Modern Piano or Harpsichord? :-)

[North Star]

Also worth considering:  the harpsichord has never been mass produced in the way that the piano has come to be, so the instrument makers have made any variety of instruments . . . at least one of my buddy Paul's instruments is quite easy for two chaps to carry about.  So that four harpsichords on stage plus a modest compliment of strings players will not necessarily require an enormous stage.

Yes, a lot less metal in those harpsichords.

[Karl Henning]

Yes, a lot less metal in those harpsichords.

I know my back is grateful!

[North Star]

I know my back is grateful!

You don't lift a grand piano with your back, though.

[Florestan]

You don't lift a grand piano with your back, though.

[James]

I don't care for the piece in question, so it doesn't matter either way.

[North Star]

I don't care for the piece in question, so it doesn't matter either way.

Thanks for your contribution.

[kishnevi]

It is good to remember that for any composer of any era, choice of instrumentation is about availability, and is not always about some heartfelt preference or hard line aesthetic choice.

The reason Bach wrote these concerti for harpsichord is because it was the loudest available plinkety-plonk keyboard instrument of his day;  he infinitely preferred the clavichord, with its capacity to play dynamics.  The Clavichord, at its fullest, can barely be heard across a small and very quiet room.  It was not, then, out of love for the sound of the harpsichord that Bach wrote these concert works for it, but rather he had no choice of another instrument if the instrument was to be heard at all in a room.  If the old Thuringian had had pick-up bars and amplification, the harpsichord concerti may well have all ended up clavichord concerti, and along with that possibility, perhaps more of a dialogue of different musical material and other instruments, (not just strings) would have been part of their fabric. 

All the Bach harpsichord concerti have string ensemble accompaniments which are wholly obbligato / continuo-like, i.e. they are nothing but doubled support for the harmony of the keyboard part(s) without any additional or 'other' musical material (ergo "no dialogue" as later became usual and expected of the form).  With these Bach concerti, the strings are present to act only as a sustain cushion to counter the fast-decay sound production of the harpsichord (canny, that J.S.); likewise, longer-held trills on the instrument are not an ornament; they are a practical solution to sustain longer duration notes which would not sound enough after being played.  [While most of the concerti were written with the string parts appearing at the same time as the keyboard parts, it is known of the two harpsichord Concerto in C Major that Bach wrote the obbligato string parts later.]

Performances of these on contemporary pianos could, more than a little in theory, be done without the obbligato strings and suffer no loss of musical material; this is especially true when the concerto is for multiple keyboards, though we are so used to the combined texture, it may seem a bit odd.

They are all categorically still chamber music, dependent upon being played in smaller rooms, not vast halls, where they are performed (live, anyway) then being much of a consideration when it comes to the balance of number of strings w the solo keyboard(s) and the size of the room in which they are performed.  Recordings of these render all matters of hall size / audibility moot, of course.

To support your argument, pull out the set of Bach concertos performed by Moroney and others: it has performances of the four keyboard concerto done both with and without the strings.

The three and four keyboard concertos have been recorded with chamber organs as the solo instrument, by Vernet with Alain and others (on Ligia, may well be OOP).

[Karl Henning]

You don't lift a grand piano with your back, though.

I have never been guilty of that degree of folly

[Karl Henning]

Thanks for your contribution.

I know I was hanging on the question of whether James cared.

[eljr]

I see no option for "it depends on my mood that day." 

[Karl Henning]

I see no option for "it depends on my mood that day." 

You're already fitting right in! 

[jochanaan]

If harpsichords are used, it is essential to use period strings, and no more than were usually present in Baroque times.  It is absurd to expect period harpsichords to project over sixty-plus modern strings! For that matter, four modern pianos would find it hard to project above, say, the complete Berlin Philharmonic strings...

[Ghost Sonata]

I have never been guilty of that degree of folly

I have a friend who did, and survived, and who now carries the weight of that deed's reputation (inspired by the love of a woman, a modern dance teacher whose piano was the instrument in question).  It didn't work out, but her beautiful daughter now looks on him with awe...

[Madiel]

To be honest I've never done a direct comparison for this work - I only have it on harpsichords.

But I've become convinced by some other experiences that harpsichord is the way to go in orchestral music as a general principle. The balance and timbre makes a lot more sense when instruments are used that more closely resemble what the composer envisaged.

For solo keyboard music, by contrast, I still much prefer a modern piano.

[JRJoseph]

The jangling of four harpsichords after five minutes drives me nuts.  I had a friend who would yell. shout and curse if he heard one harpsichord.  Again. I say it takes all kinds.

[Karl Henning]

The jangling of four harpsichords after five minutes drives me nuts.

Good to know! 

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

[Scion7]

The jangling of four harpsichords after five minutes drives me nuts.

A Clockwork Orange, part deux ... . . . .