 no 2 (Level 2), an arrangement of a traditional Chinese melody Jasmine Flower  (Level 1) and finishing in true Lang Lang style with Mozart’s Rondo alla turca . Lang Lang Piano Academy: Mastering the Piano, Levels 1-5 (Faber Music). Levels 1-3 are available now with Levels 4-5 arriving 2 October. Further details at www.langlangpianoacademy.com and www.fabermusic.com READER COMPETITION: Turn to page 4 of this

issue for your chance to win three volumes of Mastering the Piano signed by Lang Lang 

OPEN DAY FOR PIANISTS AT FINCHCOCKS MUSEUM Experience keyboard history at your fingertips Ever wonder why every one of Beethoven’s piano concertos was composed for a different type of keyboard? Find out for yourself on 12 October  when the remarkable Finchcocks Musical Museum flings open its doors to pianists to let them have a tactile experience with this extraordinary collection of keyboards and learn more about the history of the instrument from the experts. In a jam-packed schedule starting at 10.30am, the Open Day offers a detailed tour of the

Kent-based musical museum, with discussions and demonstrations coming from the likes of keyboard expert Gary Branch, harpsichordist Steven Devine and period piano expert and the Museum’s owner, Richard Burnett. Participants will have two sessions of personal tuition on the instrument of their choice and can also take part in a concert with other likeminded players. Even if you can’t make the Open Day, a visit to Finchcocks on any other day is a treat, that bri ngs 9. Pianist 80

to vivid life the keyboard history that you can read about on page 82 of this issue. There are more than 100 keyboards on display, ranging from the keyboards that pre-date the piano – spinets, harpsichords, clavichords and so on – through to the famous names that developed keyboard technology to create the instruments we know today. Finchcocks Musical Museum Open Day for Pianists is on 12 October. To register for the Day or to plan a visit,  go to finchcocks.co.uk 

News 

 All the latest news from the world of the piano

Step into the (friendly) spotlight This January, Pianist and Schott Music are presenting a piano showcase that will give you the opportunity to perform in public – no matter what your level. Editor Erica Worth has all the details

P

erforming in front of an audience can be a thrilling experience. Just the act of putting your fears to one side and having to play your piece from beginning to end – without any breaks, away from the practice room, and in front of an audience – will help you learn so much about the piece and about your playing overall. It’s the kind of experience that can shift your playing up a gear.  Where, though, to strut your stuff? You could find your supportive audience in your front room, your teacher’s recital evening or your local piano club, if you have one (see article in the last issue on piano clubs). But I constantly receive correspondence from readers who are in search of a friendly p latform to perform. That’s one reason that Pianist  has run amateur piano competitions in the past and has supported other amateur performance-type events. Our latest project is a unique partnership with Schott Music. On the evening of 23 January 2015, at Schott Music’s recital hall in the centre of London, we’ll be jointly presenting our first Piano Showcase. Performers will play on a beautifully maintained Steinway Model M baby grand. Schott has run three previous showcases. In May, I went to the latest one, which was under the direction of concert pianist Samantha Ward, who is also artistic director of Wales’s Piano Week. Ward told me about some of the participants. ‘ We had a man in his thirties who works at Credit Suisse,’ said  Ward. ‘He played the Allegretto Grazioso by Gurlitt from Schott’s Romantic Anthology  Book 1 (that’s Grade 1 standard). He was very nervous when he played the first time around, but he played it again and did really well. Then we had a woman in her forties who played a Brahms waltz from Romantic  Anthology  Book 3. It was the first time she had played in public! She was terrified beforehand, but she did really well. They were both so happy they’d taken up the challenge. And they played brilliantly. The showcase gives adults a platform to play informally for each other,’ Ward said. ‘It’s a social thing and people become friends and support each other.’

Tempted yet? Here’s what you need to know if you want to take part. First of all, it’s free, for participants and attendees. As a participant, you can be any level, though you must be over the age of 18. You’ll choose a piece from Schott’s wideranging repertoire list, which, again, covers all levels. You don’t have to memorise your piece; playing from a score is fine. Space is limited, so you  will want to reserve your place now by going to the easy-to-use website listed in the box below. Bring along a friend, family member, anyone you like. By the way, if you’re not up to performing quite yet, you can still come along purely as an audience member – though numbers are limited. Refreshing repertoire

So what kind of music will you find on the repertoire list? Schott has devised a very diverse list  with both familiar and less-usual pieces. I talk through the repertoire with Wendy Lampa, Schott’s Head of International Publishing, who explains the thinking behind the list: ‘We are highlighting our main authors and composers, such as Hans-Günter Heumann and his The Classical Piano Method [Heumann writes Pianist ’s current Keyboard Class]. Other books with arrangements by Heumann are the Get to Know Classical Masterpieces  series, which includes Carnival of the Animals , Peer Gynt  and Carmen. They’re not for complete beginners – I’d say intermediate level. Some are easier than others, though, and we find that teachers often use them for students’ recital pieces. ‘Then there’s the On the Lighter Side  series by  John Kember, which includes Latin, ragtime, blues, spiritual, rock and soul pieces. Kember also has a beginner book called Starting Out . Another choice,  with all original pieces, is Nils Franke’s Classical  and Romantic  Anthology series, with four books in each, by level, with two grades in each book.’ I’m familiar  with the Anthology series and know it contains an abundance of much-loved favourites, including some pieces that you might even be playing already. ‘We also have Tim Richards’s blues, jazz and Latin piano series,’ Lampa continues. ‘They all include 10. Pianist 80

some standards within those styles as well as his original compositions. There’s a lot of diversity, as you can see! There’s also a series called Classics Meet  Jazz  and Tango Meets Jazz . In those you get the original piece, and a jazzy or a tango version. There are some duets too that we’re offering, and some great contemporary collections such as Dances of Our Time , consisting of pieces by all the Schott contemporary composers. There’s the World Music series – Scottish, English, Irish, Welsh, Brazilian and  Argentinian. We will have a Klezmer piano book too  very shortly.’ Surely there’s got to be something in this long list that will inspire you. Study the repertoire list for yourself at the website, but get your name on the performing list soon. Remember, this event is on a first-come, first-ser ved basis. Also, the end of January is not so far away – that means you’ll want to get practising now! This is going to be a friendly and supportive event, and if you’re looking to test your performing skills, it’s ideal. As Lampa says, ‘Performers can be complete beginners, as long as they’ve practised their piece (for their sake as well as the audience!). If someone’s been learning for a few months, and they  want to play, that’s great. It’s motivating for them, and the audience is sympathetic and encouraging.’ For my part, I will be proud to see some of my loyal readers perform. Remember, this is not  a competition. You can play the simplest 12-bar prelude, or the hardest 10-page etude. Don’t be shy. I’ll be there to spur you on. And we can all have a catch-up over a glass of wine afterwards. n Pianist and Schott present

THE PIANO SHOWCASE  23 January 2015, from 6pm to 9.30pm Schott Music Recital Hall  Schott Music Shop 48 Great Marlborough Street  London W1F 7BB  For full details, go to www.schott-music.co.uk/schottpianoshowcase 

11• Pianist 77

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EXPERT TALK The pros share their views Q&A

with Tim Stein I’m having difficulty  playing left-hand leaps accurately. Can you suggest any tips? I’m learning the Merikanto waltz that appeared in Pianist No 78.

People find left-hand parts difficult to play for a number of reasons, and when the left-hand pattern involves a leap of any description, the difficulties are compounded. With any kind of leap in the left hand, particularly when you are going from a single note up or down to a chord, all too often you can end up rushing to the next note in a struggle to get there in time. ere are a number of useful tricks to improve this, and they can be applied to any piece that uses a similar pattern. When it comes to the beautiful (and popular) little Oskar Merikanto Valse lente   you are working on, you likely already noticed that there are very wide  jumps in the left hand, for example, in bars 7, 14 and 16. To begin with, when practising any kind of leap, it is essential to know your fingering. If your fingering isn’t 100 per cent secure, then you cannot practise accurately. Once you’re feeling confident with your fingering, start by practising the movement, leap, jump or whatever it is silently  over the keyboard. You can even do this away from the piano – on a table top, for instance. Try to imagine exactly where you are going and get the fingers into position. en you can apply this by actually striking the keys. First, practise the leap from the bottom note to the highest note. If the highest note is part of a chord, leave the other notes out. Do this very slowly at first, making a kind of smooth arc shape (or semicircle) with the hand and forearm. You basically  want to hover over the notes, so don’t jump too high. You can then practise jumping up to different notes of the chord. In bar 14 of the Merikanto, you would first practise getting to the high E flat, then the C and then the G. But remember to maintain the chord position of the hand, so in effect the other fingers are moving to their notes but just not playing. Eventually you will start to feel the distance between the notes, and a kind of finger memory  will take over. Once you can do t his well at a slow speed, you can try to increase the speed bit by bit. But remember to avoid rushing and landing with an accent on the higher notes, unless the music explicitly asks you to do so.  Another tip is to make the same leap again but without looking at your hand. is takes quite some time to master, and needs to be done very slowly at first. Practising this way is a really useful way to achieve accuracy, and  with time (hopefully) it will get easier to perfect your left-hand leaps. Go to www.pianistmagazine.com to watch Tim’s online lessons for beginners, and visit Tim’s own website at www.pianowithtim.com

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WRITE TO:The Editor, Pianist , 6 Warrington Crescent, London , W9 1EL, U K OR EMAIL: [email protected]

PIANIST AT WORK

 Angela Hewitt  Angela Hewitt talks to Erica Worth about learning The Art of Fugue, warming up with a hot water bottle and owning six pianos on two continents  Why did you decide to learn e Art of Fugue? So many people were writing me asking me to do it that I finally gave in! I presented it in the 201213 International Piano Series at the Royal Festival Hall, London (the first half in the autumn; the second half in the spring), giving me time to learn it over a year. I’m very happy I did it that way. Did it help to know all the other Bach works? Of course! I can’t imagine that I really would have understood e  Art of Fugue   without having done all the rest. e Well-Tempered Clavier  and the Goldberg Variations seem like child’s play in comparison. As Bach waited until the last decade of his life to present the world with this, I think it was a good idea for me to follow suit and hold off until I had learned all the rest.

Well-Tempered Clavier . You can’t play well in four  voices until you can play well in two or three.

 What’s your typical practice day like?  An ideal day would be to have eight hours free to practise on all sorts of repertoire. But of course on so many days I travel or give a concert How long did it take you to learn? (and I save my energy for the concert, so I only One is never finished practising such a piece, but rehearse maximum 90 minutes during the day). it took me almost exactly one year from the time I But when I can, I am happy to do my eight started to first performing it. I was doing a million hours! One still has to practise, even after more other things then, but I worked incredibly hard at than 50 years of playing the piano. it – hour after hour, figuring out the fingering and making the texture clear in my brain. Do you do any warming up? I hold the hot water bottle tightly to my chest before a concert when there is no piano to  What’s it like to perform t he work in public? It’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience to hear it all at  warm up on. It is always in my suitcase, along  with a travel kettle to boil the water. As I g et once without a break (90 minutes). It demands a lot from the audience but it’s worth the effort. I’m older, I realise the importance of warming up, sure it will remain in my repertoire. especially on cold days. So I start practising very slowly (which I do anyway) and gradually the fingers and arms become agile again. It’s also Do you need a special technique to play Bach? To play Bach successfully you need almost  very important to keep your body in shape with stretches, massage and if necessary osteopathy. everything: a keen musical intelligence, great discipline, beautiful tone, an understanding of musical form, beautiful phrasing, perfect evenness  What piano do you own? I suppose I own six pianos in total. In Canada, and independence of every finger in both hands.  where I grew up, I still have the first piano I Do you think about the sound/feel of the learned on: a Heintzman pedal piano (with full pedal board like on an organ) made for my harpsichord when playing a modern piano? organist father in the 1930s. It’s quite a relic! Not a lot. I think more of a Baroque orchestra, of an organ, of a violin, an oboe and especially a I own two Yamahas (a G2 now with friends in London and a C3 in my flat in Ottawa). I have singer. Playing ‘cantabile’ was very important to Bach (as he wrote in the Preface to his Inventions) three wonderful Faziolis: a F183 in my London flat, and two concert grands (F278), one on each and you can do that so much better on the piano. side of the Atlantic (Umbria and Ottawa). ese But you should have the clear touch necessary to play the harpsichord. It can’t be flimsy at all. are the pianos I use for my recordings, and they are stunning. e one in Italy has four pedals.  Which Bach works would you adv ise an intermediate-level pianist to try?  Angela Hewitt’s recording of e Art of Fugue is out on 1 October on Hyperion (CDA67980, 2 discs). Start with the Little Preludes, then some of the She plays two Bach bonus tracks on this issue’s easier dance movements from the French Suites. en the Two-Part Inventions; then the reecovermount CD. For further information about  Angela Hewitt, go to www.angelahewitt.com Part. Only then would I begin to approach e 12• Pianist 80

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Schubert, Mahler, Couperin and Ravel

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Schubert, Chopin and Schumann

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Angela Hewitt’s much-awaited recording of Bach’s ultimate masterpiece, The Art of Fugue, is destined to be the crowning achievement of her Bach cycle  for Hyperion—a revelatory recording and performing project which has taken her all over the world and won her millions of dedicated fans. With decades of experience behind her, she breathes fresh air into the most complex keyboard-writing of Bach, bringing it to life with crystalline clarity and thoughtful sincerity.

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INTERVIEW

Alessio Bax

Perfect blend  Music is clearly the food of love for Alessio Bax, for whom Beethoven, fine dining and Lucille Chung (his wife and duet partner) are his greatest passions.  Jessica Duchen meets the charming Italian pianist 14• Pianist 80

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ave piano, will travel’: Alessio Bax’s blog has the ultimate concise title to sum up the life of a concert pianist. Log on to it, though, and you might be surprised to find yourself reading a recipe for Sea Urchin Spaghetti, or reflections on the superior quality of fish in Iceland. Bax, 36, appears to have found the perfect blend for a satisfying life as international musician.  Well grounded, pragmat ic and with an ever-charge d sparkle in his brilliant blue eyes, Bax seems better adjusted than any performing musician should have a right to be, especially one of whom Gramophone  once declared, ‘His playing quivers with an almost hypnotic intensity.’ He and his wife Lucille Chung, herself a superb pianist, have both an established duo and a new baby daughter, Mila; and whether he is on the road, teaching at Dallas University or at home in New York’s Upper West Side, Bax can charm his way into the hearts of friends and fans alike with his sheer zest for life and all the best things in it.  You can’t not  ask if he is related to Arnold Bax, the English composer – but the answer seems to be ‘no’. ‘I think we would have known about it, as he lived not so long ago,’ he points out. ‘e name does c ome from England, though. ere are very few Baxes in Italy and they are all related to each other. e theory,’ he adds with a grin, ‘is that there was an English sailor  who came to Italy and stayed. Perhaps there is some research to be done.’ Bax was born in Bari, Puglia, the remote and enchanting part of s outhern Italy that forms the heel of the country’s boot-like shape. ‘My parents were not musicians, but they always loved music,’ he recounts. ‘I only started music by chance, together with my brother, who is three years older. ey bought me a gift of an electric keyboard, and I just fell in love with it and tried to figure out by myself how it worked.’ His parents found good teachers for him from the start. ‘I went to the conservatory at nine years old, and at 14 I won a scholarship to study in Dallas with Joaquín Achúcarro.’ is distinguished Spanish pianist became Bax’s chief mentor. ‘To this day he’s an incredible pianist, still very active,’ Bax enthuses. ‘I love his playing, first, and then there is the realisation that he’s not just a God-given talent, but really knows the piano inside out and is able to communicate everything about it so freely and so easily. He has an incredible sound, and knows exactly how to produce this sound – and that is what really attracted me to study with him. It’s a continual amazement to me that he always tries to learn something new and his playing keeps on developing.’ Bax has never forgotten the masterclass he took with Daniel Barenboim, staged as part of the documentary film Barenboim on Beethoven, directed by Andy Sommer. ‘at opened a whole new world,’ he says. He played the gigantic fugue of the ‘Hammerklavier’; the pressure of performing it made incrementally more intense by the fact that Barenboim, whom he had not met before, was sitting next to him under the scrutiny of five cameras. ‘It felt intimidating,’ he admits, ‘but there’s something wonderful about Barenboim. He has a special curiosity about music in general, which is inspiring. Of course his suggestions were wonderful, but they weren’t the sort that make you think “what a genius he is,” but more like “why didn’t I think of that myself? It’s common sense, it’s logical.” at triggered a lot in my mind. Now I try to think more analytically about my own playing.’ In 2000, when he was 22, he entered the Leeds International Piano Competition for the second time (his first try was in 1993). He went home  with first prize. ‘I’d won the Hamamatsu Compe tition in Japan three years earlier and I hadn’t wanted to enter any more – except for the Leeds, because of everything this competition represents and the inspiring people  who’ve won it,’ he says. ‘Today it still has the reputation of being a musician’s competition. I loved the selection of programmes, so I decided to enter and ended up  winning. I was a little bit under pressure, but I knew that at my age I had time to enter more competitions and I just wanted to get to the final, because the most exciting thing was getting to play the Brahms First Concerto with the CBSO and Simon Rattle! At that point you really forget it’s a competition because it’s such a thrill.’ Bax laughs with delight at the memory. ‘We had only half an hour to read through some spots in the concerto before the final – t hat would be diffi cult to do now , and back then I didn’t have so much experience, but with musicians of that calibre it hardly seemed to matter.’ ere was no doubt that the Leeds victory helped to open doors, but Bax points to a vital way that his success sparked a shift in his attitude. ‘It was something Fanny Waterman said, and I didn’t think much about it at ▲ the time, but over the years it has kept coming back to me. She said to

Up close ALESSIO BAX

If you could play only one piece in the whole repertoire from now on, what would it be? The ‘Hammerklavier’ Sonata. If you could play only one composer from now on, which would it be? Beethoven, on a human and intellectual level. But for sheer beauty and emotion, Schubert. I’d be sad to lose either. One pianist, dead or alive, you’d travel long and far to hear? Rachmaninov. One concert hall you’d love to play in? The Berlin Philharmonie. Any technical struggles? When I was little I didn’t lik e to practise scales. There are usually a couple of times a year when I regret this. What would be your advice to amateur pianists about how to improve their playing? An amateur by definition loves music, so already has a visceral connection to it. So when you are trying to solve a problem, try making an intellectual link to your job: make a parallel with the way you would solve a problem there. If you weren’t a pianist, what would you be? A chef. One person you’d love to play for? Franz Liszt. One composer you’re not quite ready to tackle? I’ve played quite a lot of Chopin, but I still feel I don’t yet have something special to say in this music. I would like to study it more deeply first, get all the l ayers of false tradition out of my head – we all know every note too well – and look carefully at what he actually wrote. What other kind of music do you like to listen to? I love jazz – and the cutting-edge jazz scene in New York is incredible!

15• Pianist 80

NEW! Alessio Bax’s latest all-Beethoven CD, which features the ‘Hammerklavier’ and ‘Moonlight’ sonatas, was released in September (Signum Classics SIGCD397). Listen to him play Brahms and Rachmaninov on this issue’s covermount CD. Visit Alessio Bax’s website : www.alessiobax.com

INTERVIEW

ALESSIO BAX ON…  FOUR HANDS, ONE MARRIAGE My wife, Lucille Chung, and I have made an album of four-hands music together, consisting of Stravinsky’s complete Petrouchka , the Brahms waltzes and some Piazzolla tan gos. There’s some great repertoire for piano duo, especially for four hands at one piano. We love to play together and travel together, so now we’re at a stage where we can play exactly the repertoire we want to do and it still feels like a holiday! We do two or three tours together every year. The repertoire for four hands is some of the most special music there is – from Mozart, Schubert and Brahms to later 20th-century pieces. It’s intimate in scale, written for the players to enjoy for themselves and among friends, and there are many incredible pieces, like the Schubert Fantasy in F minor: very intimate music that can be really hard to pull off. I play chamber music mostly as part of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and at summer festivals with a range of colleagues. But when you play piano duets you’re sharing the same instrument and you know how it sounds when it’s wrong – it’s a very unforgiving medium! Lucille and I often swap places, but we decide who will play which part for the piece before we start. We change round for fun sometimes, or just to try to understand each other’s part a bit more, but we never switch halfway through learning a new work. Not every married couple of musicians can actually work together, and in that sense it is really good that we are both pianists. For example, if I were a violinist I’d need a pianist to work with, and if my wife were a pianist and I wanted to work with her, but she didn’t want to work with me, that would be very uncomfortable! But as two pianists there isn’t that pressure; we don’t have to play together. Similarly we never have to play a piece that we don’t really love. I’m so happy it works the way it does.

us that from now on, “all you finalists are going to be compared with this or that young talented performer at the competition, like Murray Perahia – and you have to live in a real world.”’ In other words, the competition prize is the beginning, not the end, and thereafter it is up to the finalists to make everything they can of themselves and their playing. Te Hamamatsu Competition had a different impact on Bax’s life, because that’s where he met a French-Canadian-Korean fellow contestant named Lucille Chung. ‘We coincided there for a while, competing against each other and 90 other pianists, then went back to our lives,’ he remembers. A year later they started exchanging emails. A year later still, they found they had been exchanging emails every day. Tey were married in 2004. Te pair have always enjoyed playing four-hands piano music [see box above] – and their first recording together centres on Stravinsky’s Petrouchka   in its duet version. Te work has been a lifelong obsession for Bax. He wrote eloquently about it in an article for the Huffington Post  in  which he rec alls begging his father to buy him the music for Stravinsky’s extraordinarily difficult solo arrangement, Tree Movements from Petrouchka ,  when he was only eight: ‘I vividly remember the wide-eyed respo nse of the

‘I really love sitting down having a nice meal with  friends after the concert – it’s a little like the carrot at the end of the stick’  shop attendant. With my small baby hands I would not have been able to play even the first chord,’ he writes. But today he still does not play the Tree Movements , mainly because he feels they have been disconnected from the ballet’s story. Te complete ballet in its duet arrangement has taken him and Chung on some fairly wild adventures, including a project with a Korean puppet theatre and a trans-Siberian tour by train in the middle of the Russian  winter. ‘Nineteen days in three weeks on the train – and I wouldn’t call it “Express”!’ he laughs. He has also made a solo tour of Russia, when, he says, ‘At times I felt abandoned on the edge of the world, but these are such special places.’ Te duo’s tour started in Moscow and from there they travelled east, east and further east, as far as Khabarovsk, 30 kilometres from the Chinese

border. Playing Petrouchka   across the vast expanses of Russia, with anywhere from 13 to 40 hours of travel between each performance, was ‘quite amazing – and you kind of get used to it, because the important thing is the two hours you spend giving each concert. Te halls were great, the pianos were good and the audiences were fantastic.’ Early starts

Back at home, Bax has turned to Beethoven for his latest recording for Signum – no less an effort than the ‘Hammerklavier’. ‘It’s daunting to record something like that,’ he admits. ‘Still, I’ve been close to Beethoven from the beginning, and maybe this sonata in particular. I’ve lived with it on and off for almost 20 years now. I was guided to it by my teacher early on and I’m very grateful for that.’ His teacher was criticised for giving him the work, recalls Bax, who says she was asked, ‘“Why do you give such a piece to such a young person?”’ His pragmatic sense of humour bubbles up again: ‘But the earlier start you can get on such a piece, the better!’ His regular round of activities includes plenty of chamber music with the likes of violinist Joshua Bell and the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center; and he has a teaching post at Dallas University, where he gives masterclasses and coaches chamber ensembles. He blogs if and when he has time, and is a keen photographer, besides admitting to being quite a social media addict. But he has one favourite way to let off steam: cooking. Plus, of course, eating. ‘I’ve always loved food,’ he beams. ‘My mother is an English teacher at a culinary institute and I remember when I was nine going from my school to hers to see the final exams, where they had to make main meals of six or seven courses. Apparently I was very picky and discerning! Now that I travel so much, good food is one of my greatest joys. ‘Usually I don’t get hungry until I see food, and I think more clearly on an empty stomach, so I always eat after my concerts. It’s not great, because there’s usually a 6am flight the day after the concert – but that’s fine, it’s part of it. I find if there’s food in front of me before the concert it’s an absolute disaster, because I eat anything and everything; and in places like Japan there will be an incredible spread backstage of Western food, Japanese food, sweet food and savoury… and soon there’s nothing left! I really love sitting down having a nice meal with friends after the concert – it’s a little like the carrot at the end of the stick.’ At home he loves to cook for friends and proudly recalls an evening when a meal in his apartment for two musicians from the Berlin Philharmonic transformed itself into a gourmet feast for 14. ‘It was one of the best evenings of my life,’ he announces. Tis season Bax tours the UK with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, performing Beethoven’s ‘Emperor’ Concerto and Rachmaninov’s Concerto No 2. But while you are waiting to hear him, do try that spaghetti recipe, if you can find any sea urchins. It looks seriously good. n

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  play  HOW TO

Te importance of the LEFT HAND

Acquiring a reliable left hand is vital for almost all music, especially Romantic repertoire, says pianist and teacher Mark Tanner. Sharpen up your left-hand skills by following his practical advice

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eft-handers constitute stylistic reasons Scarlatti can appear roughly 10 per cent somewhat more right-hand biased of the population. than Bach). By the time Schumann and  Arguably, in everyday Busoni were being themselves fascinated life, ‘lefties (or by piano fugues, they instinctively ‘southpaws’, as the designated much of the gritty, dramatic  Americans call them),  writing, such as octave-doublings, to are passively discriminated against: the left hand. I’m thinking of mundane things like Over time, shifts in compositional scissors and pens. Doubtless, the approach have inevitably affected likes of Horowitz, Rubinstein and how   pianists set about learning the Barenboim – all left-handed virtuosos– instrument, so that our two hands  would shrug their shoulders and have evolved strengths and flexibilities  wonder what all the fuss is about, but specific to each. Although standard conceivably other left-handers may feel technical exercises frequently place a little short-changed, since most juicy emphasis on the acquisition of melodies are plucked from the upper equivalent motor skills in each hand half of the piano register, i.e. ‘north’ (scales, arpeggios, etc.) in countless of middle C, by the right hand. As a real-world scenarios, a reliable left hand right-hander, I’m naturally inclined to  will function entirely differently from believe the division of labour is entirely a well-oiled right hand. logical, the left hand conventionally  A simple exercise demons trates how being allocated octaves, wide-spaced/ each hand is routinely called upon to arpeggiated chords, Alberti bass-type function according to different logic accompanimental figures, textural systems. Start by positioning your seat material and, of course, bass lines. far to the left of centre, so that the Needless to say, there turns out to be so right hand is aligned with the bottom much more to the business of ‘which couple of octaves (stroke the cat with hand does what’ than the mere question your temporarily redundant left hand). of melodic designation. Now, using your right hand, try playing From the 19th century onwards, the the left-hand part of any piano piece increasing requirement for piano music you have lying around (teachers often to sound rich in harmonic texture from do this kind of thing in lessons when the bass register through to the tenor pupils can only cope with playing one predisposes the left hand to have to fend for itself. Composers of Romantic piano TOP music lost no time in packing more and TIPS BRINGING YOUR LEFT HAND TO RIGHTS more into the left hand’s role; music by Brahms or Liszt will often reveal a quasi-orchestral conception in which Although the left hand is a mirror image of the right, its function much important material is entrusted in piano playing is often vastly different. to the left hand.  A common pianistic device is the Cultivate a strong, flexible and independent left hand – a wide trapping of bass notes with the left stretch, supple wrist and arm, nimble Alberti-bass facility and hand’s little finger in conjunction powerful octaves/tremolos will prove indispensable.  with pedal, before gliding the whole hand deftly towards the middle of Practise the left hand on its own, with pedal as appropriate, to the instrument in order to flesh out build an awareness of how a typical piano piece’s harmonic, the remaining harmony. Tis leaves rhythmic and textural details can all come together. the right hand free to finesse its way around melodic lines and dispatch Enjoy chances to take melodies in the left hand, especially in the embellishments in the higher register. delicious tenor register and when hand-crossing opportunities Even in Baroque keyboard music, where naturally arise. the contrapuntal detail tends to be more evenly spread between the hands, In duets, always be prepared to take certain right-hand notes in there is nonetheless often a specificity the left, and vice versa, to ease difficulties. to the demands made of each hand (for

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18• Pianist 80

Mark Tanner’s solo appearances include London’s Wigmore Hall, South Bank Centre and St John’s, Smith Square. He appears regularly in recital on cruise ships, having given recitals on all of the Cunard, P&O and Saga lines. His recordings have received widespread critical acclaim, and he has made world premiere broadcasts on BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM. Spartan Press has published nearly 50 volumes of his music, and his Lullaby for Prince George , which appeared in issue 75’s scores, was featured by Alan Titchmarsh and John Suchet on Classic FM. Find out more at www.marktanner.info

hand at a time). You’ll likely find that as soon as the music involves any degree of hand-shifting or complexity, your right hand will encounter difficulty in accomplishing the required effect.  Wholesale changes to the fingering may  well become necessary too, and even then it may not lie as comfortably as it did when played by the left hand as  written. Were you to s wap around, that is attempt to play right-hand material in your left hand (having first shifted the seat – and the cat – over to the right), a similar set of issues would strike you straight away. A blindingly obvious fact here is that our left thumb is on the right side of the hand and the right thumb is on the left, so all of the handpositioning and weak/strong finger allocations that have been painstakingly  weighed up by the composer aren’t likely to transfer across tidily. Tis makes the accomplishments of Scriabin, et al, all the more impressive, for their ambition was to traverse the entire instrument using just the left hand,  while giving the illusion of two hands playing simultaneously. It’s one of the many ironies of playing the piano that much of our attention gets diverted to practising material which turns out to be relatively  unimportant – after all, no one ever came out of a recital whistling the  Alberti bass of a Mozart sonata!

MASTERCLASS

Nevertheless, the entire thrust behind the piano’s development over a period of centuries was to endow it with a compelling sonority throughout its register: the power to project, to sing, to evoke intoxicating soundworlds. Out of this ambition for evergreater colour and intensity grew the prerequisite for a sizeable stretch in the left hand. Upwardly arpeggiated chords (CGE, played with fingers 5-2-1, is a commonplace configuration) will require you to effect a bold left-toright wrist movement, in this example targeting the E with the thumb. A  workaround for t hose possessing smaller hands is to employ appreciably more lateral wrist movement. ough a little awkward at first, if approached  with a really loose arm and wrist, this technique will contribute invaluably to the Romantic pianist’s gamut of skills; besides, without it, Chopin’s F minor Etude opus 10 no 9 will surely remain tantalisingly off limits. Stretched out

 Acoustically speaking, composers and performers have to be rather more attentive to issues of balance when dealing with important melodic material situated deeper in the piano register. Yet when we think of how Rachmaninov – and Chopin before him – re-imagined the role of the so-called accompaniment, to the point where its traditional function became somewhat blurred, we are forced to reconsider the conventional notion of tune and accompaniment altogether. In theory, it is perfectly possible to envisage a piano  with bass notes to the right and treble strings to the left, just as we might come across left-handed golf clubs, though I suspect most pianists (lefthanders included), would consider the instrument’s conventional orientation central to our understanding of it, just as the arbitrary notion of east and west seems ineradicably imprinted upon the  world in whic h we live. e thought of re-learning to play the piano on a left-handed instrument fills me with dread; nevertheless, left-handed pianist Christopher Seed has done just that (check out his fascinating YouTube video). A number of well-known pianists found themselves suddenly  without the use of one hand and had to come up with a plausible alternative means of negotiating the instrument in order to continue performing. [See article on left-hand pianists, page 76.] So, of what relevance is this to folk  with two able hands? e acquisition of a reliable left hand – and a good stretch between fingers, especially 5-2, 5-1 and 2-1 – is indispensable in realising the musical priorities built into virtually any piece. Bearing in mind that the piano’s lower notes are assigned

increasingly heavier keys due to the chunkier action designed into this register of the instrument, the left hand needs to be capable of attacking with appreciable force when called upon. It’s a good idea to cultivate powerful octaves/repeated chords in your left hand. For octaves I like to imagine a hawk targeting its prey in slow motion, swooping in gracefully with wings tucked in before unfurling its claws at the moment of strike. Of course, the speedy dispatch of octaves and chords regularly crops up in the right hand too, but you’ll particularly struggle with repertoire from Beethoven onwards if you’ve not evolved a workable solution to all those strenuous left-hand octaves and tremolo passages (the All egro movement in Beethoven’s ‘Pathétique’ Sonata is a splendid example). It may well be that while the left hand is extrovertly pounding around in the nether regions, the right hand is called upon to per form intricate leggiero passages, and this is  where piano playing becomes a decidedly complex, demanding task, with the upper body working overtime to assist the left hand and a ‘quiet’ wrist needed to govern the right. I’ve mentioned in previous articles that the central tenor register of the piano might be considered its ‘sweet spot’. Indeed, the urge to position important melodies in this region of the instrument was one that proved irresistible for composers from the early 19th century onwards. is is  where a versat ile left thumb will prove particularly indispensable (Schumann’s Romance opus 28 no 2 inside the last issue is a perfect example). Furthermore, in much music from this period you will doubtless find the two hands passing important melody notes between them in this luscious region of the keyboard. Don’t shy away from such opportunities, for they are moments to cherish. Incidentally, one of the main reasons composers involve hand-crossing in their distribution of melodies (Liszt’s Un sospiro and Brahms’s Rhapsody in G minor spring to mind) is because they are acutely aware of how each hand functions best, hence it usually makes good sense to consider such implications if you are going to make a plausible job of tracing out the musical progression.  Arguably, making full sense of the final subterranean melodic statement in Liszt’s Consolation No 4 only becomes possible if you follow the composer’s line of thought by coaxing it out with your right   hand. Irrespective of whether you happen to be left- or right-handed, as a pianist your left hand will need to be reliably strong and flexible in fulfilment of its individually conceived role. By its very design, pedalling tends to affect 19• Pianist 80

LEFT FIELD Mark Tanner’s advice for getting the best out of your left hand in 3 of this issue’s scores

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Jensen Lied opus 33 no 10 [Scores page 50]: This is a serenely romantic, song-like piece which, given its teneramente ed affetuoso marking, requires an especially tender and contoured right-hand (RH) melody. Your left hand (LH) wil l have to be on its best behaviour throughout, for even though it never gets to ‘sing’ as such, it provides essential harmony, texture and sense of gentle movement. In the many places where the hands have to operate closely together in the central register of the instrument, balance and pedalling issues inevitably surface, while at bars 9-12 and similar places, finger-pedalling detail has been carefully calculated by the composer to achieve an easily overlooked subtle new colour.

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Frank Bridge At Dawn  [Scores page 53]: At Dawn is an atmospheric character piece written in 1918 as one of Three Improvisations, skilfully integrating melody and accompaniment in the LH. Bridge achieves this by enterprising use of the keyboard register, daring dynamic shading and the subtlest of pedal/half-pedal changes. When you can elegantly tie together all of these elements, make the fioritura  (a ‘flourish’, such as in bars 3-4) sound effortlessly light and shape off the melodies with sensitivity, you will have a performance well worth all the effort!

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Moszkowski Etude for the Left Hand opus 92 no 4 [Scores page 56]: Paderewski once commented that Moszkowski was the second most intuitive composer for the piano – praise indeed, given that he awarded the number-one slot to Chopin! This etude is a splendid example of the need to be free in the wrist and able to pass fingers over the thumb without undue bumpiness or unevenness in those endless chains of semiquavers. Pedal will need to be exactly timed so as to trap essential bass notes, while permitting melodies to cut through the texture clearly at all times. The balance at bars 25-28 will require your utmost care, since there is an ever-present danger of muddiness.

the left hand’s notes more than the right’s, so time spent practising the left hand in conjunction with pedal  will never be wasted. Final ly, it’s worth pointing out that there are differing degrees of ‘handedness’; in reality, one might be orientated anywhere on the spectrum from right-handed, to ‘lefty’, to ambidextrous. A person’s dominant hand for one task might not be so when it comes to another task (my father  writes left-handed, but holds his knife in his right hand and also plays golf and cricket right-handed). One thing is for sure, although the left hand has had to become increasingly adaptable as a consequence of the instrument’s evolution in parallel with the music  written for it, it has always   been just as central to what is heard. Besides, I’m not sure many pianists give much thought to which hand is ‘harder’ when playing any more than cellists do, for in reality a natural symbiosis occurs right from the earliest months of learning the instrument. ■ In the next issue Mark Tanner discusses how to stay motivated.

  play  HOW TO

How to make the  PIANO SING

Good sound comes from correct touch, explains teacher and performer Graham Fitch, whose techniques for tonal control will help you get the beautiful singing sound that you are after

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sk a group of pianists to play on the same piano, one after the other, and you will doubtless notice that each one makes the instrument sound distinctly different. How is this possible? Part of the answer to the riddle lies in the full name of our instrument itself – ‘pianoforte’. When Bartolomeo Cristofori invented the prototype piano in the early 1700s, the term  gravicembalo col  piano e forte (‘harpsichord with soft and loud’) was used to describe it. On this new instrument, unlike the harpsichord, it was possible to control the  volume of each note by the speed with which the player depressed the key. On our sophisticated modern piano this same basic principle still holds true: the faster the key is depressed, the louder the sound. However, there is an additional and far more elusive factor we need to consider when discussing tone, and that is tone quality . We have heard it said that Mr X’s tone is ‘thin and brittle’, whereas Ms Y’s is ‘deep, sonorous and rich’. Te secret of beautiful sound lies in controlling the tonal relationships between one note and the next. Tis applies between the successive notes in a melodic line, among the notes of a chord or between the various layers of texture that happen simultaneously. In this article, I’m going to explore how to achieve that most elusive and revered of pianistic qualities – a beautiful singing tone. I have discussed the subject of touch in previous articles, but let me just go back over some of the salient points. Te way we touch the piano has a direct bearing on the sound we produce. If we play with tension in our arms and hands, we will produce a stiff and wooden tone; if we hit the keyboard from above or jab at it, an unmusical and jarring percussive tone results. Good sound comes from correct touch: using the right conditions of the arm and fingers for the type of sound we want. If we want a brilliant or percussive tone, we use striking movements from the tips of the fingers,  which need t o be curved. A singing tone in a legato line requires a flatter finger position. Instead of striking movements we use stroking, caressing or even grasping and squeezing movements from the pads of the fingers. Te flatter position enables us to feel that the finger is an extension of the arm, and instead of controlling the key drop with an individual finger stroke, we control it with the arm as a whole. Te arm needs to be loose and free at all joints, and it is most important when producing a singing tone that the  wrist especially be flexible and never stiff. However, knowing the mechanic s of piano playing is of no value whatever unless we listen very attentively to  what we are doi ng – it is ultimately the ear  that controls the adjustments  we make in our hands to produce the sounds we have in our imagination.  Without a clear idea of the sounds we wish to make, anything that comes out of the piano will be an accident. From the beginning stages of piano study, we start developing independence between the two hands so we can play a melody line stronger than the accompaniment that goes with it. Next, we explore different touches and how to combine them, so that we are able to play legato in Graham Fitch is a pianist, teacher, writer and adjudicator. He gives masterclasses and workshops on piano playing internationally, and is in high demand as a private teacher in London. A regular tutor at the Summer School for Pianists in Walsall, Graham is also a tutor for the Piano Teachers’ Course EPTA (UK). He writes a popular piano blog, www.practisingthepiano.com.

one hand and staccato in the other simultaneously. If we practise doing this using a scale or a Hanon (or other five-finger) pattern, we can also combine two-note slurs with our basic legato and staccato touches. We are forming the basis of pianistic skill. In this extract from the Rondo of Mozart’s Sonata in C K545 [inside this issue’s Scores on page 38], not only do we need to play the right-hand (RH) stronger than the left-hand (LH) Alberti bass, the top line also needs to be clearly phrased and articulated: 1

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Te next task is to develop independence of the fingers within the one hand, in order to gain control over different levels of tone and types of touch. It is a very good plan occasionally to practise specific exercises for this purpose – scales and exercises in double notes are excellent ways to do this (see my article in Pianist   No 73). Here is an exercise I like to give to my advancing students. Te exercise is given in the major, and then the minor – you might continue with diminished, and then dominant seventh positions (see my online video demonstration): etc.

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Play the top line  piano  and the lower line forte , then reverse this on the repeat. You can also play the triplets legato and the duplets staccato, reversing this too. Naturally, practise this in the LH as well, and try with both hands together (transposing into other keys for variety). Consider learning some repertoire for one hand alone, as this will significantly increase dexterity and technical control of sound. Since it is usually the LH that is weaker or neglected, I can highly recommend two LH pieces

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MASTERCLASS in this issue’s Scores – Frank Bridge’s delightful At Dawn [page 53], and Moszkowski’s Etude opus 92 no 4 [page 56]. Sometimes the melodic line is formed from the top notes of a progression of chords, as in this example from Schubert’s Moment Musical No 1 [page 60].  We call on the weaker fourth and fifth fingers to project this line, ensuring the stronger fingers (thumb, second and third) play somewhat softer: 5 4

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like a voice. We will need to factor in the varying lengths of the notes from long to short. In general, we give longer notes more weight than shorter ones. If we play the sextuplet group in bar 2 on the same tonal level as the longer notes, they will sound like machine-gun fire. So, we play them very delicately. Start the crescendo in bar 3 very softly, so that we can build the line (remember that crescendo means ‘soft’). In bar 6, really listen to the decay from the dotted crotchet E to the quaver D and match up the tone on the D (play this note especially carefully so that it blends with the remains of the long note). Tereafter, we will need to come back up to a mezzo forte   on the C sharp in the next bar in order to make the diminuendo. In a musical phrase there is almost always just one climax, one high point where the line moves towards (this happens to be the highest note, B, in bar 4). Make sure to save your strongest sound for this note. In general, the LH (the accompanist) needs to be quite a bit softer than the RH (the singer, and the star of the show):

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 An excellent way to practise this is first to play the top line alone, with the fingering you will use in performance. Make sure to shape it beautifully and project the sound. Later you can play the top line while miming the lower notes of the chords (touching the keys but not allowing the notes to sound). Lastly, practise the whole chord and, while holding onto the top note, tap the lower notes twice very lightly.

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The singing line

Producing a beautiful singing tone starts, then, from an ability to control the levels of sound not only between the two hands but also within each hand. Tis is because one hand often has to take care of the melodic line as well as the accompaniment or background material. But a singing line is much more than the ability to play the notes of a melody louder than other notes – we need to know how to blend the notes in a line to imitate a voice or a melodic instrument, such as a violin, cello or clarinet. Chopin advised his students to listen to the great bel canto opera singers, so that they would learn how to play in a singing manner. An overlapping legato touch, tonal shading and colouring as well as a sense of timing are all integral to the singing line. Let’s look at how we can develop these. Firstly, we need to keep in mind an important fact about piano sound: after  we play a note, the sound begins to decay. So how, then, can we produce a beautiful singing legato line that imitates the rise and fall of the voice? Only by illusion! We have to factor in the decay of the sound from one note to another and either match what remains of the note we are holding to the start of the next note, or play the next note louder or softer. An excellent exercise in listening and control of tone is to take a scale in one hand and play just one octave very slowly, grading each sound from loud to soft:

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Tis is not as easy as it may seem! Listen really carefully and you might notice bumps (where one note was too loud) or dips in the sound, or two notes that were on the same dynamic level. ry also with a diminuendo from loud to soft, and at a variety of different speeds from slow to fast. Listen intently as you grade and control each sound. Experiment also with a legatissimo touch – release the key only after the next note has sounded. Tis  will give a very connected effect that is very much a part of a singing tone. Let’s take a real piece of music, Adolf Jensen’s Lied (Song) opus 33 no 10 [this issue’s Scores page 50], and find out how to make the RH line sound

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In addition to controlling all the levels of tone, timing is also crucial.  When I speak of timing, I am not talking about note values, but a sense of how notes are placed within the rhythmic framework. We need to feel the ebb and flow of the music (where it wants to move imperceptibly forwards and then relax backwards) and to use agogic accents (delaying an important note very slightly) where appropriate. And let’s not forget how important sensitive pedalling is in blending sounds together.  Another very important feature of our instrument is the different qualities in resonance from register to register. All notes begin to decay the moment the note is sounded, but treble notes fade much quicker than bass notes. Te notes in the top treble, while brilliant and zingy have virtually no sustaining power, whereas the lower bass strings will boom for many seconds. We need to keep this in mind when balancing a singing cantabile line in the top register over a full and active LH. Te LH, even though it is the accompaniment, needs to be practised extremely carefully, each note graded and controlled by finger and pedal. In my next article, I am going to take this a step further and look at how to control texture. Knowing how to do this will give your playing real depth and dimension. n

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  play 

TRACK 3

HOW TO

 I S S  ’ T M  N IE  ’ S  D O N  M E LA  S W I C K  N  S PA N  O  S S  IE C E  L E  T H I S P  O N PA G E  2 2

Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)

BEGINNER/ INTERMEDIATE

The Doll’s Funeral, No 7 from  Albumforthe Young op39

InspiredbySchumann’s AlbumfortheYoung ,Tchaikovskydecidedtowritehisown much weightis neededto depress the keyin orderto make itsound,butsoundas collectionofshortcharacterpiecesdesignedto beplayedbychildren.Containing quietlyaspossible.Youwillneedtothinkofthephrasingtoo–thetempoindication 24pieces,Tchaikovsky’s  Album for the Young w   ascompletedin1878. Pianist  has is‘grave’,whichmeansveryslow,butitstillneedsto moveforward. previouslypresentedothersfromtheset,includingNo15,ItalianSong( issue74); Pedaltips: Somepedallingsuggestionshavebeenaddedintothescore.But only  No21,SweetDreams(issue70)andNo14,Polka(issue64). addthepedalonceyou’veworkedonyourfingerlegato. Playingtips:  This is a great exercise in learning to master soft chord playing. Don’tforgettoreadMelanieSpanswick’sdetailedstep-by-steplesso nonthis Playinganykindofmusic pp ( pianissimo)isnoteasy.Youneedtoknow exactlyhow  pieceonpage22. Grave

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Teacher and author Melanie Spanswick shows you how to develop subtle legato, an excellent tone and a good balance between the hands so you can play this melodic Romantic miniature beautifully  Ability rating Info Key: C minor empo: Grave Style: Late Romantic

Beginner Legato playing gradation 3 Balance between the hands 3

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 A cycle of 24 piano miniatures, chaikovsky’s Album for the Young  was dedicated to the composer’s favourite nephew, Vladimir Davydov. It is subtitled ‘24 simple pieces à la Schumann’, in a nod to the German composer’s Album for the Young . Tis sombre yet melodic little piece is full of drama and pathos. ‘Te Doll’s Funeral’ succeeds ‘Te Sick Doll’, and appears fairly straightforward, however, it does have several challenging elements that make it an excellent study for the beginning or even intermediate pianist.  With a time signature of 2/4, the piece has the distinct feel of a march, albeit a slow, stately one. Te key of C minor adds to the bleak character, and it could conceivably be played very slowly for a tragic, melodramatic effect.  You will likely find the metronome marking of crotchet equals 50 beats per minute to be a suitably solemn speed. Start by listening to house pianist Chenyin Li’s recording of this piece on the covermount CD. Tis will provide the necessary overview with regards to pulse, rhythm and dynamics. Examine the key of C minor carefully before you start, playing the scale and arpeggio a few times, noting where all three flats occur and particularly observing the sharpened seventh.

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Melanie Spanswick is a classical pianist, teacher, adjudicator, author and presenter. She regularly conducts workshops and masterclasses in Germany as well as for EPTA (European Piano Teachers Associati on). She adjudicates for the British and International Federation of Festivals and curates the Classical Conversations Series, where she interviews eminent classical pianists on camera. These interviews are published on YouTube. Her book, So You Want To Play The Piano?  has been critically acclaimed. Find out more about Melanie at www.melaniespanswick.com and www.soyouwanttoplaythepiano.com

Will improve your

Even if learning the notes doesn’t prove too difficult, you’ll have several issues to surmount to master this work musically. ‘Te Doll’s Funeral’ consists of four-bar phrases, and the dotted rhythm in the melody needs rigorous articulation to sound convincing, in a way that resembles the music for a funeral procession. ry sub-dividing the crotchet beat into semiquavers by counting four regular beats to each crotchet (or set a semiquaver metronome pulse). When you count out loud, be sure that whenever you encounter the rhythmic pattern of dotted quaversemiquaver in the melody (on beat

two in bars 1 and 2, and many times thereafter) that you play the semiquaver precisely on beat number four. Lighten this semiquaver in each phrase, playing it  with slightly less force. Tis will also help to phrase each musical sentence.

Once chords are fluently joined, they will need careful voicing or balancing. Tis is particularly important in the right hand (RH), where the top of the chord is the melodic line. At bars 3 and 4, and at bars 29, 30 and 31 (the cl imax), you  will need strong fourth and fifth fingers.  When practising, play on the tips of your fingers and arch your hand accordingly, as the fingers should move independently from the knuckles and the hand must not appear collapsed (imagine you are grasping a ball). Balance the hand so there is plenty of weight directed at the

Slow works such as this call for excellent tonal balance and sound  variation. Fingering is crucial, and some of my suggested fingering are in the score. Once you have assimilated the fingering, learn the piece hands separately, ensuring every single note in both hands is entirely joined and smooth. Tere should be very few gaps in  Learning Tip the sound. Tis may prove tricky where Experiment with colour – find out chords are concerned, and is especially just how softly you can play while true in the left hand (LH), where much ensuring all the notes sound of the passagework is chordal. Aim to  join all the notes without using any pedal, as this will be added later.  weaker fingers (bars 4 and 5). Playing the notes in the chord separately can help,  Working without the sustaining pedal is but you’ll need secure coordination and a very useful exercise and will improve your legato playing immeasurably, imagination to project, highlight, and ‘sing’ the melody effectively, above and encouraging attentive listening right beyond the other musical material (keep until the end of each note. the LH chords soft). One way of practising perfect chordal Observe the musical directions legato and balance is to employ a very flexible, free wrist. Make a circular throughout. Close attention to the crucial crescendo and diminuendo motion with your wrist as you move slowly from one chord to the next. ry markings (bars 5-8, 22-32), as well as to the overall dynamics and the phrase to find the point in the key bed where marks will enhance your interpretation. the sound actually manifests (it’s akin to finding the ‘biting point’ of the clutch in If you are a more advanced player, try adding the una corda pedal to the first a car). Once you have found this point, practise taking the keys (or notes in each phrase, for a muted opening. chord) up and down with precision and  Aim to achieve a good legato with your total coordination, so that all the notes fingers alone. Tis will suppress the desire sound at exactly the same moment. Experiment with colour, noticing the for excessive pedal. A little sustaining pedal creates drama, space and clarity amount of arm weight and movement required to play pianissimo and similarly  without obscuring harmonic progressions.  fortissimo. Grading the sound in this way It’s so easy to over-pedal in a Romantic miniature, but a cleaner approach with can be a useful technique allowing for efficient finger legato allows for clearer copious tonal possibilities. Much of the piece is quiet, so it’s worth exploring as articulation and ultimately a more compelling performance. ■ many soft dynamics as possible. 22• Pianist 80

 April 2014, recording of the Beethoven “Emperor Concerto”, Sir Neville Marriner and the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields, Cyprien Katsaris with Steingraeber E-272

„The magnificent Steingraeber E-272 has proven once more to be an ideal companion … The sound is always perfect and never gets hard.“

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Sir Neville Marriner

  play  HOW TO

SCHUBERT

 Moment Musical No 1 As you learn this popular piece, remember that Schubert was a great song composer, advises concert pianist and teacher Lucy Parham, who helps you fnd the right legato and cantabile  Ability rating Advanced Will improve your

Info Key: C major empo: Moderato Style: Late Classical

Cantabile tone structure of a piece 3Light-footed pedal work 3

Te forte in bar 13 is sudden and the phrase is repeated twice for extra effect. Te B major chord at the

3 Overall

Tis gem of a piece is the first in a set of six Moments Musicaux  for solo piano. Te pieces were composed by Schubert in 1828 in Vienna and have remained extremely popular with both professional and amateur pianists since their initial publication. Don’t be fooled by the apparent simplicity of the Moments Musicaux – they are all exceptionally tricky pieces to pull off. Although not as technically challenging as the eight Impromptus, they nevertheless pose their own unique set of problems (and pleasures). I advise glancing at all six pieces before you start learning this one, as they form a coherent unity and are most frequently played as a set. You don’t need to learn them all of course, but it’s good to look at them as a whole. And if you enjoy learning this one, I am in no doubt that you will enjoy some of the others too. Te ‘Moderato’ marking is crucial. Tis piece must not sound hurried in any way, but you do need to keep a real sense of line and direction throughout the whole work. Schubert was a perfect composer of song, so melody and line are two of the most crucial points to bear in mind as you start out on this piece.  Another important point to remember is to strive for a good quality of cantabile and legato. Always go to the bottom of the key bed and aim for a warm and sonorous tone. ake your tempo from bar 30. In this bar, the triplets must not sound rushed, so it will be a very good guide.

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in bars 1 and 3 are not squashed in any  way. Tey are an inherent part of the melody and should be included as such.

Lucy Parham performs Rêverie  at the Quartz Festival in Taunton with Henry Goodman (Oct 9) and at St John’s Smith Square, London with Simon Russell Beale (Oct 19), part of her Sheaffer Sunday Matinee Series. The series concludes with Nocturne  with Juliet Stevenson and Alex Jennings (Nov 23). Parham’s recording of Odyssey of Love  with Henry Goodman and Juliet Stevenson has just been released by Deux-Elles. Parham’s season of Sunday morning Coffee Concert at Kings Place commences on 7 December with a celebrity gala. For other dates and details, please visit www.lucyparham.com

Te RH has the melody alone in bar 3.  Learning Tip In bar 4, the LH enters with its own In order to find the right tempo, special character. When you play the first look at bar 30, where the LH entry, note the slurs on the second triplets must not sound rushed and third notes (the two semiquavers) and try to articulate them. Also beginning of bar 15 intensifies the articulate the staccato notes that follow dramatic feeling, so make sure you really – they should match the RH staccato quavers in terms of touch. Tere are so grip this chord and voice every note. I suggest you practise the jump from many different types of staccato, but I the triplet to the fz  chord (i.e. from suggest the staccato here should not be in any way spiky or too short. Really beat two to beat three). Te last beat of ‘grip’ the RH chords, and when it comes bar 16 needs to sound enormous: whip your hands off the key so the silence of to bar 5, make it less (dynamically speaking) than the previous bar. See if bar 17 becomes all the more dramatic. you can make a perfect echo. Always Make sure to count precisely through ensure you can hear the top note of the chord – imagine that your fifth the rest in bar 17. Te temptation to cut it short must be quashed! Listen finger has a steel tip at the end of it! Crescendo through bar 6 and make sure to the silence you have created. Te you observe the accents on the first and following bar is one of the most heavenly moments in the piece and it’s fifth quavers. Tere is a sense of arrival  when you reach the s econd beat of  worth spending a lot of time trying to bar 7 but that is immediately dissipated  work out the per fect decrescendo. It needs to melt into bar 20 where the by the ensuing piano. Te repeats are very important in this piece, which RH must observe the slurs beautifully. means you should do something slightly Imagine they sound like perfect sighs! Against this, the projection and different the second time around. emphasis of the LH must be exact. In bar 9 there is a sense of canon, Constantly ask yourself if your RH is too loud against your LH. i.e., the theme is entering at alternate times in either hand. Keep an eye on  Judicious peddlin g is called for in  where the theme is, because that will bars 20-24. ry to ensure you do not help your focus. Make sure the triplets are all seamlessly legato, as there must pedal over the triplets (i.e. beat number two), otherwise you will smudge them not be any suggestion of ‘prodding’ the notes out one by one here. and clarity is very important. A light foot is needed here. In Schubert’s music, like that of all Classical composers, it is essential that your pedalling is harmonically adjusted, and clean. Of course, there are always exceptions to this, but not here. Above all, use your ear to tell you where to pedal. Play the four bars that start from bar 26 hands separately. Te reason for this is that the LH requires some extra precision. You could try it with some dotted practice in the LH (that is, play each chord twice in a dotted rhythm) and try to focus on the descending line  with the lowest fi nger in the LH. ry also to phrase over the barline for a real sense of continuity.

Te opening statement is a very simple theme, almost innocent in character. It therefore needs to be delivered without any excess rubato.  Although the two hands are playi ng in unison, pay particular attention to the left hand (LH) line, as it is more likely to get overshadowed by the right hand (RH) line. Make sure the grace notes 24• Pianist 80

TRACK 12

 I S S  ’ T M  M  ’S  HA  D O N  Y PA R  N  L U C  S O  S IS P I EC E  L E  H  E  G  O N T  PA  2 4

Franz SCHUBERT (1797-1828)

ADVANCED

No 1 from  Moments MusicauxD780

Schubert’sSixMomentsMusicaux areamongthemostoftenplayedofhispianoworks,  willalsoneedtoemployyourbests ingingtone.WesuggestthatyoureadGraham althoughthecollection’stitlecamefromthepublishe r.Ithasbecomeapopularname Fitch’sMasterclassonpage20,thesubjectofwhichis‘makingthepianosing’.There foracollectionofshortpianoworks;Rachmaninovwrotehisown MomentsMusicaux, arenopedalmarkingsonthescore,but,asLucyParhamadvisesinherlessononpage forexample.We’vepresentedNos2,3and4fromtheSchubertsetinpastissues. 24,yourearshouldtellyouwhereto pedal,bearinginmindthatSchubert’spiano Playingandpedaltips: Evenifthereseemstobelots ofrepetitioninthisbeautiful musicrequiresaverysubtleandadvanceduseofpedal.  work,almosteverybarcontainssomuchtoabsorb–attentiontodetailisneeded.You ReadLucyParham’sstep-by-steplessononthispieceonpage24.

Moderato

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e next eight-bar section r uns from bars 30 to 37. When you reach this section, try to feel one long line and observe the hairpin dynamic in the middle of bar 32. At bar 32 you must be very melodic and really shape this very beautiful four-quaver phrase, while letting it be flexible and elastic, too. When that same phrase is repeated in bar 36 make sure your top line is legato – use fourth and fifth fingers to enable this. Practise the LH separately at bar 38 and always use a rotational movement. Rotation is a crucial part of piano technique; it prevents stiffness and makes many passages much easier to play. [See Graham Fitch’s lesson on lateral movement in issue 72 for more on this subject.] Give due weight and attention to the C in the LH in bar 39. Again, try not to chop the phrases up – the RH is in two-bar sweeps. e tempo in general here should not become stagnant. Now use both hands to make a powerful crescendo from bar 45 until you arrive at bar 48. ere is a real sense of unwinding for the next several bars until you reach the double barline at bar 44.  At bar 55, really sing out the top

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D in the RH (the dotted minim  with the accent). Use the weight of your whole forearm to project this note. As the LH descends lower (almost sounding like a distant rumble, yet with clear articulation) from bar 59 to bar 60 you feel that you are melting away to nothing. Make sure that your articulation of the dotted notes in the RH is played in perfect rhythm.  At bar 75 try to find a different colour for this repeat of the first section. At bar 77 don’t let the RH overshadow the LH. In bar 79 make sure you prepare the leap from the end of the triplet on the second beat to the beginning of the third beat (i.e., from the E to the G).  You could try practising this section with your eyes shut, or even practising the exercise of ‘doubling the leap’ (that is, going up an octave higher to make it more difficult – to the G the octave higher).  When you reach the penultimate bar, really ‘lean’ into the accent on the second beat, almost as if you are playing this chord for the final time. Let the last chord gently die away, as if you are preparing to go straight into  Moment Musical  No 2. ■

pianist Chenyin Li on Schubert

Schubert’s music is probably the ultimate challenge for musicians. When you play it, there is just no room for you to hide. Every note has to breathe music. Even the rests are important. You need the highest level of musicianship, and that’s why all the greatest artists play Schubert throughout their lives. His musical language has a lot of depth. It’s never over complicated but it always grasps a certain sentiment that, a lot of the time, you simply cannot put into words. There are moments of absolute ecstasy and then in the next moment, desolation. It’s like a smile with tears. When playing his piano works, try to think vocally, as if you are playing one of his songs. The accompaniment should never be exactly just  accompaniment. It has to rise and flow with the tune, breathing with it. It helps to know what it’s like accompanying singers, because when it comes to the solo pieces, the one hand is doing the melody and the other the accompaniment. Think carefully about the grace notes and dotted rhythms. They cannot be dealt with in a simplistic way. For example, in the Moment Musical  No 1, for the opening theme with the second beat grace note, think about whether it’s a passing note or whether to lean on it a bit more. There’s no rule to say what’s right or wrong. It’s the same with the dotted rhythms. Often in Schubert’s music you see a dotted quaver/semiquaver against a triplet. Sometimes you should do as written. But other times you need to play the quick semiquaver together with the last triplet. Use your judgement to think about what’s more appropriate to do. You can always discover something new about Schubert. His D960 B flat Piano Sonata is a milestone; the piano quintet (‘Trout’) and the C major string quintet are both wonderful, and one cannot overlook his many string quartets!

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 I S S  N ’ S  ’ T M  W MA  D O N  E  JA N E T N S O N  E S H I S P I E C E  L  E  O N T  PA G

TRACK 6

 Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)

HOW TO

INTERMEDIATE

Rondo fromSonatain C K545

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Mozartwasamaturecomposerwhenhewrotethissonata;hedescribeditasbeingfor difficultiesaddingabitofhumourtoit!Forexample,justlookattheplayfulpauseat beginners(it’salsoknownasthe‘Sonatafacile’).Pianist presentedthefirstmovement bar52.Amoretechnicalaspecttonoticeisthat halfwaythroughbar8,bothhands ofthischarmingsonatainissue14andthesecondinissue3,soitseemslongpastdue  jumptothetreble,soyouwillwantto haveyourhandsintherightplaceassoon as forthisfinalmovementtomakeitsappearanceinthemagazine! you’vefinishedplayingtherepeatofthefirstsection.Verylittlepedalisneeded. Playingandpedaltips :Whatawonderfullyhappypiecethisis.Youshouldhaveno ReadJanetNewman’sstep-by-steplessononthispieceonpage26.

 Allegretto 5

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 Rondo from Sonata in C K545 Teacher and performer Janet Newman reveals how you can nd a range of expression even within the boundaries of the Classical style to infuse real joy into this sparkling movement  Ability rating

Intermediate

Info Key: C major empo: Allegretto Style: Classical

Will improve your Finger dexterity of touch 3Interplay between hands 3

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Tis little Classical piece epitomises many of the demands of Mozart playing within a miniature context. Precise, clear and sparkling fingerwork are allied to a joyful, playful melody, and every note matters – this is what makes Classical playing so demanding. If you listen to the many wonderful Mitsuko Uchida recordings of the Mozart sonatas or concertos, you will hear Classical playing at its absolute best. Her limpid, delicate touch is completely at home within this style and yet she manages to reveal the enormously expressive qualities of the music without ever forgetting the boundaries of the period.

In general, this kind of Classical playing benefits from keeping fingers curved. ry to play on the fingerpads, not the ‘flat’ of the fingers. Tis is especially true when you have runs and semiquavers, as you have a far greater control over evenness and tone as a result. In bar 8, the first two quavers in the LH are to be detached – and at any other corresponding moments such as bars 16, 17, 18, 28 and 60. Te LH phrasing in bars 32-34 and bars 45-46 are usually played legato. Tese moments contain some of the more expressive elements of the music, so  work on this hands separately in order to have control over the tone and shape.

Te Rondo comes from the Sonata No 16 in C major K545 and was unpublished in Mozart’s lifetime. It has since become very well known, especially the first movement, with its simple melody and scalic passagework. Te last movement, written in rondo form, has a lively, mischievous quality to it and is a worthwhile piece to study. Apart from the simple pleasure of playing such music, it will also do  wonders for your technique in general. Tere are no pedal markings in the score. Tere is not an outright ban on pedalling in Classical music and of course, there may well be moments in this piece where a dash of pedal would be just perfect, but it is best to use pedalling sparingly, like any powerful seasoning! Tat is why I have not put any pedalling in the score, as the little you may choose to use will be a personal choice – for example, the final chord. On no account use it through any runs or passagework, as this would be ruinous to clarity and precision. Te opening rondo theme in C major should be evenly detached. Keep your fingers nicely ‘braced’ and prepared for the light staccato touch. Make sure that they all have the same quality of sound – no accents on the first beat, for example – and let the interplay between

the two hands be playful and simple. Te semiquaver run that follows is best thought of as melodic and singing. Play into the keys and use your fingers very precisely. Also make sure that the little LH figure is absolutely rhythmic and carefully placed with the RH part.  Although this seems very straightforward, for less-experienced pianists, this kind of stripped-down playing can reveal problems with coordination and synchronisation just when least expected!

 After the double bar at bar 8, practise the RH alone so that you have a real grasp of the fingering. Te first three semiquavers are slurred – the third one should be staccato, like the one that follows (fourth). If you adhere to the printed fingering, this will help you to show the phrasing that Mozart wants. ry to relax on the slurred notes by pulling down with the wrist, and then coming up slightly in the wrist on the detached notes. If you also imagine that you are ‘plucking’ the key surface  with your fingertip, this helps gives a lightness to the sound and also keeps the articulation alive and rhythmic.

Janet Newman is Head of Keyboard at the Royal Grammar School in Guildford. In addition to her teaching, she is in demand as a freelance pianist and is an examiner for the ABRSM.

Tere can be a tendency to rush passages like these throughout the piece, so use different rhythms to help you to gain security. If you count this passage in four quavers and then hold up the second and fourth quavers by turning them into crotchets, this makes you very aware of every single note in the phrase and prevents you from practising automatically by just constantly playing through. Do this on the first and third quaver beat too, then 26• Pianist 80

mix it up by holding up only the fourth beat, then second and so on. Be able to play these passages in all of the possible permutations as well as good oldfashioned slow practising – something that can get forgotten!

 Learning Tip Listen out for a good balance between the hands – don’t let the LH rule the roost!

 You will also have noticed t here are no dynamic markings in the piece. Tis does not mean that you do nothing  with the musical shape. It’s left to you, the performer, to choose how you wish to colour the music, bearing in mind that in Mozart’s time, the limits of the instruments would have meant that the dynamics were never going to be vast ranging. I would keep the Rondo theme quiet throughout, and then ‘warm up’ the tone after the double bar (halfway through bar 8 to the first beat of bar 12), then drop back to a muted dynamic in the theme’s return later in the piece. [Listen to Chenyin Li’s account of this piece on the covermount CD to see what she does in this place.]  When the music moves into the relative minor key at bar 29, there is a slightly less positive mood for a short while. Keep the dynamic quiet at the start of this phrase and then have a crescendo from bar 32 through all of the semiquavers into the E major phrase at bar 36. I feel that the dynamic here is bigger, but then drops again at bar 40 before another build-up beginning at bar 46. Tis subsequent phrase could also drop away, ending at  piano  again at bar 52 – which leaves an element of surprise in the rather sudden ending.  Aim to create expectation here and make the most of the pause bar so that the cheekiness of the Rondo theme brings a welcome sense of return. Practising the coda – bar 60 to the end – in differing rhythmic patterns will help you control both the articulation and coordination between the hands. Bring a feeling of exuberance and impetuosity to this p assagework. Finish  with a very firmly placed final chord, as this should bring the whole piece to a happy, sparkling close. ■

TRACK 3

 I S S  ’ T M  I E  N  D O N A  E L  K ’ S

Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)

 M  W I C  S  S PA N  O  S  P I N  S  E C E  L E  H I S  O N T A G E

The Doll’s Funeral, No 7 from Album for the Young  op 39

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Inspired by Schumann’s Album for the Young , Tchaikovsky decided to write his own collection of short character pieces designed to be played by children. Containing 24 pieces, Tchaikovsky’s Album for the Young  was completed in 1878. Pianist  has previously presented others from the set, including No 15, Italian Song (issue 74); No 21, Sweet Dreams (issue 70) and No 14, Polka (issue 64). Playing tips: This is a great exercise in learning to master soft chord playing. Playing any kind of music pp ( pianissimo) is not easy. You need to know exactly how Grave

7 

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much weight is needed to depress the key in order to make it sound, but sound as quietly as possible. You will need to think of the phrasing too – the tempo indica tion is ‘grave’, which means very slow, but it still needs to move forward. Pedal tips: Some pedalling suggestions have been added into the score. But only add the pedal once you’ve worked on your finger legato. Don’t forget to read Melanie Spanswick’s detailed step-b y-step lesson on this piece on page 22.

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Pyotr Ilyich TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)

TRACK 3

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2 4

1 3 5

1 2

2 3

5

1 3

1 2 4

3 1

3 1

3 2

1 4

1 5

2 5

3 5

5

1 3

3

2 4

3

1 3 5

1 2

 43

2 3

3 1

3

5 3

1 3

5 2

2 5

1 3 5

 37 

5 3

3

1 3

31• Pianist 80

1 2 4

 Johann Nepomuk HUMMEL (1778-1837)

TRACK 4

INTERMEDIATE

Scherzo in A 

19

3

3

cresc. 1

3

 23

3

4

2 4

1

1

3

5

4

 26 3

4

1

 30

 33

1 1

2

2

2 4

33• Pianist 80

1

 Johann Nepomuk HUMMEL (1778-1837)

TRACK 4

INTERMEDIATE

Scherzo in A   36 2 3

2

3

1

3

1

2

cresc.

 40 5

3

5

2

 44

4

1

2

4

2

 48

53

5

5

2 4

2

5

3

4

4 4

34• Pianist 80

 Johann Nepomuk HUMMEL (1778-1837)

TRACK 4

INTERMEDIATE

Scherzo in A 

5

56

4

4

3

2

4

5 2

59

1

4 1

1

1

1

2

2

2

2

5

1

63 2

1

2

1

1

3

3

1

2

67  2

1

3

1

70 1

3

35• Pianist 80

1

George Frideric HANDEL (1685-1759)

TRACK 5

INTERMEDIATE

 Allemande in A minor HWV 478 The German-born Handel made a brilliant career for himself in England as a composer of operas, oratorios, chamber music and solo works; his keyboard output includes 16 suites. In 1705, Handel was still living in the town of his birth, Halle, when he  wrote this Allemande. An Allemande, from the French word for ‘German’, is a dance in duple metre that generally has a quick upbeat. Playing tips : This elegant Allemande should sound stately, bearing in mind th at it’s a courtly dance. Listen to Angela Hewitt play Handel’s music – we think she plays his  works beautifully and in a graceful manner. Remember not to rush – keep steady time and feel the ebb and flow. At the cadences, such as end of bar 8 and end of bar 18, you

can slow down a very little, as long as you pick things back up again. Both sections should be repeated. The development starts at bar 9, and there should be a little more sense of urgency within this section. But it all dies down calmly towards the end. Try for a detached quality to the LH quavers. Notice how our pianist, Chenyin Li, spreads some of the chords and adds the odd extra ornament (feel free to try this too, after mastering the notes). Even if there are no dynamic markings (which was the norm in Handel’s time), we suggest that you stay within the parameters of mp/mf   , adding the subtle crescendos and decrescendos as called for. This is a gorgeous piece to play. Pedal tips : Very little pedal necessary. In fact, you can go totally without.

 Al le ma nd e 1

5

2

1

2

1

2

4

2 1

3 3

4

 4

4

2

4

2 1

2

5

1

4

4

4 2 1

1

2

5

7  4

1

3

4

5

36• Pianist 80

2

1

5

4

5

4

George Frideric HANDEL (1685-1759)

TRACK 5

INTERMEDIATE

 Allemande in A minor HWV 478 4

5

9

3

4

5

3

2

1

1

4

12

1

2

2

4

5

5

5

5

5 1

1

4

1

1

1

3

1

17  1

2

3

1

1

3

1

3

2

2

3

2

5

5

15

2

2

2

2

5

5

4

5

2

3

1

1 5

37• Pianist 80

1

2

2

2

3

4

 I S S  ’ T M A N ’ S  D O N N E W M

 Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)

 N  O  S S  I E C E  P   S  I  L E  N T H  E

 JA N E T

TRACK 6

INTERMEDIATE

Rondo from Sonata in C K545

 O  PA G  2 6

Mozart was a mature composer when he wrote this sonata; he described it as being for beginners (it’s also known as the ‘Sonata facile’). Pianist  presented the first movement of this charming sonata in issue 14 and the second in issue 3, so it seems long past due for this final movement to make its appearance in the magazine! Playing and pedal tips : What a wonderfully happy piece this is. You should have no

difficulties adding a bit of humour to it! For example, just look at the playful pause at bar 52. A more technical aspect to notice is that halfway through bar 8, both hands  jump to the treble, so you will want to have your hands in the right place as soon as you’ve finished playing the repeat of the first section. Very little pedal is needed. Read Janet Newman’s step-by-step lesson on this piece on page 26.

RONDO  Al legr etto 5

 4

4

3

2

5

1

3

5

3

3

5

3

5

2

2

5

3 2

1

5

3

4

2

2

1

4

3

2

3 5

5

1 4

4 1

1

4

11

3

2

2

1

9

4

3

2

1

3

4

5

1

3

1

4

5

4

5

5

2

1

1

2

1

4

1

2

4

3

1

3

3

38• Pianist 80

3

2

1

1

3

1

5

5

1

2

1

5

4

2

3

5

3

4

1

 Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)

TRACK 6

INTERMEDIATE

Rondo from Sonata in C K545 15

19

2

5

2

4

3

4

2

1

 24

4 3

5 1

 28

3

3

 32

1

2

3

5

4

5 1 4

2

3

2

3

4

2

3

2

3

2

2

3

3

2

3

3

3

2 5

2

39• Pianist 80

5

2

 Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)

TRACK 6

INTERMEDIATE

Rondo from Sonata in C K545  36

5 3

1

5

 39

2

2

3

5

3

3

2

2

3

5

3

3

5 2

5

2

3

2

4 1

 44

5

3

2

3

5

3

4

5

3

51

1

1

2

2

1

2

5

5

3

1

3

3

4

3

2

3

2

3

3

2

1

2

5

3

4

3

2

3

2

 48

4

1

4

3

1

2

1

40• Pianist 80

1 5

3

1 5

3

3

1 5

1

2

4

1

2

TRACK 6

 Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)

INTERMEDIATE

Rondo from Sonata in C K545 56

1

4

3

61

4

4

4

4

4

2

5

1

3

1

4

64

1

4

67 

4

4

2

4

4 2

1

4 4

2

4

1

5

2

1

4

1

2

3

1

2

4

2

5

3

70

41• Pianist 80

1

3

2 1

4 2

4 2

3 1

4 2

Cole PORTER (1891-1964)

TRACK 7

INTERMEDIATE

I’ve Got You Under My Skin Cole Porter was at the height of his fame in 1 936 when he wrote I’ve Got You Under  My Skin, which first appeared in the MGM film musical Born to Dance . The song has since been recorded by Cab Calloway, Jamie Cullum, Ella Fitzgerald and many others , but it is Frank Sinatra, who first sang it in 1946, with whom it is most associated. Playing tips : This piece needs to have a certain whimsical quality to it. Make the crotchets swing – they shouldn’t be too even (let’s say, they don’t need to be 100 per

Thoughtfully 2

cent in time) or the piece will sound too ‘classical’. Listen to the CD and hea r the lilt. Experiment with the rhythm, maybe adding some extra filler notes too. Pedal tips : As marked in the score, most of the time you can keep to just one pedal change per bar. Our house pianist, Chenyin Li, tells us that she tends to clear the pedal during the second half of each bar if she thinks it’s sounding too ‘mushy’. Using a half pedalling technique should do the trick.

poco rit.

5 1

a tempo

2

1 5

 =

4

2 5

1 4

6

5

4

sim.

11

66

4

4

5

1

16

3

5

42• Pianist 80

3

 .    d   e   v   r   e   s   e    R   s   t    h   g    i    R    l    l    A  .    d   t    L   c    i   s   u    M   r   e    b   a    F    f   o   n   o    i   s   s    i   m   r   e   p   y    b    d   e   c   u    d   o   r   p   e    R  .    S    B    8    6    W  ,   n   o    d   n   o    L  ,    d   t    L   a   c    i   r   e   m    A    h   t   r   o    N    l    l   e   p   p   a    h    C    /   r   e   n   r   a    W  .   c   n    I   o    C    &    l    l   e   p   p   a    h    C    )    d   e   w   e   n   e   r    (    6    3    9    1    ©   r   e   t   r   o    P   e    l   o    C   y    b   c    i   s   u    M    d   n   a   s    d   r   o    W  .   n    i    k    S   y    M   r   e    d   n    U   u   o    Y   t   o    G   e   v    ’    I

Cole PORTER (1891-1964)

TRACK 7

INTERMEDIATE

I’ve Got You Under My Skin 5 3 1

 21

4

4

 26

1 5

 30 5

 35

5

2 1

4

 40

43• Pianist 80

Cole PORTER (1891-1964)

TRACK 7

INTERMEDIATE

I’ve Got You Under My Skin  44

3 2 1 5 3

 49

3

1

54

58

3

4

61

44• Pianist 80

2

HANS-GÜNTER HEUMANN

A Z E R T Y

B E Gzerty INNERS XXXX (XXXXX)

KEYBOARD LESSON 8:

CLASS

THE SEMIQUAVER (16TH NOTE)

On these four pages, Pianist covers the most basic stages of learning the piano through a series of lessons by Hans-Günter Heumann. This eighth lesson covers the subject of semiquavers (also known as 16th notes), with explanations and musical examples to get your semiquavers into action.

Semiquaver (16th note) • The semiquaver (16th note) has a filled-in note head with a stem and a double flag:

• Two or more semiquavers are joined by two beams, as shown here:

Finger Fitness exercise Now play this short exercise, keeping the rhythm steady even in the quick semiquaver passages.

45• Pianist 80

PLAGE

HANS-GÜNTER HEUMANN KEYBOARD CLASS

Arabian Air

PLAGE

A Z E R T Y XXXX (XXXXX)

zerty

A

Félix Le Couppey (1811-1887) Melody No 28 from L’ABC du Piano du faux textewhich Bella terra et mari civilia toto in orbe terrarum saepe gessi, ctorque omnibus veniam peperci. Externas gentes, quibus This piece, continues on theexternaque next page, mainly features quavers. Butvibe prepared to play the petentibus bars with civibus semiquavers.

tuto ignosci potuit, conservare quam excidere malui. Millia civium Romanorum sub sacramento meo fuerunt circiter quingenta. Ex quibus deduxi in colonias aut remisi in municipia sua stipendis emeritis millia aliquanto plura quam trecenta, et iis omnibus agros adsignavi aut pecuniam pro praemiis militiae dedi. Naves cepi sescentas praeter eas, si quae minores quam triremes fuerunt.Bella terra et mari civilia externaque toto in orbe terra rum saepe gessi, victorque omnibus veniam petentibus civibus peperci. Externas gentes, quibus tuto ignosci potuit, conser vare quam excidere malui. Millia civium Romanorum sub sacramento meo fuerunt circiter quingenta. Ex quibus deduxi in colonias aut remisi in municipia sua stipendis emeritis millia aliquanto plura quam trecenta, et iis omnibus agros adsignavi aut pecuniam pro praemiis militiae dedi. Naves cepi sescentas praeter eas, si quae minores quam triremes fuerunt.Bella terra et mari civi lia externaque tot.

Félix Le Couppey (1811-1887) Country: France Period: Romantic

Félix Le Couppey was a music teacher, pianist and composer. He studied at the Paris Conservatoire with Victor Dourlen and began as an assistant teacher in harmony classes there at the age of 17. In 1843 he became professor of harmony and took over the position of his teacher. Soon after that he became a professor of piano, and wrote numerous pedagogical works for the instrument, such as L’ABC du Piano, L’Alphabet, Le Progrès, École du mécanisme du piano, 24 Études primaires and L’art du piano.

46• Pianist 80

HANS-GÜNTER HEUMANN KEYBOARD CLASS

A Z E R T Y XXXX (XXXXX)

zerty

Turn to the next page for another semiquaver piece to try.

Hans-Günter Heumann continues his beginner series in the next issue. To find out more about Heumann, go to www.schott-music.com

47• Pianist 80

PLAGE

HANS-GÜNTER HEUMANN KEYBOARD CLASS

PLAGE

ASteps Z E R no T 52 Y The Young Pianist’s First op 82 XXXX (XXXXX) Cornelius Gurlitt (1820-1901)

zerty

A

du faux texte Bella terra et mari civilia externaque toto in orbe terrarum saepe gessi, vi ctorque omnibus veniam petentibus civibus peperci. Externas gentes, quibus tuto ignosci potuit, conservare quam excidere malui. Millia civium Romanorum sub sacramento meo fuerunt circiter quingenta. Ex quibus deduxi in colonias aut remisi in municipia sua stipendis emeritis millia aliquanto plura quam trecenta, et iis omnibus agros adsignavi aut pecuniam pro praemiis militiae dedi. Naves cepi sescentas praeter eas, si quae minores quam triremes fuerunt.Bella terra et mari civilia externaque toto in orbe terra rum saepe gessi, victorque omnibus veniam petentibus civibus peperci. Externas gentes, quibus tuto ignosci potuit, conser vare quam excidere malui. Millia civium Romanorum sub sacramento meo fuerunt circiter quingenta. Ex quibus deduxi in colonias aut remisi in municipia sua stipendis emeritis millia aliquanto plura quam trecenta, et iis omnibus agros adsignavi aut pecuniam pro praemiis militiae dedi. Naves cepi sescentas praeter eas, si quae minores quam triremes fuerunt.Bella terra et mari civi lia externaque tot.

48• Pianist 80

 Adolff JEN  Adol JENSEN SEN (18 (183737-187 1879) 9)

TRACK 9

INTERMEDIATE

Lied op 33 no 10 12

5

3

4

2

cresc.

3

1

2

15 1

2

3

2

1

2

1

2

18

cresc.

 21 2

 24

2

5 2

3

1

3

2

4

51• Pianist 80

3

 Adolff JEN  Adol JENSEN SEN (18 (183737-187 1879) 9)

TRACK 9

INTERMEDIATE

Lied op 33 no 10  27 

cresc.

3

1

2

 30

 33

cresc.

 36

 40

2

2

3

5 2

5 2

4 1

5

52• Pianist 80

3 1

4

3 2

1

WATCH CHENYIN LI PLAY THIS PIECE ONLINE AT WWW.PIANISTMAGAZINE.COM

Frank BRIDGE (1879-1941)

TRACK 10

INTERMEDIATE

 At Dawn, No 1 from Three Improvisations for the Left Hand Playing and pedal tips from Nicholas McCarthy: The improvisatory introduction of this piece requires you to pay particular attention to the tone of your playing. Try to achieve a singing, pearl-like quality. Once the theme comes in with the melody and the ‘rocking’ accompaniment, pay attention to the balance between melody and accompaniment. The climax of the piece comes at bar 32 where the melody is taken

by octaves. Really take your time here, broadening to create the sense of arrival as well as helping to make sure the tricky octave leap is cleanly played. In left-hand repertoire the pedal plays a much bigger part than in two-handed music. So don’t be alarmed if you find yourself using more pedal than you ordinarily would. Read the article on left-hand piano music on page 76.

For the left hand.

Poco adagio

5

ten.

1

3

1

5

1

1 5

1

1

5

3

ten.

 espressivo e rubato

1

5

2

1

1

molto rit.

2

3

1 2

5

dim.

dolce

1 5

3

4

2

2

5

a tempo

9

3

1

2

1

1

5

2

5

3

2

2

 espress. 2

1

2

1

2

5

1

1

2 5

13

5

1

1

2 5

2

3

1

2 5

2

1

2

5

1

2

5

1

1

2

53• Pianist 80

1

3

1

4

5

2 5

2 5

1

2

5

1

5

2 5

1

2

5

1

Moritz MOSZKOWSKI (1854-1925)

TRACK 11

INTERMEDIATE/ ADVANCED

No 4 from 12 Etudes for the Left Hand op 92  A neurolog neurological ical illness illness ended the virtuoso virtuoso piano career of Moritz Moritz Mosz Moszkowsk kowskii in the the 1880s, but it didn’t stop him from composing many works for the piano, including this technically challenging set of etudes for the left hand from 1915. Playing tips from Nicholas McCarthy: This McCarthy: This Etude is predominantly based around arpeggios and it’s really important to shape each one. Imagine t he arpeggio is an arc shape; this will add interest and highli ght the melodic line more. Moszkowski writes some unexpected dynamic changes half way through the piece, so it’s important to

prepare and to know where these happen, it will help you to shape the piece overall. In bar 39, at the ‘a tempo’, tempo’, try and create a sense s ense of a strong return. This is the same theme as the beginning but it is enhanced with a chord and should be played fortis  fortissimo simo.. Pedal tips: See tips: See markings on the score. Note: Mark Tanner Tanner offers additional playing tips for this piece in his hi s Masterclass on page 18. Read the article on left-hand piano music on page 76.

 Alle  Al leg g ro mo mode dera rato to

3 2

4 2

1

2

1

3 2

1

2

1

4 1

 4

1

2

1

1

3

2

4 5

1

3

1

2

4 1

1 4

sim.

7 

3

4

2

2 2 4 1

5

4

3

3

1 2 3 4

3

2

10 4

 poco cresc. cresc.

2 3

2

3

2

1

2

56• Pianist 80

4 1

1

2 3

Moritz MOSZKOWSKI (1854-1925)

TRACK 11

INTERMEDIATE/ ADVANCED

No 4 from 12 Etudes for the Left Hand op 92 13

 espress. 1

3

1

3

2

2

dolce 4

1

2

3

2

16

4 1

1

3

1

1

4

3

4

2

3

2

3

5 5

sim.

legato

19

1

3

2

5

4

2

2

4

2

3

5

4

3

cresc.

2

3 3

2

 22

2

dim.

5

1

1

2

1

 25

legatiss.

molto 1

2

2

4

4

2

2

1

4

2

4

57• Pianist 80

3

3

4

1

Moritz MOSZKOWSKI (1854-1925)

TRACK 11

INTERMEDIATE/ ADVANCED

No 4 from 12 Etudes for the Left Hand op 92  28

2

3

4

2

1

4

cresc.

 31

3

1

3

2

1

2

2

1

3

1

1

5

1

4 1

 33

5

 35

cresc.

1 1

 38

rit.

a tempo 5

5

1 5

5

1

1 5

58• Pianist 80

sim.

1

1

Moritz MOSZKOWSKI (1854-1925)

TRACK 11

INTERMEDIATE/ ADVANCED

No 4 from 12 Etudes for the Left Hand op 92  41

5

5

1

poco rit.

 44

a tempo

1 2

4

5

5

2 3

1

 47 

a tempo

poco rit.

2 3 4

3 1

5

4

4

2 3

1

5 3

1

 sempre 1

3

1

2 5

50 1

2 5

1

3

4

1

53

1

poco rit.

2 1

59• Pianist 80

TRACK 12

 I S S  ’ T M A M ’ S  N  O  H  D  Y PA R  L U C  E  P I E C  T H I S  E  N  O  PA G

 S O N  L E S

Franz SCHUBERT (1797-1828)

ADVANCED

No 1 from Moments Musicaux D780

 2 4

Schubert’s Six  Moments Musicaux  are among the most often played of his piano works,  will also need to employ your best singing tone. We suggest that you read Graham although the collection’s title came from the publisher. It has become a popular name Fitch’s Masterclass on page 20, the subject of which is ‘making the piano sing’. There for a collection of short piano works; Rachmaninov wrote his own Moments Musicaux, are no pedal markings on the score, but, as Lucy Parham advises in h er lesson on page for example. We’ve presented Nos 2, 3 and 4 from the Schubert set in past issues. 24, your ear should tell you where to pedal, bearing in mind that Schubert’s piano Playing and pedal tips: Even if there seems to be lots of repetition in this beautiful music requires a very subtle and advanced use of pedal.  work, almost every bar contains so much to absorb – attention to detail is needed. You Read Lucy Parham’s step-by-step lesson on this piece on page 24.

Moderato 3

2

 4

5 4

3

5 4

5 3

5

1

5 4

4 2

5

5

2

1

5 3

4 2

4 2

4 2

5 4 2

5 4

5 4 2

4 2

5 3

cresc.

2

4

4 2

7 

3

4 2

5 3

5

3

4

2 4

2

3

3

5 5 4

3

3

5

5 3

3 (2

3

11

2

4

2

2 1 1 2

3)

4 5 3

2(2) 4(3)

5

3(1) 5(4)

4(2) 2(3)

60• Pianist 80

2

5 3

3

5

1

2

Franz SCHUBERT (1797-1828)

TRACK 12

ADVANCED

No 1 from Moments Musicaux D780  45

cresc.

2

4

3

1

2

3

2

3

 48

5

51

3

4

3

4

4

5

4

5

4

2 4 5

2 3

4

3

54

5

5

1

2 3

56

63• Pianist 80

1 2

2 3

Bring the magic of Riverdance to life on your piano

Music from Riverdance

Selections from

- The Show

Riverdance - The Show

20th Anniversary Edition for piano, voice and/or guitar 

arranged for easy piano

A collection of 12 pieces taken from Riverdance – The Show arranged for easy piano, with lyrics and chord symbols.

A collection of 20 pieces taken from Riverdance – The Show arranged for piano, vocal and guitar, with lavish photography from the show and introductory notes from composer Bill Whelan.

Includes American Wake, The Countess Cathleen, Lift The Wings and Riverdance

Includes Reel Around The Sun,  American Wake, Riverdance and Lift The Wings

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66• Pianist 80

INSIGHT

Movements Moments As Amy T Zielinski’s lively photos of top concert pianists go on show at Turner Sims Concert Hall, she tells Inge Kjemtrup about her ongoing project – photographing pianists’ hands

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oncert pianists are an exceptional breed of human being. ey must have innate musical talent, exceptional coordination, the patience to continually maintain their skills through endless hours of practice and study – and then they must test themselves regularly in the public arena. Photographer Amy T Zielinski has been snapping the world’s greatest musicians for several years, and she has a rare understanding of concert pianists, capturing the focus, inspiration and intensity of these musical thoroughbreds in photos. Some of Zielinski’s photos are on show at the Turner Sims Concert Hall at Southampton University. ‘e concert pianist is the focus,’ she says of the show, and that’s putting it mildly. e entrance might as well be marked ‘Caution: Pianists at Work’. One photo is of a patrician-looking Imogen Cooper at the keyboard; another shows an expression of concentration on Peter Donohoe’s face as he looks at his music; a third finds Gabriela Montero staring dreamily up at the ceiling as her fingers touch the keys. I tell Zielinski how charmed I am by a photo in which Alfred Brendel grasps his head with his hands (below). ‘Brendel’s photo was a happy accident,’ she explains. ‘At end of a shoot, I say to the pianist that the last gesture is yours. I love the playfulness about him at the moment.’ Most of the pianists pictured in the exhibition have either previously performed at Turner Sims or are making their debuts this season in the Hall, which is celebrating its 40th year. Its 2014-15 International Piano Series has a dynamic line-up, from the legendary Radu Lupu (25 Nov) playing variations by Brahms, Beethoven and Mozart and Christian

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Blackshaw in Schubert’s last three sonatas (14 May), to recent Pianist  cover artist Federico Colli (5 Feb) and Yundi, whose programme includes the four Chopin ballades and the op 28 Préludes (9 Apr). Other pianists are Rafal Blechacz, Pascal and Ami Rogé, and Ingolf Wunder. ough not a pianist herself, the American-born Zielinski knows well  what it takes to play the instrument because her father was a keen pianist. He attended a conservatoire, but active military duty in the Korean War curtailed his dreams of being a professional. He became a grade school music teacher and his love of playing never faded. ‘When I was growing up every morning I heard scales, Bach and Beethoven,’ Zielinski recalls. In her own life, drawing and then photography took precedence over music, but later, ‘when I started to listen to classical music, I realised this was all within me.’ For the past five years, Zielinski has been working on a fascinating selfassigned project: photographing the hands of concert pianists. ‘I’ve always  wanted to do something with hands,’ she says. ‘When my grandmother died, and she was laid in the casket, I couldn’t recognise her very well, but  when I saw her hands, I knew the hands that had cooked meals and so on.  When it comes to hands, what a better profession than the pianist, whose music comes through their hands?’ e idea of photographing a pianist’s hands is hardly original, as Zielinski  will readily admit: ‘It’s a natural thing to zone in on a pianist’s hands.’ e difference is that she has photographed so many hands with such care. What kind of discoveries has Zielinski made about pianists’ hands? ‘It reveals that there is not one norm of size and shape. You don’t have to have huge Rachmaninov hands, you could have tiny hands. You may have a different work flow, but you get there! I think this project will show it takes all kinds of hands. ere will be other things to notice, such as how fingers and knuckles are shaped. I use a 35mm or 50mm lens, so I’m very close.’ ere’s another aspect to the project that makes it very personal. ‘I bring along a box of sheet music, music my dad worked on, with his notes on it,’ says Zielinski. She asks the pianist to choose which piece of music they  would like to have their hands photographed with. ‘Some play the music.’ So far, Zielinski has photographed the hands of 150 pianists, including some of the best-known performers. ‘I still have ten I have been trying to get,’ she says. ‘I could stop now and have a beautiful collection, but there are hands that are important to include. is is a bit of a love letter to people  who play the piano.’ Clearly there’s something important to Zielinski about getting it just right before her hand photos make their public debut, whether in a show, a book or both. But for now, you can revel in her work at the Turner Sims show. ■

 Amy Zielinski’s exhibition of photographs, e Concert Pianist: Movements &  Moments, is at Turner Sims Concert Hall, Southampton University, until 1 December. For further information about the 2014-15 Turner Sims concert season, please visit www.turnersims.co.uk. 67• Pianist 80

REVIEW

Verbier Festival 2014 Sun-drenched sounds in the rainy Swiss Alps

Rain (and there was a lot of that) or shine, Erica Worth  was still determined to catch some of the biggest names in the piano world at the Verbier Festival

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t’s the morning of 18 July, the start of the 21st Verbier Festival’s first weekend. I am zipping off to this Swiss mountain resort to hear three of my favourite pianists (I’ll keep you guessing as to  which three they might be). My flight has been scheduled so that I will be able to get there in ample time for the opening concert featuring Martha Argerich performing Tchaikovsky First Piano Concerto with her long-time collaborator Charles Dutoit and the  Verbier Festival Orchestra, in the Salle des Combins, the main concert hall. I’m sure it’s going to be spectacular. But things don’t always go as planned. My early-morning flight is cancelled and I’m on standby for the next. Alas, I don’t get on and can only  wave sadly at other Verbier attendees who do. When I eventually get on the early-afternoon flight (staring at my watch all the way over – are we going to make it in time for those monumental opening chords?), my luggage hasn’t accompanied me. I arrive in Verbier at 1am, well after the pianist, the conductor and everyone else has gone to bed. Deputy Editor Inge Kjemtrup, who is already in Verbier, does make it to the concert and shares her reactions. ‘I’ve heard Argerich perform brilliantly at Verbier before, most memorably in the Shostakovich First Concerto, but it wasn’t her best night,’ says Kjemtrup. ‘e fingers are still fleet and the touch still exquisite, but Argerich struggled to get her ideas

across to a less-experienced orchestra than usual – the upper age limit is 26, and I had heard that there had been a big turnover of players this year.  Verbier audiences adore her, though, and ins isted on an encore, whic h she eventually, and seemingly reluctantly, offered: Schumann’s “Of Foreign Lands and People” from Kinderszenen. Was there a hidden message there?’ Maybe I didn’t miss the concert of the century then. It’s now day two and the concert in store for me tonight, again in the 1700-seat Salle des Combins, is Stephen Kovacevich playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto in C minor No 24, with the Verbier Festival Chamber Orchestra under the direction of Gábor Takács-Nagy. Kovacevich plays in the style of old-school pianism with great tenderness and romantic phrasing and without ever breaking the flow of the musical line. He makes one sonorous pianissimo after another, which is sometimes more than the orchestra can respond to. e first two movements are pure magic. It’s not his fault that he’s not totally in sync with the orchestra at the beginning of the last movement, but being the consummate professional, he gets back on track quickly, and the lively flow of the last movement continues beautifully. ere are so many heartbreaking moments: this is Mozart playing we are lucky to hear and it’s surely a straight line back to the great days of Myra Hess, with  whom he studied. Kovacevich’s romantic approach to early music manifests itself in the encore, the Sarabande from Bach’s Partita No 4.

In concert at Verbier: Daniil Trifonov; Martha Argerich; Joaquín A chúcarro; Stephen Kovacevich 68• Pianist 80

Grigory Sokolov; Jan Lisiecki

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Te following morning’s recital, in the more intimate venue, the 500seat Eglise (church), is a revelation. Joaquín Achúcarro is probably the most famous Spanish concert pianist today, as well as a sought-after teacher (our cover artist Alessio Bax studied with him) and I’ve not heard him perform till now. His Schumann Fantasy  is out of this world; I can’t help but shed a tear at the beginning of the third movement. Te second half is an all-Spanish programme, which features a very sultry Ravel  Alborada del gracioso. His mixture of encores includes the ferocious Chopin Prélude No 16 in B flat (this seems to be the ‘must-play’ piece of the Festival – nearly every pianist I hear either plays it in their programme or has it as an encore!), played with great passion and authority, and the Scriabin Left Hand Nocturne. Te Scriabin is atmospheric, understated and restrained – and I do admire that Achúcarro plays a left-hand piece as an encore. Te evening’s hot ticket is a recital by Daniil rifonov at the Combins. His first half is a strange programme of Stravinsky, chaikovsky (Original Teme and Variations) and Rachmaninov (the Chopin Variations). rifonov displays the array of phenomenal techniques that have impressed many, but for this listener, his tonal range is too restrained in the chaikovsky and Rachmaninov – not enough variety to those variations. In the second half, he performs the Schumann Etudes symphoniques , a work that I love, but due to the heavy rain, I can hardly hear anything. What a shame that Verbier Festival’s major concert hall can’t be better sound-proofed against the fickle mountain weather. rifonov though, is 100 per cent focused, and when I speak to him afterwards, he says he didn’t even notice the sound of the rain. Now that’s concentration. He plays a few encores (including that Chopin Prélude No 16, which is pretty impressive: maybe faster than Achúcarro’s, but with less gravitas). It’s raining heavily yet again as I make my way to the next day’s recital by the young Canadian Jan Lisiecki back at the Combins. It seems an odd location for a morning recital, but I hear Sokolov has blocked off the Eglise for the  whole day to practise for this evening’s recital. Lisi ecki’s first half, t he complete Chopin Préludes opus 28, is impressive if a bit bombastic (interestingly, his version of the Chopin Prélude No 16 is the one I least like). But when the soft moments come, they are beautiful. However, unlike rifonov, Lisiecki is totally stymied by the rain. He stops twice, once saying to the audience ‘ça marche pas’ (‘it’s not working’). Whether it’s lack of concentration or just personal style, he makes such a long pause in between each prélude that the overall line is lost. Te rain dies out for the second half, but the focus has gone. I’d like to hear him again under less stressful circumstances.  Attend a Grigory Sokolov recital, and you will doubtless be struck as I was by the number of famous musicians in the audience. I spot a whole row of them including Evgeny Kissin, Mischa Maisky, Martin Helmchen and Kissin’s teacher, Anna Kantor, whom I notice standing transfixed at the back during the encores. In an all-Chopin programme, Sokolov somehow manages to use the instrument like a fully-fledged orchestra. His tonal palette ranges from the softest strings on a double bass to the penetrating sound of a whole woodwind section. And it all sounds so natural and effortless. He begins with the Tird Sonata, which at times is wildly overwhelming. But in this interpretation, one can feel Chopin’s frustrations and agony. Sokolov manages to portray the many sides of Chopin, not forgetting tenderness and intimacy. Tis is one-ofa-kind piano playing – nobody can achieve it or replicate it. What more can I say? It’s gargantuan playing. Being one of the most generous musicians there is, Sokolov continues with a plethora of encores that last almost as long as the full programme – this time it’s pretty much all-Schubert. I do think he’d have happily continued throughout the night. Rainy weather, delayed flights and all – for this recital (and a couple of other rare treats), I’m glad that I made it to Verbier. n 69• Pianist 80

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O N S TA G E

RACHMANINOV ROCKS

The London Philharmonic Orchestra launches a major season-long festival of Rachmaninov’s music in October. Erica Worth asks LPO Chief Executive and Artistic Director Timothy Walker why Rachmaninov is still such a draw  Why do you think Rachmaninov’s music has retained its appeal with audiences? ere is a very direct emotional connection through the big melodies that are lavishly orchestrated in full Romantic style. Do you think Rachmaninov is a truly great composer? ere was a time when his music was looked down on and the piano concertos were  viewed as just flashy showpieces. If you look beyond the known works, then you begin to understand that Rachmaninov is indeed a greater composer than he has been given credit for. His greatness perhaps lies in the lesserknown works, which is what this festival seeks to uncover. e most popular works are steeped in the 19th-century Romantic tradition. e more adventurous works emerge after 1917, when he  was living in exile. ere are the influences of Stravinsky and later Ravel and Gershwin. His opera, e Miserly Knight , which we will present in concert version, is a very different world from the Second Piano Concerto. Within years of his death, there was an expectation that his music would not survive at all. How wrong the naysayers were.  What are some festival highlights? For pianists, it will be the chance to hear both the first and last versions of his First and Fourth piano concertos. We also have the Second and ird concertos programmed, along with the Rhapsody on a eme of Paganini , but to have both versions of the First and Fourth will be very interesting.

e idea is to place Rachmaninov within the period of his writing and that of his influences and contemporaries. Upon first inspection, his work may appear to belong to the 19th century, but the influences of Wagner, Strauss, Ravel, Stravinsky and Gershwin place him squarely in the 20th.  Are Rachmaninov’s living descendants still involved in his work? I have met his children and I know that they have great pride in what their father established. With the support of the Rachmaninoff Foundation, the LPO has been presenting Rachmaninov Gala Concerts for many years. It was through my friendship with the composer’s grandson,  Alexander, who established the Foundation, that  we devised this grand project: a celebration of Rachmaninov that would go beyond just one concert. Regrettably, Alexander died two years ago. is festival will be a fitting memorial to him, as his work was very much centred around revealing the ‘unknown Rachmaninov’. LPO Principal Conductor Vladimir Jurowski has a fantastic track record with Rachmaninov’s music. Did he help plan the season? Vladimir was at the forefront in determining what  we should do. Inevitably, one can’t do everything. It would have been nice to have included the Vespers , for example, but choices had to be made.

How did you choose the pianists to perform the concertos?    )   r   e  We chose Alexander Ghi ndin for the lesser   k    l   a    W known versions of the First and Fourth concertos    (  What do you hope to achieve by setting his   a   g   e   v music alongside that of contemporaries, such because he is one of the few who plays them.   o    l   a    E as Szymanowski, Scriabin and Enescu, and Nikolai Lugansky is a master of all of the   n    i   m   a    j  concertos, and it would have been easy to have composers who influenced him, such as Wagner,   n   e    B him alone. But we felt we wanted to balance the    © Richard Strauss and Tchaikovsky? 70• Pianist 80

season, and introduce the new generation. For the ird Concerto, we have the winner of the 2012 Honens Competition, Canadian-based Pavel Kolesnikov. We have the winner of the last London International Piano Competition, Behzod  Abduraimov in the Paganini Rhapsody , and one of Alexander Rachmaninov’s discoveries, Dmitry Mayboroda, who will be just 21 when he plays the First with us in March. en there is Jorge Luis Prats who will play the most famous of all, No 2. He is a pianist with a huge personality. is will be a concert not to miss. How long have you been planning the festival? Five years.  Which is your favourite Rachmaninov piano concerto and why? e Second is my favourite because of the melodies, but for now, I am actually more interested in the First. ■ Rachmaninoff: Inside Out 3 Oct 2014-29 April 2015

Piano highlights  Concerto No 1: Alexander Ghindin (3 Oct, original version); Dmitry Mayborada (25 Mar, revised version) Concerto No 2: Jorge Luis Prats (11 Feb) Concerto No 3: Pavel Kolesnikov (29 Oct) Concerto No 4: Alexander Ghindi (13 Feb, original version); Nikolai Lugansky (7 Nov, revised version) Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini : Behzod Abduraimov (28 Nov) Scriabin Piano Concerto: Igor Levit (3 Dec) Find full listings at lpo.org.uk/rachmaninoff 

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71• Pianist 80

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POPULAR PIANO

ronnie scott’s For more than 50 years, the legendary London club Ronnie Scott’s has hosted the world’s greatest jazz artists. Nick Shave tells the story of the club, its founder, its pianos and the jazzers (especially the pianists) who made it great

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hen Ronnie Scott opened his eponymous venue in the heart of Soho’s red light district in 1959, he advertised it as ‘the best jazz club in town’. Yet to pianist Eddie ompson, who played on the opening night, the new club must have seemed as unrefined and unpredictable as its old upright piano. Located in the basement of 39 Gerrard Street, the club had previously been a cab drivers’ hangout and didn’t have a licence to serve alcohol or proper kitchens in which to prepare food. But it was the jazz that was the draw, with ompson, the Tubby Hayes Quartet and proprietors, Peter King and Scott himself, forming a line-up that presented the crème de la crème of British jazz.

Since then, the venue has become known for its great pianists and pianos alike. It was where Bill Evans seduced London audiences in the 1960s, where Oscar Peterson wowed BBC television viewers in the 1970s and where Nina Simone boosted ticket sales in the 80s. It’s where Chick Corea played his first Elektric Band gigs and where America’s visiting saxophonists – from Zoot Sims to Roland Kirk to Sonny Rollins to Stan Getz – were accompanied by the club’s ever-accommodating rhythm section, featuring house pianists ompson (1959-60), Stan Tracey (1960-68) and John Critchinson (1978-1995). It’s also where, in rather more salubrious surroundings, the current artistic director and house pianist, James Pearson, continues the Ronnie Scott’s legacy. is past August, the club hosted a piano trio festival featuring performances and workshops from 12 different leading jazz pianists, including Joe Sample, Julian Joseph and  Jacky Terrason. e second festival of its kind at the c lub, it marked an opportunity for pianists to fully explore the freedoms of the genre, culminating with Pearson’s homage to Oscar Peterson. e festival also put the club’s new Yamaha piano, as chosen by Pearson and Ronnie Scott’s regular, Tom Cawley, under the spotlight. ‘It’s one of our manifestos to make sure we get the best pianos possible,’ says Pearson. ‘e piano gets used so much, usually by three or four different pianists every week,’ he explains, ‘so we have been looking for one that has lots of durability.’ Since the days of that first upright, Ronnie Scott’s pianos have varied tremendously in quality, ranging from a robust Steinway to a sub-standard Kawai to a fabulous yet unloved Fazioli. So what can visiting pianists expect from the club’s new CF6? ‘e range of the colours is very strong,’ says Pearson. ‘You can strike a note and get an aggressive, attacking sound, and you can also get that gentle ballad

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Opposite page: interior and exterior of Ronnie Scott’s This page, clockwise, from top left: John Critchinson; Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Orchestra; Jamie Cullum; Julian  Joseph Trio; Pete King;Tom Cawley 

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approach – that’s the hardest sound to get out of a piano, that even, beautiful sound. is piano responds to that very well, it’s only just over six feet, but has the richness of a bigger piano. e action is particularly good, but like a concert grand piano, you have to be able to play the thing to get the notes out of it, you have to have the technique.’ How times have changed since Tracey, on recording with Ben Webster, would navigate the untamed percussive sounds of an upright, coaxing and jabbing them into oblique shapes. Back then, the story was the same across Europe and the US: while the best classical musicians enjoyed the very best concert grand pianos, virtuoso jazz pianists usually had to make do. ‘e pianos that Bud Powell used to play and Oscar Peterson at London House in Chicago were dreadful compared with modern-day standards,’ says Pearson. Now,  when big-name pianists visit Ronnie Scott’s on Frith Street (its venue since 1965), Yamaha will install a CFX concert grand piano: ‘Chick Corea and McCoy Tyner – they always  want to play on a concert grand, even if you explain to them that you don’t need one,’ explains Pearson, ‘because they’re used to playing concerts.’ It was the attraction of big-name American artists, and in particular the arrival of Bill Evans that led to the installation of the first grand piano at Ronnie Scott’s. Evans had the jazz  world at his feet after his meticulous renderings of modal jazz on Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue . To meet the demands of one of  jazz piano’s most revered per fectionists, Scott sold the club’s upright a week before Evans’s arrival with a view to hiring something better. But he soon found that local dealers had little time for jazz and saw the club’s basement steps, drinks and late-night hours as a potential liability. At the eleventh hour, it was pianist Alan Clare who came to the rescue, arranging for the loan of a grand piano for the show.

Looking back, it’s hard to believe that Evans, with his extreme sensitivity and light touch at the keyboard, could be considered a threat. His unique playing style – with its impressionist sense of colour and harmony, and its reflective, profoundly poignant lyricism – marked the first in a series of landmark performances at Ronnie Scott’s. In his Jazz Journal  review of a Bill Evans Trio performance at the club in 1965, David Rosenthal wrote: ‘is was jazz as free and as intense

‘It’s one of our manifestos to make sure we get the best pianos possible. The Ronnie Scott’s piano gets used so much, usually by three or four different pianists every week’ -Ronnie Scott’s house pianist, James Pearson as anything the avant-garde could create, but made ultimately sublime by the inner tension and discipline of the basic chord structure and tempo. In his masterful balancing of form and freedom, Bill Evans has created a music that is the most profound and exhilarating experience jazz has to offer.’ Besotted with bebop

But the story of Ronnie Scott’s piano – from its mend-andmake do upright to its current support from Yamaha – reflects the country’s changing attitudes towards jazz, and in ▲ particular towards American musicians, who were banned

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POPULAR PIANO from working in the UK after the war. It begins 12 years before the club opened, when Scott made his first trip to New  York, and, besotted wit h bebop, resolved to bring the US jaz z club to London. wo years after the club opened, he would successfully negotiate a new agreement with the Musicians’ Union that would relax the ban on work permits, allowing for a transatlantic exchange between jazz artists. In return for ubby Hayes’s invitation to the Half Note Club in New York in 1961, then, the UK would welcome the arrival of  American tenor s axophonist Zoot Sims for a four-week residency at Ronnie Scott’s.  As rhythm sec tions were too costly to import, Scott was tasked with finding a rhythm section that could accompany his big-name stars. It was a tough balance to strike: the pianist needed to be able to stand his own ground without upstaging his soloists – and that was where Stan racey came in. A teenage accordion player in the forces entertainment network ENSA, racey had performed on the RAF Gang Show, directed by comedian and actor ony Hancock. Te pianist had first met Scott at the Paramount Club on ottenham Court Road in the early ’50s. As jazz critic John Fordham recalls in his book, Jazz Man: Te Amaz ing Story of Ronnie Scott and His Club: ‘racey had a punchy, muscular way of playing, possessed a receptive and forceful improvisator’s intelligence and swung furiously.’ On stage, racey could be declamatory and sensitive, drawing from the angular, percussive style of Telonious Monk and the lyricism of Duke Ellington. At a time when US jazzmen would look down on rhythm sections from Europe, racey would earn his visitors’ respect: a successful run with Sims saw them go on to record together in the first transatlantic studio collaboration of its kind. After Sonny Rollins played with racey in the mid-1960s, the saxophonist enthused, ‘Does anybody here know how good he really is?’ Not all, however, were so complimentary: in one memorable

‘It’s one of those clubs that you’re aware of when you are growing up. It’s the equivalent of Wembley to a footballer’ -Jazz pianist Tom Cawley

The Yamaha CF6 grand arrives at the club ; James Pearson with the new piano

show of disdain, Sonny Stitt stopped the performance so as to take racey by the hands, guiding them to the correct keys on the piano. ‘His [racey’s] seven years as the house pianist at a time of frequent musical and racial tension in the jazz world  was often stress ful and thankles s,’ writes Fordham. ‘It was that kind of job.’  John Critchinson, who was S cott’s pianist, playing re gularly at the club since his first gig with Scott in 1979, remembers happier times at the club, playing with George Coleman and  James Moody in collaborati ons that ‘just worked’. When pianist John Horler had to call in sick (he was suffering from detached retinas) Critchinson played two nights with the great trumpeter Chet Baker. ‘It was wonderful,’ recalls Critchinson. ‘Te one thing that came out of all this was that the real stars, the jazz stars, didn’t make a big fuss: they just played standards really, came on stage and called them. ‘I was playing with styles, and if you knew the people you were up against – such as Ornette Coleman – then you accompanied them, you played the way you play. And if they didn’t like it – and I very rarely got any “I don’t like” – they’d say, “Can you put different changes into that?” Maybe they would have suggested chord changes and things, but you coped with what they did.’ And what about Scott, was he demanding? ‘He was only demanding when it came to loyalty,’ says Critchinson. ‘In the early days, in 1980-83, 74• Pianist 80

I was in another band, [Morrisey-Mullen], but only on the understanding that I did Ronnie’s work first.’ Over the years, Scott was responsible for the artistic decisions at the club, while King was the powerhouse behind its administration. ogether, they won the support of the music industry and when the club ran into financial difficulties in the early ’80s, it was members of the music industry – among them Chris Blackwell of Island recordings,  who famously donated £25,000 – who kept the venue afloat. But not without the help of musicians: among the pianists  who were paid to bring the punters in was Nina Simone,  who would turn up as though straight from a day’s shopping , dressed in trainers and fur coat. Since then, the debate over which pianists are playing jazz and which are merely sales-savvy pretenders has only become more heated as a new generation of jazz artists and styles have sat in the spotlight at Ronnie Scott’s. With the UK jazz revival in the ’80s, the club hosted new bands such as Loose ubes, and young British pianists – including Julian Joseph,  Jason Rebello, C awley, Jamie Cullum and Gwilym Si mcock – established their reputations there. ‘It’s one of those clubs that you’re aware of when you are growing up,’ says Cawley,  who first played there in 1998, taking part in a week-long residency after winning the Young Jazz Musician of the Year  Award. ‘It’s the equivalent of Wembley to a footballer.’  As well as supporting new British acts, the club has also embraced the global proliferation of fusions – from Acid Jazz to Nu-Jazz to Soul-Jazz – that comes with this ever-expanding territory. Clearly the new styles are a long way from the jazz that made this club great, so where does Pearson draw the line when choosing which acts should play? ‘It’s sad because there are not that many jazz venues now in the whole of the country – especially that have decent pianos,’ he says. ‘Te reality is that some people don’t even like the idea of jazz and the word puts them off. So all venues have to be slightly open-minded about bringing in the other types of jazzinfluence: funk, rare groove, obviously blues. Providing there’s improvisation to it, you could, if you’re a barrister, argue it’s got jazz, but it’s about the musical language.’ Pearson believes that the future of jazz piano at the club lies not only in remaining open to new styles, but most importantly in appealing to young audiences and players. In recent years it has hosted Big Band in a Day Sessions – a free one-day monthly workshop in which young players form a band, performing on stage in the evening – and its latenight jam sessions continue to attract young pianists. ‘In the late sets, young kids are coming out with these new things and you get inspired by hearing them play,’ he says. ‘Ronnie Scott’s attitude was very much like, “Make sure you have musicians in the building; you can’t have a jazz club without musicians,” and that’s what we’ll continue to do.’ n

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REPERTOIRE

Left hand

 forward  One hundred years ago, pianist Paul Wittgenstein lost his right arm in the First World War – a tragedy that led him to commission some of the greatest piano music for the left hand. Inge Kjemtrup looks at the left-hand repertoire and talks to two of its players

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iano music composed for the left hand alone remains something of a novelty in the concert hall, even though many pianists and discerning audience members are familiar  with works such the Ravel Concert o for the Left Hand, the Godowsky Chopin arrangements and the Brahms left-hand setting of the Bach Chaconne. at’s a shame, because the left-hand repertoire is large, diverse and worthy of exploration – and because of the pioneering efforts of Paul Wittgenstein (of  whom more later), i t also includes some 20th-century masterpieces. Happily, left-hand repertoire is in the spotlight once again, thanks to several pianists, none more determined the young British concert pianist Nicholas McCarthy. Born in 1989 with a complete left arm and hand, but  with a foreshort ened right arm, McCar thy was 14 when he had a p iano epiphany after hearing a friend play the first movement of Beethoven’s ‘Waldstein’ Sonata. ‘I became piano-obsessed!’ laughs McCarthy. ‘Quite naively, I said to my parents that I wanted to be a concert pianist.’ He says his non-musical parents supported his ambition, providing him with a small digital keyboard, all the while assuming it would only be a passing fad.

Paul Wittgenstein commissioned left-hand pieces from Ravel, Britten and more

But McCarthy was soon spending hours on the keyboard. ‘I found that I could play the tune with my little arm [the right]. e Mozart C major Sonata was good because the left hand is an Alberti bass and the right hand has the melody.’ [e Rondo movement is presented in this issue’s scores.] It was two years into his study before McCarthy turned to the left-hand repertoire, thanks to the ‘inevitable knock-back’, when he was denied a place at a specialist music school due to a head’s scepticism about his ability to play scales. Later McCarthy was accepted at the Junior Department of the Guildhall School on the condition that he specialise in left-hand repertoire. In 2012, he became the first left-hand alone pianist to graduate from the Royal College of Music. In his life as a one-handed concert pianist, McCarthy can point to some illustrious predecessors, most notably the Austrian pianist Paul Wittgenstein (1887-1961), who lost his right arm in the First World War but continued his career as a left-hand player, commissioning pieces from some of the greatest composers of his age. ‘Without Paul Wittgenstein, I wouldn’t have much of a career,’ says McCarthy. ‘Britten, Strauss, Ravel, wouldn’t have composed that music.’ Paul Wittgenstein was born into an extremely wealthy and deeply eccentric Viennese family (revealed in all its gossipy glory in Alexander  Waugh’s e House of Wittgenstein: A Family at War ). Even more than his musically knowledgeable and quarrelsome siblings, who included the famed philosopher Ludwig, Paul was entranced with music and studied  with a noted teac her, eodor Leschetit zky. His businessman father, Karl, opposed his ambitions, forcing Paul to take a job as a banker. It can’t be a coincidence that Karl had recently died when Paul finally made his public concert debut in Vienna in 1913, age 26, playing four concertos in a row. e following August, in the opening month of the First World War, Paul Wittgenstein was serving as an Austrian officer in Poland when his right arm was shattered by a bullet and had to be removed. After enduring terrible deprivations as a prisoner of war, he made his way back to Vienna, determined to continue as a concert artist. He took inspiration from the one-armed pianist Count Géza Zichy, the composer Joseph Labor (the first to write him a left-hand piece) and Leopold Godowsky, a pianist-composer whose arrangements for left hand of 22 Chopin études is a cornerstone of the repertoire. e rebuilding of  Wittgenstein’s technique went slowly. ‘It was like trying to climb a mountain,’ he said. ‘If I could not reach the summit by one route I would climb down and start again from the other side.’ ree years almost to the day of his first

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Nicholas McCarthy says he’s only covered one-third of the lef t-hand repertoire

concert, Wittgenstein made his one-handed debut in a programme including Labor’s now rarely performed Konzertstück  and several Chopin/Godowsky etudes.  Wittgenstein began a search in earnest for the left-hand music, scouring ‘the antiquarian music stores of Paris, Vienna, Berlin and London,’ writes Waugh. His finds included original works by Scriabin, Dreyschock, Saint-Saëns and  Alkan. He also made his own arrangement s of Mendelssohn, Liszt, Wagner and Mozart, but it was soon obvious that what was needed was more original music. Wittgenstein was uniquely placed to become the initiator of this new repertoire – he had the knowledge, connections and financial resources. Te long list of his commissioned works include Ravel’s Concerto for the Left Hand, Strauss’s Parergon and Panathenäenzug , Hindemith’s Piano Music with Orchestra , Korngold’s Piano Concerto and Britten’s Diversions . Many of the resulting pieces show innovative efforts by the composers to overcome the acoustical challenge of a lone hand playing a piano against a large orchestra. But Wittgenstein was a tricky customer. He insisted on exclusive performing rights for the first several years. He re-wrote his own part and

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‘The pedal is key. As a left-handed  pianist, I’m creating the illusion of two hands playing. You pedal more than you would otherwise’  -Nicholas McCarthy the orchestral parts in many of his commissions, or, in other instances, never played the pieces in public (the Hindemith was locked away and only received its first performance in 2004 by Leon Fleisher and the Berlin Philharmonic).  After he made alterations to Ravel’s score, Wittgens tein’s tussles with the composer were ferocious. In a 1932 letter to Ravel, Wittgenstein put his cards on the table: ‘As for a formal commitment to play your work henceforth strictly as written, that is completely out of the question. No self-respecting artist could accept such a condition. All pianists make modifications, large or small, in each concerto they play.’ Te Ravel, nonetheless, was a huge success. Later composers took note of Ravel’s experience. Prokofiev’s accompanying note to Wittgenstein along with the Fourth Concerto included this plea: ‘I have tried to make it as straightforward as possible; you, for your part, must not judge too quickly, and if certain passages seem at first indigestible, do not rush to judgement, but wait a while. If you have any suggestions of improving the work, please do not hesitate to tell me them.’ Wittgenstein never performed the concerto.  Wittgenstein gave the premiere of Britten’s Diversions   in 1942, but not before having a similar scuffle with its composer. Britten wrote in a letter ▲ to a publisher, ‘I’m having a slight altercation with Herr von Wittgenstein 77• Pianist 80

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REPERTOIRE over my scoring – if there is anything I know about, it is scoring so I am fighting back. Te man really is an old sour puss.’ Given all this, McCarthy admits to having a ‘love-hate relationship’ with  Wittgenstein. ‘Te fact that he had wealth behi nd him meant he coul d get repertoire of pieces that people will play. For me it’s a fine line with Paul  Wittgenstein. I feel I’m in his debt, yet I could throttle him for thi ngs he did, like keeping the Hindemith score hidden away.’

Originals and arrangements Some pianists come to the left-hand repertoire out of necessity, such as McCarthy and Wittgenstein, and those suffering a right-hand injury, such as Leon Fleisher, Gary Graffman and Yehudi Menuhin collaborator Paul Coker. wo-handed pianists often come to it out of curiosity. One pianist in the latter category is Ivan Ilić, who recorded an album of the Chopin/ Godowsky left-hand études in 2012. Ilić came to left-hand music in an indirect way, via a teenaged ‘obsession  with Nathan Milstein’s recording of the Bach Sonatas and Partit as for solo violin.’ Once his second cassette of the recording was worn out, he says, ‘I learned the Brahms transcription as a way of getting deeper into the music. I was surprised, a few years later, when I finally saw the original violin score: Brahms had changed very little. He brought Bach’s original  work down an octave, and, most im portant, he came up with a few ingenious ideas to fake the difficult violin passagework. In those tricky passages Brahms manages to imitate both the sound and the physical gestures of the original violin Chaconne, a remarkable achievement.’ So how much music is there for left hand alone, if you take into account original works, arrangements and transcriptions? ‘I have only c overed a third of repertoire,’ says McCarthy, who spent much time at the RCM researching this. (wo good sources of left-hand repertoire are Teodore Edel’s Piano  Music for One Hand , which lists over 1,000 works, and Donald L Patterson’s One Handed: A Guide to Piano Music for the Left Hand .) I ask McCarthy and Ilić to name some of their top pieces. ‘My favourite piece, which I’ve played in every single concert, is the Scriabin Nocturne,’ says McCarthy. ‘Ravel studied this score when writing his concerto. Scriabin is an absolute master of writing for left hand.’ ‘For me, the greatest solo left-hand music is Godowsky’s set of 22 Chopin Studies, which are essentially variations on 22 of Chopin’s 27 Etudes (opus 10, 25, and the posthumous set),’ says Ilić. ‘For pianists and music lovers who know Chopin’s études intimately, the Godowsky Chopin Studies can be rather disconcerting at first. Your expectations are constantly thwarted by Godowsky’s quirky harmonic additions. It’s like returning to a small town where you grew up after a 20-year absence; you recognise everything, but at the same time everything has changed.’ McCarthy also cites Frank Bridge’s Tree Improvisations for the Left Hand (the first movement, At Dawn, is in this issue’s scores). Bridge wrote the piece in 1918 for his student and friend, Douglas Fox, who lost his arm in World War I. Ten there are Moszkowski’s 12 Etudes for the Left Hand (No 4 is in this issue’s scores). ‘It’s quite standard Romantic writing,’ says McCarthy. ‘He realised importance of developing the left-hand repertoire.’ Saint-Saëns wrote Six Left Hand Etudes, which are intermediate level and in a neo-classical style. ‘Tey’re lovely,’ says McCarthy.  When it comes to the concertos, Ilić is a big fan of the Prokofi ev Concerto No 4. ‘Prokofiev takes the opposite approach to Ravel; he doesn’t shy from blending the one hand of the piano with the orchestra. Te Fourth Concerto is an exciting, high-adrenalin affair for everyone involved; the first and fourth movements are electrifying.’ McCarthy says, ‘I really enjoyed performed Britten’s Diversions . ‘It’s 25 minutes long and it goes by so quickly! It suits my technique; there are lots of fast octaves.’    )    ć    i    l    I    (   g   n   o    K    H    D   ;    )   e   g   a   p   s   u   o    i   v   e   r   p  ,   y    h   t   r   a    C   c    M    (   e   g   r   o   e    G    d   n   o   m   y   a    R    ©

Technical matters  A different techni que is required to p lay the left- handed piano reper toire. First and foremost, says McCarthy, ‘the pedal is key. As a left-handed pianist, I’m creating the illusion of two hands playing. You pedal more than you would otherwise.’ He also positions himself an octave higher than the usual ‘belly button to middle C’ spot. ‘I feel there is a difference between someone playing left-hand repertoire who has two hands versus Paul Wittgenstein and me. You can almost hear when someone is playing from necessity instead of choice.’ One reason might be that two-handed players can grip the stool with their right hand as they play with their left. Not being able to do that has made McCarthy very particular about his choice of stools. ‘In my second year at the RCM, there was a technical

Ivan Ilić has recorded the Godowsky left-hand arrangements of Chopin études

exam and the stool was like a rocking horse. I was going so fast in the Godowsky that I had to stop and get a new stool!’ Ilić lists some of the reasons that two-handed players might want to explore this repertoire: ‘It will make your left hand more agile, it will make you more aware of the different registers of the piano, your pedalling will improve, your left hand will become more expressive, and your two-handed sound will become more rich, because you will develop a more attentive way of listening to the bass. But the best reason is that the music itself is wonderful. You can certainly play the Bach/Brahms Chaconne with two hands if you like, but it’s a lot more fun to try to play it the way Brahms intended!’ For his part, McCarthy has something of a missionary’s zeal: ‘I’ve been  waking people up to the repertoire. Sixty per cent of my audience are people  who’ve seen me on the telly, but after one of my recitals, they are more knowledgeable about left-hand repertoire than the critics. I give them stories before I play; there is quite an interesting story behind many of the pieces.’ Playing a piece for one hand alone also has a definite audience appeal. ‘Left-hand music is a fantastic way to introduce visual contrast into any programme, an aspect that is so obvious that it’s little discussed,’ says Ilić. ‘When you play a piece with one hand, the audience immediately becomes curious and engaged. Tere is a buzz, you can feel it.’ It’s a buzz that is definitely getting ever louder in concert halls everywhere, thanks to the likes of McCarthy and Ilić. n Find out about Nicholas McCarthy’s War and Remembrance tour in November at nicholasmccarthy.co.uk; for more on Ivan Ilić go to ivancdg.com. Watch Chenyin Li  play Bridge’s ‘At Dawn’ on the Pianist website,www.pianis tmagazine.com/tv 

More left-hand pieces to try ’ 3 choices from Ivan Ilic Scriabin Prelude op 9 inged with a kind of Chekhovian nostalgia and melancholy, this is a lovely piece that deserves its fame. echnically, it’s not very difficult, but there seems to be something elusive about it: I’ve heard many, many different versions, none of which has ever been completely satisfying. Either the tempo is too slow, the rubato is awkward, or something else is wrong. Tere’s a challenge t o Pianist  readers out there! [Tis piece appeared in issue 47.] Saint-Saëns Bourrée, No 4 from Six Etudes for the Left Hand op 135 Tis piece has a delightful rhythmic lilt to it, and he does so much with so few notes. Tose who like Bach will love it, and it’s short enough to not be too intimidating. Godowsky  Meditation  A sensual, romantic piece that’s almost never played. It’s less than four minutes long, and the tempo is on the slow side. Te difficulty is in trying to sort out the different layers of sound,  which is typi cal of Godowsky’s music.

78• Pianist 80

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MAKERS

 Before the piano  How did the piano come about? Gez Kahan presents an overview of keyboard development to uncover how we arrived at the modern instrument 82• Pianist 80

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eople have been trying to make the perfect keyboard instrument for more than 2,000 years. e story of how  we ended up with the piano we have today is really the story of polyphony and compromise. Keyboard instruments lack the breath control of a wind instrument or the fluidity of a bowed string instrument, and they can’t match the mix of individual timbres, expressions and personalities within, say, a classical orchestra. But they are the best way yet devised for a single musician to produce multiple notes. e organ, that important piano predecessor, started life in ancient Greece (organon is Greek for ‘instrument’) and its environs. e organ’s ancestor was the syrinx , or panpipes, a series of reed stems cut to different lengths to make a scale. To turn this into a polyphonic instrument, you need to add a container for the  wind, bellows to fill it and levers operated by keys to activate which of the multiple pipes will sound. at is the principle underlying the first primitive organs (and other instruments such as the bagpipe and accordion).  We don’t have hard evidence of the earliest bellows-driven organs, but we do have detailed descriptions of a later water-driven instrument developed in Alexandria in the third century BC, when sophisticated hydraulic engineering was being used for all manner of machines. is organ  was called the hydraulus or hydraulis (from the Greek words for water and pipe) and originally needed two people to play it – one to control the flow of  water which provided compress ed air to the pipes, the other to operate the keys that selected which pipes would sound. e instrument lasted into Roman times, and though it fell out of use with the fall of Rome, it survived in Constantinople – as did the bellows organ, which gradually found its way from there back into Western Europe. Organ builders soon began to experiment with the design of pipes  with different timbral characteristics and stops to control them, additional keyboards in the form of manuals and pedals, and devices such as the swell pedal. e result was an instrument capable of tonal variety and overall  volume changes. What wasn’t possible  was control over the dynamic s of individual notes.  Wind instruments weren’t the be all and end all, however. Stringed instruments have been around since prehistoric times too, as have different  ways of making them sound: mediaeval instruments included the likes of bowed fiddles, plucked lutes and hammered

dulcimers. And naturally inventors looked for ways to mechanise them and make them polyphonic. e idea of a keyboard-operated bowed instrument can sound slightly alien to those who’ve grown up with the feeling that the piano is at least a close relative of tuned percussion. at, though, is the essence of the hurdygurdy . e right hand turns a handle attached to a rosined wheel (effectively a circular bow), while the left operates the keys.  While popular culture has tended to equate it with the barrel organ, which largely displaced it as a Victorian street instrument, the hurdy-gurdy – also known as the vielle à roue  in France, the organistrum in its large version for church use, and a host of other names in German and Italian – requires much more skill from the performer. Instruction books were written for aspiring players, several French composers wrote suites, sonatas and concertos for it in the 18th century, and Haydn wrote three concertos and eight nocturnes for two hurdy-gurdies plus chamber orchestra. ere’s also a related Swedish folk instrument, the nyckelharpa or, in its Italian version, the viola a chiavi , which are played with an actual bow in the right hand instead of a wheel,  while left-hand keys control the pitch. Strings and keys More familiar is the concept of using a keyboard for plucking strings – the harpsichord being the obvious example. e instrument was certainly known by the 15th century, although the earliest surviving examples date only from the 16th century. In its simplest form, the  virginal, there’s a series of single strings each operated by a key. Depressing the key causes a wooden ‘jack’ fitted with a plectrum to rise and pluck the string in passing (with an escapement to prevent the plectrum from plucking the string again as the jack falls back). Depending on the shape and other factors, these keyboards could be known as virginals, spinets or harpsichords (see glossary). e more complicated  versions have more strings per note and often a set tuned an octave higher, two (or sometimes three) keyboards, and occasionally a pedal keyboard, together  with stops and levers to allow coupling for added volume and grandeur. e drawback with keyboards that either vibrate (i.e. bow) or pluck the strings mechanically is that, like the organ, they lack significant control of dynamics. at becomes much easier  when the string is struck by a hammer,  where the player has direct control over the force of impact. at was the big advantage of the clavichord. e big bang, sadly, was just what ▲ the clavichord didn’t have. It did, 83• Pianist 80

More key words in keyboard history Celesta A keyboard instrument using hammers to strike tuned steel plates suspended over wooden resonators. Most famously heard in Tchaikovsky’s Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy  Celestina A treadle-operated horsehair ribbon used to rub the strings of a harpsichord. Suitable, according to Thomas Jefferson, who owned a celestina-equipped harpsichord, for slow movements and to accompany singing Cembalo Short for clavicembalo, an alternative term for the harpsichord Clavicytherium An upright harpsichord (i.e., a vertical soundboard) Clavier Generic word for keyboard. Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier does not specify the instrument it is to be performed on Eschiquier or chekker A 14th-century instrument said to resemble an organ that sounds by means of strings. No details of its construction or operation are known Geigenwerck Similar in principle to a hurdy-gurdy, this had several rosined wheels operated by keys. Its maker, Hans Haiden, claimed it could recreate the sound of an ensemble of viols, with dynamic control depending on key pressure Gravicembalo A corruption of ‘clavicembalo’ Harpsichord A stringed keyboard using ‘jacks’ mounted plectra or quills to pluck the strings. The harpsichord proper may have two or more manuals, each with two or more sets of strings and associated plucking mechanisms playable individually or coupled to change loudness and tone colour Hurdy-gurdy A stringed instrument using a handle-operated rosin wheel to vibrate strings and a set of keys to control pitch Hydraulis/Hydraulus An early organ using water-generated compressed air rather than bellows to fill the pipes Lautenwerck A harpsichord strung with gut instead of metal to imitate the sound of a lute Piano éolien A stringed keyboard where the strings are sounded by blowing a current of air past them Spinet The term ‘spinet’ is strictly applicable only to a type of virginal, winged-shaped but smaller than the harpsichord proper. The name may derive from the Latin word for a thorn, spina, in reference to the quills (plectra) that plucked the strings. ‘Spinet’ is now also used to describe a small piano Virginal A stringed keyboard designed to sound the strings by plucking, this was the simplest and probably oldest member of the harpsichord family. Possibly named from the Latin virga, meaning ‘rod’ and referring to the wooden shaft that held the plucking mechanism. Sometimes built as a pair of virginals, a smaller, higher pitched keyboard being mounted over the main one. Often used as a generic term for any member of the harpsichord family

Opposite, clockwise from top left: Gerrit Dou: Woman playing a clavichord (c.1665); the ‘Lépante’ clavichord (16th century); a clavicytherium (1752) made by Albert Delin; Vermeer: Woman at a muselar  (c.1672; a muselar was a type of virginal f rom Northern Europe)

MAKERS How the keyboard was standardised The earliest keyboards often didn’t resemble the arrangement of notes we’re familiar with today. They started off as s imple natural-note scales with no sharps. There was no standard width. Some instruments had keys so large that they were fist-operated, while some organs had keys of variable widths according to the size of the organ pipes they controlled. But as modal plainsong began to give way to more chromatic music, sharps appeared, although it wasn’t until the late mediaeval period that the modern 12-semitone scale became the norm. Even then, there were exceptions. One such was the ‘short octave’. The lowest note on many early keyboards would be an E, while s ome music might call for the C or D below that. The solution (given that l ow F and G were unlikely to be required in the repertoire of the time) was to tune the E down to C, the F down to D and the G down to E, giving a nine-note octave from C–C, with B as the only non-natural. Complicating matters, this was before the introduction of the equal-tempered tuning system that we take for granted today. Previously A# and B had been different notes, as had C and D , D and E . This made it impossible to play in a key requiring sharps (such as A or B) followed by a key requiring flats (such as B ) without retuning. To get round the problem, some keyboards had ‘divided sharps’, with the front half of the raised keys sounding the appropriate sharp and the back half sounding the equivalent flat. By the time virginals and clavichords appeared, the width of the keys was becoming standard, although it still varied between six and seven inches per octave (the octave span on a modern piano being about 6½ inches or 16.5 cm). Early instruments were single octave; by the 15th century they were between two and three octaves (30–37 k eys). By Beethoven’s time, five octaves (61 keys) was usual. The modern colour scheme (white for naturals, black for sharps) wasn’t standardised until the beginning of the 19th century – black naturals with white sharps being commonplace for earlier French and German instruments.

however, have a high degree of control over the dynamics of individual notes. Instead of having one or more strings per key (as with the harpsichord and the piano), this instrument had a limited number of strings with the keys configured to cause a flat blade called a ‘tangent’ to strike them in different positions to produce the different pitches. e principle is similar to the way a guitarist or violinist selects pitches from a limited number of strings with the left hand.  Although the clavichord could play polyphonically, in practice the combinations available were limited by

the number of strings available (just as guitarists are limited to playing a maximum of six notes at once). Furthermore, because the string would only continue to vibrate while in contact  with the tangent, true legato could only be achieved between notes using different strings. On the plus side, it was a simple design (which made it affordable) and it  was popular as a teaching instrument, especially as it allowed for a great deal of dynamic expression. is wasn’t confined to the moment the key was struck.  While holding a key down to sustain a note, the player could vary the pressure to produce a vibrato or swell effect. On

   )   y    d   r   u   g    y    d   r   u    h    (    l   e    W   r   e    d   n   a   v   r   e    d   n   a    S   :   e   g   a   p   s    i    h   t   ;    )   m   u    i   r   e    h   t   y   c    i   v   a    l   c   ;    d   r   o    h   c    i   v   a    l   c    (   t   o   n   a    J    d   r   a   r    é    G    ©   :    2    8   e   g   a    P 84• Pianist 80

Above: A harpsichord originally constructed by Andreas Ruckers in Antwerp (1646), then remodelled and expanded by Pascal Taskin in Paris Below: A hurdy-gurdy 

the minus side, it was so quiet as to be unusable except as a solo, domestic instrument – hence the adoption of the harpsichord as the default instrument for ensemble playing. By the beginning of the 16th century there were plenty of keyboard instruments, all of which were deficient in some way. Organs, hurdy-gurdies and harpsichords  were not touch sensitive enough, clavichords were not loud enough, and some of the elaborate inventions of the 15th century (and later) were not economical enough. e pursuit of keyboard perfection continued for the next 200 years until Cristofori’s  gravicembalo col piano e forte appeared. For the first hundred years or so, Cristofori’s invention existed alongside the harpsichord: most of Mozart’s piano  works were really written for harpsichord,  while the title page of Beethoven’s Sonata No 14 (the ‘Moonlight’) specifies that it is for clavicembalo  (harpsichord) or pianoforte. But by then the piano’s dominance was assured. Of course it wasn’t (and still isn’t) perfect. A piano is incapable of volumechanging effects such as swell or sforzando followed by piano, or pitch-changing effects such as vibrato or portamento. But that’s to pick holes. No instrument has all of the above, plus ten-fingered polyphony (and more with the use of a sustain pedal), enough power to fill a concert hall and – most importantly – touch sensitivity. As a compromise, the piano pretty well answers the brief. ■

the 5h manheser Inernaional Piano conero copeiion for young Pianiss Chetham’s School of Music & University of Manchester

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CD

Marius Dawn has praise for Daniel Barenboim’s supreme Schubert, Llyˆ r Williams’s wordless Wagner and Artur Pizarro’s Romantic obscurities Pianist star ratings: ★★★★★ Essential – go get it! ★★★★ Really great ★★★ A fine release Buy these CDs from the Pianist website.Visit http://pianistmag/cdreviews

Editor’s

BENJAMIN GROSVENOR

OLEG MARSHEV

Dances. Solo piano works by Albéniz, Bach, Chopin, Granados, SchulzEvler, Scriabin, etc

★★★★

★★★★★

★★★★

KIRILL GERSTEIN Imaginary Pictures. Mussorgsky: Pictures at an Exhibition; Schumann: Carnava l

Myrios Classics MYR013

★★★★

Luiza Borac is one of the finest Romanian pianists today. I enjoyed her Dinu Lipatti CD, and her Enescu recordings are worth seeking out.  With this disc of transcriptions and original works by pianist-composers, she faces stiff competition from others who are also in love with Liszt’s arrangements of Schubert’s songs. A singing tone, well-judged tempos and fine pedalling put Borac high on the list of Liszt players, and her recording of the Silvestri pieces invites repeated listening. is thread is broken by several pieces featuring the beautiful tenor of Ion Buzea in  which Borac delivers a short piano introduction and afterlude to the original recordings.  Interesting, but it’s the Liszt that is still the main draw.

Kirill Gerstein is a lion at the piano. He swallows whole the gigantic chords in the Mussorgsky Pictures , creating a sound that is vast in its sonority. He is not one for fiddling with details and he characterises Mussorgsky’s impressions with enormous generosity. Not that he skips a single note, but it is the overall sweep of his paws that is most impressive – this may well be how Mussorgsky would have wished to play it. Schumann’s Carnaval  presents more complex musical ideas. Gerstein keeps his tone under control, never forcing his way with the faster movements. It is not the Schumann of the intimate salons, but one for the big halls. Refreshingly different and a fully acceptable view of this epitome of a Romantic composer.

ARTUR PIZARRO

LL ˆ  YR WILLIAMS

★★★★★

is may be the only slightly negative Following on from his complete review you’ll come across of this new Chopin works for piano and recital disc by the popular Grosvenor, orchestra, Oleg Marshev turns to so let me be clear from the start – he Mendelssohn, making what turns out is still a super talent. However, he is to be the first-ever complete recording up against pianists who can produce of all the works for piano and a more sonorous  fortissimo  in the orchestra by the same pianist. We are Chopin polonaises and more charm in treated to the three piano concertos, the Granados Valses poéticos . e Bach the two concertos for two pianos and Partita is the most satisfactory, possibly the one for violin and piano. is because there are few heavy chords to is consistently high-level playing, balance. e Scriabin works shimmer  which we have come to expect from  with fine shadings of pianissimo, while Marshev, and his various partners the quicksilver light of the Schulz- in the double concertos follow suit. Evler piece shows fingerwork that is It’s great to hear the early concerto a marvel. Presentation and recording for piano and strings. Orchestral are first class, but is that enough, support is sharp and attentive and the considering how impressive his recent recorded balance perfect. A four-CD live performances have been? set to cherish.

Fair

Avie AV2316

Mendelssohn: Complete Works for Piano and Orch. South Denmark Phil/David Porcelijn Danacord DACOCD 734-736 (4 discs)

Decca 478 5334

★

Chants Nostalgiques. Music by pianistcomposers including Godowsky, Silvestri, Rachmaninov, Liszt & Borac

DANIEL BARENBOIM

Daniel Barenboim has recorded at least three versions of the complete Beethoven sonatas, but this, surprisingly, is the first time that the pianist, now in his early seventies, has recorded the Schubert sonatas. He’s excluded the incomplete sonatas, however, we don’t miss them when there is such a  wealth of musicality in this five-CD release. Barenboim conveys a profound musical understanding of Schubert’s sonatas, offering us unfussy playing that is emotionally deeper and musically higher than anyone else offers. He perfectly sustains the natural flowing line throughout the sonatas – the three A minor sonatas (D537, D784 and D845) are excellent examples of this. e fine A major sonatas (D664 and D959) never drag and the tense G major sonata (D894) has probably never received such gravitas as it gets here. Barenboim reigns supreme in late Beethoven, and there’s an obvious parallel between his mastery of those architectural complex works and his performance of Schubert’s final sonata (D960) here, in which his forwardmoving pulse secures a logic harmonic progression over which the melody, rich in sonorous tone, can sing. e recordings are natural-sounding and the Steinway is in superb condition. ere is a reason why Barenboim looks so contented on the front cover. He has every right to be!

Average

LUIZA BORAC

CHOICE Schubert Piano Sonatas (the 11 complete sonatas) Deutsche Grammophon ★★★★★ DG 479 2783 (5 discs)

★★

The Romantic Piano Concerto Vol 64: Henrique Oswald & Artur Napoleão BBC NO of Wales/ Martyn Brabbins

Wagner without Words. Original works by Wagner, plus transcriptions by Liszt, Glenn Gould & Williams

Hyperion CDA 67984

Signum Records SIGCD388 (2 discs) ★★★★★

Volume 64 in Hyperion’s Romantic is two-CD set features original Piano Concerto  series dishes up  Wagner piano works along with two composers totally forgotten transcriptions and arrangements from today. Both were born in 1852; his operas. Williams squeezes the one is Brazilian (Oswald), the other originals in between the arrangements; Portuguese (Napoleão); and their a refreshing idea that makes them music represents everything we love something like intervals in an opera. in the battle between an orchestra  Williams is a master accompanist and and a grand piano: sweeping tunes, you can hear his own fine glittering passagework and romantic compositional skills in his reworking swagger. e slow movement of of scenes from Parsifal , undoubtedly the Oswald and the opening of the release’s highlight. He also the Napoleão are unique in their modifies the two Glenn Gould mesmerising hushed inwardness. arrangements, which are both For those moments alone it is worth musically very convincing. It is fine to getting this disc. Pizarro plays with have the original Wagner pieces crystalline clarity and the orchestra dispersed here and there, however the has a field day. Can we have the rest Fantasy and the Sonata surely outstay of the Napoleão concertos, please! their welcome. e rest is pure bliss!

86• Pianist 80

www.henle.com . .

Sergei Rachmaninoff New Urtext Editions for Piano

   f    f   o   n    i   n   a   m    h   c   a    R    i   e   g   r   e    S

i

i

Prélude c k minor op. 3 no. 2

Études-Tableaux

Ed.: Dominik Rahmer · Fing.: Marc-André Hamelin

Ed.: Dominik Rahmer · Fing.: Marc-André Hamelin

HN 1211 Possibly the most famous late Romantic piano work and now finally also available in Henle Urtext! First published in 1892, the work also soon became well known abroad, in particular due to the concert tours given by the pianist Alexander Siloti, Rachmaninoff’s cousin. And even Rachmaninoff himself was soon no longer able to perform any concerts in America, without someone in the audience crying out “C sharp minor!” at the end …

HN 1202 With his Études-Tableaux Rachmaninoff continued down the path that Chopin and Liszt had already set out on with their concert etudes: the most demanding technical tasks are presented in the form of expressive character pieces.

24 Préludes Ed.: Dominik Rahmer · Fing.: Marc-André Hamelin

HN 1200 Based on the Prélude in c sharp minor Op. 3 No. 2 written in 1892 that quickly became worldfamous, Rachmaninoff composed a further two collections of Préludes in the years up to 1910. These were also published as a complete volume in 1911. A final highlight of late Romantic piano music, which no pianist can ignore!

Corelli Variations op. 42 Ed.: Norbert Gertsch · Fing.: Marc-André Hamelin

HN 1206 Rachmaninoff wrote his well-known piano cycle in 1931, at a time when his great works for piano solo and the piano concertos had already made him very famous. Yet it is by no means the “work of an old man”. The composer’s variations on the theme “La folia” (taken from a sonata by Corelli) are like a series of fireworks on the piano.  n o w! J o i n u s  e r lag  / h e n l e v

i

87• Pianist 80

R E V I E W  S H E E T

MUSIC

Michael McMillan looks at the brand-new piano syllabuses from ABRSM and Trinity College London, plus Chabrier’s Habanera and folk tunes of the British Isles ABRSM PIANO EXAM PIECES 2015 & 2016 SYLLABUS

EMMANUEL CHABRIER ABRSM ISBN: 978-1-84849-649-1 (Grade 1); -650-7 (Grade 2); -651-4 (Grade 3); -652-1 (Grade 4); -653-8 (Grade 5); -654-5 (Grade 6); -655-2 (Grade 7); -656-9 (Grade 8)

Habanera

Bärenreiter ISBN: 979-0-00654223-9

Piano exams accounted for more than half the total number of instrumental exams conducted by the ABRSM last year, Chabrier’s Habanera   is on the C list and the instrument’s popularity has ensured that its graded syllabus receives the fastest turnover in the ABRSM’s catalogue. of ABRSM’s new Grade 8 syllabus. It Every two years, a new set of 150-odd pieces are introduced into the examining syllabus across eight levels of graded  was composed in 1885 at the behest of difficulty, replacing all the ones that have been in use for the previous two years. Tis biennial refreshment helps to keep Chabrier’s publishers, who had asked teachers (and examiners) on their toes, while also al lowing a wide range of sometimes neglected repertoire to co me to light. him for relatively easy piano music, Te new piano syllabus comes into play from the first examining session of 2015, and nine of the 18 pieces at each and he turned to the popular Spanish grade are printed in these books (Grade 8 is the only exception – it contains 12 from a total of 32 pieces). Te pieces are dance for his inspiration. Habanera  divided into three lists (A, B, C) according to their musical period and style, and if you were preparing for an exam you is written on three staves throughout  would be required to pick one from each list. Te repertoire is diverse, and sourced from all over the world. In the first two (the left hand covers the bottom two), grades alone, Italian, German, English, Austrian, Norwegian, Catalan, Polish, Hungarian, Russian, American, Lithuanian, is seven pages long and takes roughly  Japanese and Czech composers are represented. At Grades 5, 6, and 7, there are also three Chinese pieces (or four, if you four minutes to play. Chabrier was a count Morton Gould’s China Blue ) that reflect the examining board’s expansion into the Chinese market. fine pianist, so it comes as no surprise  With such a wide range of styles included to cover all tastes, there are, perhaps inevitably, a few pieces that are unlikely to find that the music lies comfortably to attract many candidates. From a teacher’s perspective, however, I don’t anticipate significant difficulty in finding a under the hand, with no chords motivating selection of music for students at any grade, especially when the alternative pieces on the syllabus are taken requiring a stretch greater than an into consideration. My favourite discoveries include a beautiful piece called Shui Cao Wu (Te Dance of Watergrass) octave. Cortot dismissed Habanera  as by Mingxin Du (b.1928) in Grade 7, the toccata-like Carousel   by Sylvie Bodorová, also at Grade 7 and the playful first ‘feeble’, but its popularity is evidenced movement of Dussek’s Sonata in B flat opus 24 at Grade 8. On the alternative list, look out for Carl Vine’s Trenody  at by the various arrangements later Grade 6 and Alkan’s transcription of Bach’s Siciliano at Grade 7 – these will surely appeal to sensitive candidates. published for a range of instruments, Te books can be bought with or without a CD. [Te versions with CD are listed above; teaching notes are available as and the fact that Chabrier was moved a separate volume]. Or, if you know which three pieces you want to play, a cheaper option is to visit abrsmdownloads.org to write an orchestral version. and download the individual MP3 tracks. All other syllabus requirements (sight-reading, aural tests, scales/arpeggios) are the same as the current syllabus. [Te Jensen Lied opus 33 no 10, on page 50, is in the Grade 5 syllabus.] ENGLISH, SCOTTISH, WELSH & IRISH FOLK TRINITY COLLEGE LONDON PIECES & EXERCISES FOR 2015-2017 EXAMS TUNES FOR PIANO Trinity College London ISBN: 978-0-85736-327-5 (Initial); -328-2 (Grade 1); -329-9 (Grade 2); -330-5 (Grade 3); -331-2 (Grade 4); -332-9 (Grade 5); -333-6 (Grade 6); -334-3 (Grade 7); -335-0 (Grade 8)

In 2012, rinity College London discontinued the use of its rinity Guildhall brand, which had been formed in 2004, and decided instead to offer all its exams under its own name. Tis has not resulted in sweeping changes to the examining syllabus, structure or processes. Te exams themselves are totally unaffected and it really is only the name that has changed. rinity’s syllabus at each grade (Initial to Grade 8) contains 18 pieces, half of which are included in these books, which can be bought in versions that include CDs and teaching notes. From Initial to Grade 3, a candidate can pick any three pieces to play in an exam, while from Grade 4 upwards, the pieces are divided into two groups, and a candidate must pick at least one piece from each group. Tis format gives a candidate considerable freedom to focus on their tastes and strengths – for example, at every grade except 6 and 7, it is possible to construct a programme consisting entirely of pieces  written by contemporary composers. Tere are a few general observations to make about the syllabus repertoire. Firstly, it has a modern feel because just over 40 per cent of the music has been written by composers born in the 20th century. Secondly, the selection of pieces at each grade is typically motivating – take a look at Grade 8, for instance, which inc ludes Debussy’sGolliwogg’s Cake-walk , Grieg’s Notturno opus 54 no 4, Field’s Nocturne No 4, the first movement of Bach’s Italian Concerto (if you fancy a challenge!), Poulenc’s Novelette No 1 and one of my favourite discoveries of the series, Kaski’s luxurious Nacht am Seestrand . Tirdly, there’s a piece in the Initial and Grade 1 books with an optional duet part. And finally, some pieces strike me as being a little soft for the grade at which they appear – Grovlez’sPetites litanies de Jesus  at Grade 7, for example, or Chopin’s ‘Minute’  Waltz at Grade 8 and Casella’s Galop Final  at Grade 6.  At the back of each book you will find a new set of six exercises that are one to three lines long. Tree of these are to be prepared for an exam, in addition to the list of scales and arpeggios printed on the back cover. Te scale and arpeggio requirements that have been in force since 2007 have now been slightly tweaked, with the addition of contrary motion scales in the lower grades, and contrary motion arpeggios at Grades 7 and 8. Tese are all written out in the two scales and arpeggios books from rinity: one for Initial to Grade 5 levels, and one for Grades 6 to 8. [Te books can be bought with or without CD and teaching notes; the ISBN numbers here are for the version with CD and teaching notes.] 88 80 Pianist #13 88•• Pianist

Arranged by Barrie Carson Turner Schott ISBN: 978-1-84761326-4 (English); -322-6 (Scottish); -314-1 (Welsh); -313-4 (Irish)

Each of the four books here contains 32 folk tunes that were collected from different parts of the British Isles. All the tunes have been edited and arranged by Barrie Carson urner,  who writes in his introduction that he has ‘tried to make the arrangements of the pieces straightforward, and approachable for the average pianist’. rue to his word, almost all the pieces fall between Grades 3 and 6, and the music rarely asks for chords greater than an octave. On the whole, the arrangements do not stray far from the norm, but just occasionally (such as in Country Gardens ), there are eyebrow-raising harmonisations. Tere are no fingering suggestions,  which would have helped in some areas of writing that are pianistically rather ungainly. All the books come  with an accompanying CD with sample performances.

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Broad Farm, North Street, Hellingly,

Yorkshire, YO311EU

condition, light action. Owned by

Cheshire

[email protected]

East Sussex, BN27 4DU

01904 430270 / 01904430270

Piano Teacher, £20 00. Telephone

SK116QU

www.forsyths.co.uk

Tel: 01323 843900 Email:

[email protected]

01213085473, Sutton Coldfield.

0800 0329919

With over 150 years of experience

[email protected]

www.stephenbrandonpianos.co.uk

[email protected]

Forsyth offers the complete piano

A family run business since 1995 &

We have been selling high quality

The UK’s Premiere Piano Centre-

service.

located in the Sussex countryside,

pianos for over 30 years. We stock a

Over 150 pianos in 4000sq feet of

Unrivalled selection of quality new

we offer a wide range of services

large selection of new, second hand

showrooms and workshops

and used pianos agents for

for piano owners including Tuning,

and restored upright and grand pianos

Specialists in - Piano sales |

Bösendorfer, Bechstein, Kawai,

Repairsand Restoration.

.Our showroom is open every Saturday

Restoration | French polishing |

Kemble, May-Berlin, Schimmel,

Servicing | Piano transport | Event hire

Vogel & Yamaha

GLOUCESTERSHIRE

10.30am to 5.00pm. An appointment is

WORCESTERSHIRE

Rebuilt & Pre-owned by Bechstein, Bluthner, Fazioli, Ibach & Steinway

Cheltenham Piano Centre

52 Winchcombe Street, Cheltenham

Cheltenham Piano Centre

52 Winchcombe Street,

OXON

Gloucestershire, GL52 2HP

Cheltenham

01242517635

01242 250794

advisable on weekdays.

TUITION ESSEX Pianists Together

Gloucestershire, GL52 2HP

Cheltenham Piano Centre

www.cheltenham-piano-centre.co.uk

Weekly workshop near

01242517635

52 Winchcombe Street,

Bluthner, Yamaha, Bechstein, Kemble,

Brentwood/Chelmsford: duets,

www.cheltenham-piano-centre.co.uk

Cheltenham, Gloucestershire,

Dale Forty Restorations and repairs

accompaniment, musicianship,

Bluthner, Yamaha, Bechstein, Kemble,

GL52 2HP

undertaken in our workshops

solo performance, kindred spirits

Dale Forty Restorations and repairs

01242517635 01242 250794

undertaken in our workshops

www.cheltenham-piano-centre.co.uk

Vale Pianos

taster session. Individual tuition

Bluthner, Yamaha, Bechstein,

Piano Specialists with over 100

also offered. www.cagmus.org.uk/  piano.html 07801 258261

01242 250794

HEREFORD

and friendly atmosphere! Free

Kemble, Dale Forty

pianos on display. Family business.

Cheltenham Piano Centre

Restorations and repairs undertaken

Workshops and showrooms.

52 Winchcombe Street,

in our workshops

Visit www.valepianos.co.uk

Cheltenham Gloucestershire,

01386 860419

SURREY

GL52 2HP

Piano Warehouse

01242517635

111-113 Ewell Road, Surbiton,

01242 250794

Surrey, KT6 6AL

www.cheltenham-piano-centre.co.uk

0208 399 4110

Bluthner, Yamaha, Bechstein, Kemble,

www.piano-warehouse.co.uk

Dale Forty Restorations and repairs

Specialists in sales and rentals.

Steinway & Sons model B (6’ 11”) circa 1908 in rare satinwood, fully restored, now

If so call or email us for a free no obligation quote Tel: 0161 977 0075 [email protected]

Piano Workshop of Reigate

Sales-Rental-Restoration

Peregrine’s Pianos

Practice and teaching rooms for hire

137A Grays Inn Road . London

ABRSM exam centre

WC1X 8TU

www.pianoworkshop.co.uk

Tel: 020 7242 9865 E: [email protected]

RARE STEINWAY FOR SALE

DO YOU HAVE A PIANO TO SELL?

undertaken in our workshops

LONDON

£23,950

With less fuss and fees than other auction sites it really does make sense to sell with us and maximise the potential in your piano

SURREY BORDERS

Cheltenham Piano Centre tel 01242 517635 email [email protected]

W: www.peregrines-pianos.com We are here to sell and hire out fine, modern upright and grand pianos,

i

and to provide a unique working

Handel Pianos

environment for the music profession.

Verve House, London Road (A30),

NW LONDON

i

Sunningdale, Berkshire, SL5 0DJ

l

“Looking for a label  i which speaks of  quality and trust? Find  it on all of our pianos” ii

01344 87 3645

PianoWarehouse

[email protected]

291-295 Willesden Lane

www.handelpianos.co.uk

London

Complete range of new and restored

NW2 5HY

upright and grand pianos, for the

0207 267 7671

beginner through to the professional.

www.piano-warehouse.co.uk

Appointed Bosendorfer and Kemble

Specialists in sales and rentals

agents. As new, restored pianos from Bluthner & Bechstein

Not found the company you were looking for? Then why not visit www. pianist magazine .comWhereCan-I-Find/ and check out the wide selection of products and services promoted through our website.

01323 843900 www.sussexpianos.co.uk

l

i

CLASSIFIEDS        E        H        T

PIANO MAN  EST 2002

thepianoman.ltd.uk

“

The Shigeru Kawai SX-EX is simply the finest concert grand piano I have ever played. Julian Saphir.

 Piano specialists for over four generations   :

”

FULL CONCERT GRAND Formerly, Kawai UK's concert instrument, only 5 years old.

£49,500 inc 10 year warranty FREE NATIONWIDE DELIVERY 168-170 Easterly Road (A58) Leeds � LS8 3AD www.thepianoman.ltd.uk

 .  .

Meticulously handcrafted in strictly limited numbers, the Shigeru Kawai brings to fruition over 80 years of piano advancement, knowledge and craftsmanship.

0113 240 8030

   |       :

We have over 70 pianos on offer from Bosendorfer  | Bluthner  Bechstein | Kemble  Yamaha | Kawai With many other new and quality pre loved pianos. With delivery arranged countrywide

www.handelpianos.co.uk Tel: 01344 873645 Email: sales@handel pianos.co.u k  Verve House | London Road | Sunningdale | Berkshire | SL5 0DJ

PIANO WORKSHOP

Est. 1982

Bluthner 6’2” Rosewood

Restoration specialists - pianos purcha sed. Over 90 pianos on display.

 ww w.pianoworkshop.co.uk

Tel: 01737 242174

 46b Albert Road North, Reigate, Surrey RH2 9EL

Advertise your business here!  Call

Lottie Day on

0845 226 0477