Spectralism

[Luke]

Just because it's interesting, here is a unique example of a Romantic composer treating the piano not only in a percussive way but exploiting the harmonic series in a way the spectralists would certainly regard as related to their own methods. This is the end of Paganini, from Schumann's Carnaval, in which the pianist pounds very heavily and percussively on four ugly, low chords before allowing the harmonics they have set in motion on the upper strings to float clear of the cloud they have created. (Carnaval's full of weird, amazing things!)

[Karl Henning]

Murail's claim that they used piano as a percussion instrument is extremely outlandish.

Tendentious, surely, but perhaps short of outlandish.

[Florestan]

Tendentious

This might be a better term, indeed.

Heck, one can find instances of percussive piano / keyboard even in Bach or Mozart. 

A programmatic and consistent use of the piano as a percussive instrument is not to be found until the 20th century, though.

[Franco_Manitobain]

This is not Romantic music either.

Our definition differs here, I gather.

How is that not Romantic music? I would consider late Beethoven Romantic era music, or anything from Eroica and onwards.

[Karl Henning]

Heck, one can find instances of percussive piano / keyboard even in Bach or Mozart.

I was thinking this, as well. The Toccata is almost by definition, percussive.

[Luke]

A programmatic and consistent use of the piano as a percussive instrument is not to be found until the 20th century, though.

Well, they're rare as hen's teeth. But there is Alkan's Etude alla barbaro which is brutally percussive and texturally very '20th century' throughout. (The title of this and even more of Alkan's Allegro Barbaro, a different work, is obviously connected to Bartok)

[Florestan]

Our definition differs here, I gather.

How is that not Romantic music? I would consider late Beethoven Romantic era music, or anything from Eroica and onwards.

Well, there is a difference between Romantic music and music composed during the Romantic Era. In my book, the Grosse Fuge is anything but Romantic. Let me put it differently: do you really believe that, had it been genuinely Romantic music, Stravinsky would have still praised it to skies? 

[Florestan]

Well, they're rare as hen's teeth. But there is Alkan's Etude alla barbaro which is brutally percussive and texturally very '20th century' throughout. (The title of this and even more of Alkan's Allegro Barbaro, a different work, is obviously connected to Bartok)

Good call, but as you say, it's an exception. The Romantic rule was the piano as a cantabile, even singing, instrument.

[Karl Henning]

do you really believe that, had it been genuinely Romantic music, Stravinsky would have still praised it to skies?

Why not? He was intensely fond of Tchaikovsky, you know.

[DavidW]

How is that not Romantic music? I would consider late Beethoven Romantic era music, or anything from Eroica and onwards.

Harmonically and structurally classical.  Beethoven is not Schumann.

[Spotted Horses]

I don't know what it means not to use a percussion instrument as a percussion instrument.

[Florestan]

I don't know what it means not to use a percussion instrument as a percussion instrument.

Ask Chopin, Thalberg and Schumann, for starters. 

[Spotted Horses]

Ask Chopin, Thalberg and Schumann, for starters. 

That's strikes me as a strange assertion. If you are speaking figuratively, many of Chopin's most widely known pieces emphasize the percussive sound of the piano, such as the Polonaise in A-flat (Heroic). Taken literally, you seem to be asserting that Chopin eschewed the keyboard and would crawl over the top of the piano and pluck the strings like a harp. 

[Mandryka]

Well obviously when you play Chopin the wires are being hit. But I think the idea is that in a lot of Chopin, it kind of works best when you try to make the piano imitate the voice of an opera singer doing a 19th century aria. That means that you have long and fluid phrases, liaisons are legato-ish mostly, and you very often don't do things like relish the resonances which the piano can make.

@Spotted Horses

[Mandryka]

I beg your pardon, Mr. Murail? Which Romantic composer ever treated the piano as a percussion instrument? Go ahead, name one.

I think you're being a bit unfair to Murail actually. His second paragraph makes it clear what he means

Au lieu de considérer le piano comme un simple instrument de percussion (des marteaux frappant des cordes). Territoire de l'oubli met l'accent sur son aspect le plus spécifique : celui d'un ensemble de cordes mises en vibration par résonance sympathique ou par action directe des marteaux.

That's something you don't get in romantic music. Have a listen to Territoires d'oubli.

[Luke]

I think you're being a bit unfair to Murail actually. His second paragraph makes it clear what he means

Au lieu de considérer le piano comme un simple instrument de percussion (des marteaux frappant des cordes). Territoire de l'oubli met l'accent sur son aspect le plus spécifique : celui d'un ensemble de cordes mises en vibration par résonance sympathique ou par action directe des marteaux.

That's something you don't get in romantic music. Have a listen to Territoires d'oubli.

Oddly, it is something you do get in Romantic music in the very specific example of pianistic Bel Canto composition/playing. See Charles Rosen's analysis of the effect of the subtly-calculated pedal in projecting the melodic line by aligning it with the harmonic resonances of the bass/harmony/accompaniment in Chopin's Nocturnes (he uses op 9/2 as his example).

Also see that Schumann example I posted earlier, which is a much more extreme example and closer to what Murail means. But those Romantic pianist-composers were very alive to the harmonics and overtones vibrating magically inside that wooden box.

[Florestan]

That's strikes me as a strange assertion. If you are speaking figuratively, many of Chopin's most widely known pieces emphasize the percussive sound of the piano, such as the Polonaise in A-flat (Heroic). Taken literally, you seem to be asserting that Chopin eschewed the keyboard and would crawl over the top of the piano and pluck the strings like a harp. 

I might have misunderstood you. If you mean that Chopin could not play the piano other than by hitting the keys and causing the strings to be hit in turn, then you are right. But if you mean that Chopin (and many more others) could not have used this percussive mechanics to make the piano sing, then you are wrong. I suspect it's the former that you meant, though.