Ridiculously Virtuoso Piano Works

[snyprrr]

No, no...just one of the many Hamelin clips on YouTube.  Great, isn't it! 

--Bruce

So far, that takes the cake (walk), haha! Absolutely beyond belief. I haaave to see that 'live'.

[snyprrr]

You might like .

Haven't heard Hamelin, but he ought to do a decent enough job...especially if he's loosened up first with a few drinks!

The Amazon reviews say he beats the competition. I think I heard the Oppens years ago (or was it Night Fantasies?,... or both?). I know I've had a problem with Night Fantasies (Aimard gets great reviews, though)), so, I don't know if I'm confusing the two pieces. I think the library has it, I'll check.

[greg]

That's really just a piano??

Piano player, supposedly.

[stevenski]

Try Michael Ponti playing Tausig's ridiculously difficult but sparkling Paraphrase on themes from Moniuszko Halka, as played on "operatic Piano"(VoxBox). Ok. there are a few wrong notes and Ponti strains at times, but some passages are sheer magic and technical extravagance; the last 2 minutes are particuarly startling with an "offkey" Polish theme, played very high; snowstorms of notes indeed. This is Ponti at his zaniest-an acquired taste but spectacular if u like this kind of display(am not pretending its Beethoven:)). Anyone else know this piece/version?


Steve

[abidoful]

Liszt pianoworks from 1830s are overtly virtuosic, like GRANDES ETUDES. And what about Thalberg piano works? I dont know them...
Chopin: CONCERT ALLEGRO op.46

[prémont]

BACH

Ridiculously??

Piano works??

[Dax]

GODOWSKY    all those Chopin Études transcribed for left hand solo...
                 Douglas Madge conveys too well their difficulty.

Steer well clear of these Madge performances - they're DIRE. This is actually the area in which Hamelin excels, although I'm less than impressed with various more recent recordings of his which should be better, given his undoubted pianistic abilities (Medtner and Scriabin sonatas, for instance).

[snyprrr]

Frankly, I have yet to hear the Finnissy piece that imaginarily inspired this Thread. Everything I've heard so far has a certain subdued quality to it, not spectatculaly over the top.

[False_Dmitry]

Frankly, I have yet to hear the Finnissy piece that imaginarily inspired this Thread.

There's a free'n'legal-to-download mp3 of Finnisy's Verdi paraphrase on Jonathan Powell's website cited above.  Although it's an extraordinary pianistic achievement in its own way, I ought to confess that having once turned Powell's pages for him in a recital, the most superhuman effort I've heard from him is Sorabji's Concert Paraphrase of The Closing Scene of Richard Strauss's Salome  It begins on three staves, moves to four about half-way through, and finishes on five     In the same concert Powell performed Rodion Schedrin's own piano-voice transcription of "Grusha the Gypsy" (with Ksenia Vyaznikova, mezzo) from his opera THE ENCHANTED WANDERER.  This left the Steinway looking as though it had been shot down by anti-aircraft fire.

[Marc]

It's not easy to be a piano virtuoso, but luckilly one can rebuild the instrument .....

http://www.youtube.com/v/MExljPsMEbA

[abidoful]

It's not easy to be a piano virtuoso, but luckilly one can rebuild the instrument .....

http://www.youtube.com/v/MExljPsMEbA

Isn't that from LOVE HAPPY?? hahaa, funny movie- there's also young Marilyn Monroe in it 

[Saul]

Rach etudes
Liszt Etudes
Beethoven Sonatas

[Timmyb]

Ornstein's pretty "out there"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNsn7NjDPkM

[Philoctetes]

Richard Barrett's Tracts

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sdt32IwwHiU

[not edward]

Richard Barrett's Tracts

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sdt32IwwHiU

One of the interesting things about this work is that it seems to stand more in the Alkan tradition of 'works that are harder to play than they sound' than the Lisztian 'works that sound harder to play than they are'. Barrett might well prefer the Alkan comparison anyway, given his appealingly eclectic tastes. (I recall reading him once saying the biggest compliment he'd ever been paid was "this piece reminds me of Trout Mask Replica.")

[pjme]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L6YpYKPcEBQ

Xenakis' Synaphai

[Saul]

Try playing anything on this...even a Liszt concerto would be a walk in the park on a real sized piano compared to this...

http://www.youtube.com/v/0XgIZSuZM7c

[greg]

What in the world is Sega doing spending their time making the smallest grand piano in the world? I guess ever since they stopped making consoles, they're kinda taking it a little bit easy and doing what they want. 

[pjme]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJ9eN0cvMZA

Berio: "Rounds" ?

[greg]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJ9eN0cvMZA

Berio: "Rounds" ?

Somewhat complex, but not ridiculously complex, I don't think. Take a look at the score- it does look somewhat fearsome, but far from being one of the hardest things out there to play.
(though i haven't tried playing it, that's just my impression looking at the score)