>> Thanks for the interesting URL! It strikes me that I prefer the
>> non-HIP version - even when the performer is the composer.
>> Henk
> Why? Do you think Debussy didn't know how to play his own music?
Hmmm. Debussy played his valse the way he liked best. I like other versions
better, for example Bavouzet's. Bavouzet may be musicologically wrong,
musically he's right IMO.
This isn't unusual. In Hamlet an actress plays the role of Ophelia these days. This may not be HIP but it's certainly a vast improvement - and there are many other artistic reasons not to copy faithfully the mise-en-scène etc. of the Bard
himself.
> > Thanks for the interesting URL! It strikes me that I prefer the non-HIP
> > version - even when the performer is the composer.
> > Henk
> Why? Do you think Debussy didn't know how to play his own music?
Do you really think if a person prefers an interpretation other than
the composer's own performance that it means that person doesn't think
the composer knows how to play his or her own music?
>On Nov 17, 11:36 am, "HvT" <hvtuijl- SPAM- @xs4all.nl> wrote:
> Thanks for the interesting URL! It strikes me that I prefer the non-HIP
> version - even when the performer is the composer.
Thanks, Scott, and I almost completely agree with Henk. The HIP
version works for me only in the Schubert waltz, perhaps the Brahms
Intermezzo although both approaches seem equally effective in the
Brahms. The Mozart and Schumann were offensive.
Here is Fiorentino discussing and illustrating arpeggio :
> >> Thanks for the interesting URL! It strikes me that I prefer the
> >> non-HIP version - even when the performer is the composer.
> >> Henk
> > Why? Do you think Debussy didn't know how to play his own music?
> Hmmm. Debussy played his valse the way he liked best. I like other versions
> better, for example Bavouzet's. Bavouzet may be musicologically wrong,
> musically he's right IMO.
So you are saying Debussy was musicologically right, but but musically
wrong?
> This isn't unusual. In Hamlet an actress plays the role of Ophelia these
> days. This may not be HIP but it's certainly a vast improvement - and there
> are many other artistic reasons not to copy faithfully the mise-en-sc ne
> etc. of the Bard
> himself.
That's not a good comparison. A man playing a woman vs. a woman
playing a woman is a much more drastic difference than the fine
musical nuances we are talking about here.
> > >> Thanks for the interesting URL! It strikes me that I prefer the
> > >> non-HIP version - even when the performer is the composer.
> > >> Henk
> > > Why? Do you think Debussy didn't know how to play his own music?
> > Hmmm. Debussy played his valse the way he liked best. I like other versions
> > better, for example Bavouzet's. Bavouzet may be musicologically wrong,
> > musically he's right IMO.
> So you are saying Debussy was musicologically right, but but musically
> wrong?
I'm pretty sure it is not what is being said. There is no single
"musically right" way to play any piece of music. Musicality is
neither an objective quality nor a black and white/ yes or no
proposition. To say any one version of a piece is "musically right"
does not infer that all other versions are "musically wrong."
In article
<3bc9218a-45e3-48f2-b15b-bfaebad45...@c16g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>,
M forever <ms1...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > This isn't unusual. In Hamlet an actress plays the role of Ophelia
> > these days. This may not be HIP but it's certainly a vast improvement
> > - and there are many other artistic reasons not to copy faithfully the
> > mise-en-sc ne etc. of the Bard himself.
> That's not a good comparison. A man playing a woman vs. a woman
> playing a woman is a much more drastic difference than the fine
> musical nuances we are talking about here.
In Elizabethan times it would not have been a fully mature man playing a
woman's role but a prepubuscent male around 17 years of age which would
not have looked particularly odd.
Alan
-- alan.da...@argonet.co.uk
alan.da...@riscos.org
Using an Acorn RiscPC
> > Thanks for the interesting URL! It strikes me that I prefer the non-HIP
> > version - even when the performer is the composer.
> I'm concerned with the piano roll transfers he uses as examples. Is
> there another source for the Debussy?
That's what I was thinking -- though that Debussy take may illustrate
the point, this might be something of an excessively perforated,
cylindrical form of Debussy...
Thanks from me, too. I loved the Schnabel portion (mainly for its
imagination, but the chords are okay too :) ).
> > It strikes me that I prefer the non-HIP
> > version - even when the performer is the composer.
> Thanks, Scott, and I almost completely agree with Henk. The HIP
> version works for me only in the Schubert waltz,
(I'm not sure HIP is quite the word in this context, but never
mind. :) )
I thought Schnabel's portion was fantastic. This kind of imagination
is all too rare...
Anyway, all "rolled" chords aren't the same... You can "roll", while
veering towards oiled-up lounge pianism, or go for tasteful, patrician
arpeggios. Beveridge Webster's Brahms is in the latter category...
(actually, they sound great to me).
M forever wrote:
>> Hmmm. Debussy played his valse the way he liked best. I like other
>> versions better, for example Bavouzet's. Bavouzet may be
>> musicologically wrong, musically he's right IMO.
> So you are saying Debussy was musicologically right, but but musically
> wrong?
Indeed. Debussy is the composer of this little piece. Whether he had any intentions at all while composing it and whether he was aware of these intentions while performing it, we don't know. We only know that he performs it in the tradition of his days, which makes it a historical performance.
>> This isn't unusual. In Hamlet an actress plays the role of Ophelia
>> these days. This may not be HIP but it's certainly a vast
>> improvement - and there are many other artistic reasons not to copy
>> faithfully the mise-en-sc ne etc. of the Bard
>> himself.
> That's not a good comparison. A man playing a woman vs. a woman
> playing a woman is a much more drastic difference than the fine
> musical nuances we are talking about here.
The comparison shows that there is no relation between the quality of the performance of a piece and the way it was performed by or with the approval of it's creator.
Alan Dawes wrote:
> In article
> <3bc9218a-45e3-48f2-b15b-bfaebad45...@c16g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>,
> M forever <ms1...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> This isn't unusual. In Hamlet an actress plays the role of Ophelia
>>> these days. This may not be HIP but it's certainly a vast
>>> improvement - and there are many other artistic reasons not to copy
>>> faithfully the mise-en-sc ne etc. of the Bard himself.
>> That's not a good comparison. A man playing a woman vs. a woman
>> playing a woman is a much more drastic difference than the fine
>> musical nuances we are talking about here.
> In Elizabethan times it would not have been a fully mature man
> playing a woman's role but a prepubuscent male around 17 years of age
> which would not have looked particularly odd.
<g> There is more to a female Ophelia than just her looks ...
> In article
> <3bc9218a-45e3-48f2-b15b-bfaebad45...@c16g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>,
> M forever <ms1...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> This isn't unusual. In Hamlet an actress plays the role of Ophelia
>>> these days. This may not be HIP but it's certainly a vast improvement
>>> - and there are many other artistic reasons not to copy faithfully the
>>> mise-en-sc ne etc. of the Bard himself.
>> That's not a good comparison. A man playing a woman vs. a woman
>> playing a woman is a much more drastic difference than the fine
>> musical nuances we are talking about here.
> In Elizabethan times it would not have been a fully mature man playing a
> woman's role but a prepubuscent male around 17 years of age which would
> not have looked particularly odd.
In an issue of his celebrated comic, The Sandman, Alan Moore wrote (and Rick Veitch, I believe, illustrated) a rather good account of a performance of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" commissioned by the Faerie, and his handling of the cast, on and off the stage, rings very true to life. The young boys who played the beautiful women were somewhat catty behind the scenes, for instance. In the span of the story, Moore weaves Will Shakespeare into the dream mythos of his series, and brings a real Robin Goodfellow into the cast of traveling players for a night. Though in a good mood and on fairly good behavior, you can see that the Good Folk aren't anybody you'd really want to deal with the Bard both gains and loses from his commission.
>> I'm concerned with the piano roll transfers he uses as examples.
>> Is there another source for the Debussy?
> That's what I was thinking -- though that Debussy take may illustrate
> the point, this might be something of an excessively perforated,
> cylindrical form of Debussy...
Reproducing pianos do not reproduce every nuance of a performance. (For example, I think the dynamics are terraced.) But I find it had to believe they convert block chords into individual notes.
On Nov 19, 6:24 am, "William Sommerwerck" <grizzledgee...@comcast.net>
wrote:
> >> I'm concerned with the piano roll transfers he uses as examples.
> >> Is there another source for the Debussy?
> > That's what I was thinking -- though that Debussy take may illustrate
> > the point, this might be something of an excessively perforated,
> > cylindrical form of Debussy...
> Reproducing pianos do not reproduce every nuance of a performance. [...]
> But I find it had to believe
> they convert block chords into individual notes.
That's what "that Debussy take may illustrate the point" means, of
course (the point in this thread being the playing of the chords)...
The concerns expressed were about something else -- about judging
Debussy's playing by this excerpt. (Or at least that's what mine
were, though 'concern' might be too big a word.)
Interesting tape,
but two concepts being discussed.
One is starting one hand before
the other, in order to emphasize
both voices --used to be called
rubato, I believe. (Today, rubato
means something else.)
He, however, calls that rolled chords,
The earlier 20th-c examples he plays
include some older-style rubato,
but chords seem to be rolled
(arpeggiated) in unexpected
places too.
So a distinction is needed, but it
seems that both rubato and rolled
chords were used differently
in the past than they are today.
>>> I'm concerned with the piano roll transfers he uses as examples.
>>> Is there another source for the Debussy?
>> That's what I was thinking -- though that Debussy take may illustrate
>> the point, this might be something of an excessively perforated,
>> cylindrical form of Debussy...
> Reproducing pianos do not reproduce every nuance of a performance. [...]
> But I find it had to believe they convert block chords into individual > notes.
That's what "that Debussy take may illustrate the point" means, of
course (the point in this thread being the playing of the chords)...
The concerns expressed were about something else -- about judging
Debussy's playing by this excerpt. (Or at least that's what mine
were, though 'concern' might be too big a word.)
---------------------------------------------------------------
There have always been questions as to whether reproducing pianos accurately represent the pianists' performances. They could be edited, not just to correct wrong notes, but to create difficult fingerings or passages the pianists was incapable of.
> There have always been questions as to whether reproducing pianos
> accurately represent the pianists' performances. They could be edited,
> not just to correct wrong notes, but to create difficult fingerings or
> passages the pianists was incapable of.
Gershwin memorably overdubbed his roll(s) of Rhapsody in Blue. To my surprise, Alicia Zizzo managed to edit a version from the roll that can be played by two hands, seemingly without sacrificing anything.
> Interesting tape,
> but two concepts being discussed.
> One is starting one hand before
> the other, in order to emphasize
> both voices --used to be called
> rubato, I believe. (Today, rubato
> means something else.)
> He, however, calls that rolled chords,
> The earlier 20th-c examples he plays
> include some older-style rubato,
> but chords seem to be rolled
> (arpeggiated) in unexpected
> places too.
> So a distinction is needed, but it
> seems that both rubato and rolled
> chords were used differently
> in the past than they are today.
I like how Paderewski explicitly indicates this in his Menuet. "This is how -I- play stuff!" is the message behind the notation.
Piano roll or not, I still love his take on the Second Hungarian Rhapsody.
> William Sommerwerck wrote, On 11/19/12 12:24 PM:
>> There have always been questions as to whether reproducing pianos
>> accurately represent the pianists' performances. They could be edited,
>> not just to correct wrong notes, but to create difficult fingerings or
>> passages the pianists was incapable of.
> Gershwin memorably overdubbed his roll(s) of Rhapsody in Blue. To my > surprise, Alicia Zizzo managed to edit a version from the roll that can > be played by two hands, seemingly without sacrificing anything.
And since there's only one of her, there were no Czerny exercises added.
-- Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!!
Read about "Proty" here: http://home.earthlink.net/~oy/proty.html To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
Opinions expressed here are not necessarily those of my employers.
>> There have always been questions as to whether reproducing pianos
>> accurately represent the pianists' performances. They could be edited,
>> not just to correct wrong notes, but to create difficult fingerings or
>> passages the pianists was incapable of.
> Gershwin memorably overdubbed his roll(s) of Rhapsody in Blue. To my > surprise, Alicia Zizzo managed to edit a version from the roll that can be > played by two hands, seemingly without sacrificing anything.
The Gershwin performance is combination of the solo piano part with a transcription of the orchestral part. Columbia Masterworks produced a recording in which the orchestral part's holes were pasted over, leaving a decidedly brisk performance of the solo part. The orchestral part was performed by a small jazz orchestra.
It was originally a quad SQ LP, and was later released in stereo on CD.
