Music that is very fast

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

I had a very interesting discussion today with some musicians I'm currently working with about the subtleties of tempo in interpretation. There seems to be a certain point where fast music no longer sounds fast if the music includes many running notes. This composition of mine that they are playing has several sections where the character is determined by how the musicians phrase groups of very short notes (with syncopation) at a fast tempo in succession. What is certainly interesting, and this may come down to something a little more psychological, is that the slower they played these passages, the greater control they had over micro-phrasing and thus the faster the music seemed. Keeping the interpretation within reasonable tempo boundaries to keep within the character of the composition, it was fascinating to note that fast music interpreted on the slower side can sound faster than the same passage played at a faster tempo.

Now I completely understand why I perceive speedcore as boringly slow. Same with music like Chopin's prelude no. 5 and the last movement of his 2nd piano sonata. Are those lightning-speed interpretations of Chopin a complete misjudgement if the notes are impossible to distinguish from one another? Is 'speedcore' a misnomer? Is this the reason I find the opening of Higdon's Concerto for Orchestra drawn-out and uneventful rather than exciting and lively, as it probably was intended? What are your thoughts?

[amw]

There's also a psychological limit that's involved where it comes to speed; like, a lot of it is determined by our perception of the beat, which has a lot to do with our heart rate. So a tempo marking of quarter = 600 is practically meaningless because that's so far beyond our ability to perceive a beat that we'll just group them up into the nearest common denominator (eg fours, sixes or eights), perceiving the individual notes more as an aural "smear", and as a result it doesn't sound particularly fast. This is especially true of pieces in perpetual motion, and is a known compositional problem—Hindemith tried to tackle it in one of his solo viola sonatas with a movement at that approximate tempo of quarter = 600 by making sure to vary the lengths of all of the larger beat groupings—groups of notes, bars, phrases—to create that sense of edginess and speed and acceleration despite the individual notes being barely palpable.

With e.g. the finale of Chopin's 2nd sonata, slowing it down enough that the brain can perceive the half-note level as the beat (rather than the full bar) does make the individual notes audible and therefore lends more interest to the piece, as one is capable of perceiving the harmony and counterpoint. It also helps if pianists use less pedal than they typically do though! Chopin marked no pedal until the final chords; the tradition of playing the movement with heavy pedal throughout to imitate a howling wind dates to Liszt, I think.

[mc ukrneal]

Strange. The only thing that I can think of to explain it - when you go too fast, you lag on the beat. That is, you are at the back of the beat or even behind it if unison disappears. By slowing down, you are able to play forward on the beat (and in better unison), thus giving the impression that the music is moving forward. I suspect this is what you are hearing. Performers also have a tendency to speed up when they are playing slower, and so perhaps there IS some actual speeding up when you are playing slower (thus giving the impression that you are playing faster than you are).

[Karl Henning]

One of the keys is periodicity. If the rapid notes fall into regular patterns (of both rhythm and pitch) the ear doesn't take the rapid notes as a presto pulse, but as the flickering rhythmic surface of a broader pulse.

The story is that Dukas, perceiving that a scherzo in triple time is rhythmically exciting, decided that three groups of three would compound the intensity, making for more of a whirlwind. The piece he wrote in 9/8 with this in mind was L'apprenti sorcier which, because all the patterns are regular, galumphs along very comfortably. Great piece, of course, and deservedly a concert staple. But not the propulsive dynamo which the composer reckoned on.

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[ahinton]

With e.g. the finale of Chopin's 2nd sonata, slowing it down enough that the brain can perceive the half-note level as the beat (rather than the full bar) does make the individual notes audible and therefore lends more interest to the piece, as one is capable of perceiving the harmony and counterpoint. It also helps if pianists use less pedal than they typically do though! Chopin marked no pedal until the final chords; the tradition of playing the movement with heavy pedal throughout to imitate a howling wind dates to Liszt, I think.

I'm not sure of the date of or responsibility for the inception of such a tradition (insofar as it's ever become one), but Chopin was right about this; the tonal instability that he sought, as well as the impression of lightning velocity, would both have been compromised by pedalling through passages before those final chords even on the kinds of instrument that Chopin played, let alone on a modern Steinway D or Bösendorfer 290! Whilst there's no doubting the sinister nature of that finale following the marcia funebre movement, this "howling of wind over graves" stuff is, I think, misleading as to Chopin's intentions; as with Medtner's Sonata Op. 25 No, 2 commonly known as the Night Wind on account of the Tyutschev poem with which the composer heads its score, what's at work here is the "night wind of the mind and soul" rather than a physical "night wind" howling over anything.

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

There's also a psychological limit that's involved where it comes to speed; like, a lot of it is determined by our perception of the beat, which has a lot to do with our heart rate. So a tempo marking of quarter = 600 is practically meaningless because that's so far beyond our ability to perceive a beat that we'll just group them up into the nearest common denominator (eg fours, sixes or eights), perceiving the individual notes more as an aural "smear", and as a result it doesn't sound particularly fast. This is especially true of pieces in perpetual motion, and is a known compositional problem—Hindemith tried to tackle it in one of his solo viola sonatas with a movement at that approximate tempo of quarter = 600 by making sure to vary the lengths of all of the larger beat groupings—groups of notes, bars, phrases—to create that sense of edginess and speed and acceleration despite the individual notes being barely palpable.

With e.g. the finale of Chopin's 2nd sonata, slowing it down enough that the brain can perceive the half-note level as the beat (rather than the full bar) does make the individual notes audible and therefore lends more interest to the piece, as one is capable of perceiving the harmony and counterpoint. It also helps if pianists use less pedal than they typically do though! Chopin marked no pedal until the final chords; the tradition of playing the movement with heavy pedal throughout to imitate a howling wind dates to Liszt, I think.

This makes a lot of sense! Thanks so much for your response and especially the comments on Hindemith and Chopin. The former really is a great example of a composer's awareness of hearing excessively fast tempos as grouped into slower underlying patterns which he then goes on to actually break. With the Chopin, I think I've begun to realise that the 'aural smear' is the result of pedalling and perhaps it's not actually meant to sound as much like Ligeti's Continuum as it often does. With a greater amount of detail that can be heard, a greater feeling of excitement can be evoked through even more distinctive articulation and phrasing.

Continuum DOES show how extremely fast notes are perceived in an overall 'slowness' I suppose.

[amw]

Continuum is a pretty obvious example, yes—also a lot of minimal music in general, e.g. Music for 18 Musicians, which has a very fast subtactile pulse but unfolds in extremely slow and meditative sheets of music.

I don't know a lot of performances of Op. 35 that follow Chopin's pedal instructions—only Perahia and Badura-Skoda, but I don't know that many pianists who do it in general. Perahia does much more to articulate the structure of the music (he takes liberties with the pedal in a few places to do this though) and sounds faster, but he also is faster by about ten seconds. This is not a work I've heard a lot of recordings of, though.

[Mahlerian]

Now I completely understand why I perceive speedcore as boringly slow. Same with music like Chopin's prelude no. 5 and the last movement of his 2nd piano sonata. Are those lightning-speed interpretations of Chopin a complete misjudgement if the notes are impossible to distinguish from one another? Is 'speedcore' a misnomer? Is this the reason I find the opening of Higdon's Concerto for Orchestra drawn-out and uneventful rather than exciting and lively, as it probably was intended? What are your thoughts?

I agree with what everyone here has said so far, but harmonic rhythm also plays a role.  The beginning of Schoenberg's Op. 11-3 feels rapid because the cascade of notes is tumbling out vehemently and the harmony moves at the pace of a half beat.  The actual pace may be around eighth note/quaver = 87, but it feels like twice that and more because of the speed with which the harmonic gamut is traversed.

https://youtu.be/VeTFxbsVGrI?t=668

Bruckner's music, on the other hand, has a tendency to feel slow, even when the actual tempo is rather quick, for the same reason.  The harmonic rhythm in Bruckner always moves at a leisurely pace, making even a quarter note/crotchet = 105 tempo seem stately, rather than the moderately fast of the composer's marking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95r6c9Cv16Y

As for the Higdon Concerto for Orchestra, I think the reason is simpler.  The absolute emptiness of the music makes it sound entirely uneventful, despite the number of sounds coming at you.

[aesthetic]

It seems to me that the final minute or so of the rondo-burleske from Mahler 9 is one of the more rapid passages that belongs to the 'standard concert rep'. And of course the enormous orchestral detail makes it even more impressive.

[Contemporaryclassical]

This a fascinating thing that I find throughout a lot of music history, from fast Bach fugues, to the 50s avant-garde and minimalism.

I believe there is a mathematical theory which describes this, which is also relevant to other ideas to. More is less and less is more, when concerning polyphonic duration and tempo in particular

[Andante]

I had a piece marked "Forte" that was fast enough for me.

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

I had a piece marked "Forte" that was fast enough for me.

What do you mean by this?

[Andante]

What do you mean by this?

I was jesting jessop

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

I was jesting jessop

It is an interesting joke....................It is interesting that you bring up the question of dynamics and speed, however, as it is often the case that young musicians can sometimes fall into the trap of speeding up as they grow louder to a forte.

Maybe the intensity of sound, the loudness and the number of different sounds we can hear in a space of time have a close relationship with one another in terms of excitement evoked in the performance of music.

[Andante]

It is an interesting joke....................It is interesting that you bring up the question of dynamics and speed, however, as it is often the case that young musicians can sometimes fall into the trap of speeding up as they grow louder to a forte.

Maybe the intensity of sound, the loudness and the number of different sounds we can hear in a space of time have a close relationship with one another in terms of excitement evoked in the performance of music.

It is an old joke used between musicians that own fast cars.    = 40mph 

Just thought 'Bolero' is a good example of a piece that seems to get faster but is only a crescendo.

[aleazk]

One reason I don't like the super fast harpsichord solo in Bach's fifth Brandenburg Concerto is that, in some places, the harmony moves very slowly and at an uninteresting pace.

[Monsieur Croche]

Check some recordings of anything conducted by Sergio Celibidache, who was 'famous' for slower tempi. Most often, if not always, with the superb musicianship of his directed phrasing and articulation, those recorded works seem faster than many another recording at an actually faster tempo... ergo, a lot is psychological; works performed like those recordings of Celibedache seem faster because the cumulative effect of all those events so well phrased and articulated make for a feeling of greater momentum, which translates into speed.

The Gary Graffman, Cleveland Orchestra w George Szell recording of Prokofiev's 3rd piano concerto is like this, slower than many another recording, yet with a much greater feeling of forward momentum.

https://www.youtube.com/v/rSrlrcpNu7o

There is also a fullness of tone that can lend 'weight' to what one hears, and then weight at speed, gives the same impression of a greater momentum, fast/faster than light and fast can do.

As an aside, your comment on students, beginners parlaying dynamics into tempi, i.e. soft = slower / loud = faster, is endemic in beginners and many a self-taught amateur.  It is their 'handle' on expressive, lol.
Both composers and performers who are seriously familiar with a work will often play things too fast, forgetting that they do so because they so well know the score, where the audience will feel it is rushed.  Actors performing plays, night after night and week after week, will also -- unaware of doing so --  speed it up because of that same familiarity.  The 'speed trap' of the very well rehearsed and many a virtuoso.


Best regards.

[Karl Henning]

Learn to take your time.