Bach on the piano

Started by mn dave, November 13, 2008, 06:12:24 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Jo498

It is still a moderately common name in German speaking countries as well, e.g. IOC functionary Thomas Bach.
Tout le malheur des hommes vient d'une seule chose, qui est de ne savoir pas demeurer en repos, dans une chambre.
- Blaise Pascal

Dry Brett Kavanaugh

Enjoying the distinctive interpretations and unique world.

milk

From Daniel Barenboim's Wikipedia pared:

In his recording of The Well-Tempered Clavier, Barenboim makes frequent use of the right-foot sustaining pedal, a device absent from the keyboard instruments of Bach's time (although the harpsichord was highly resonant), producing a sonority very different from the "dry" and often staccato sound favoured by Glenn Gould. Moreover, in the fugues, he often plays one voice considerably louder than the others, a practice impossible on a harpsichord. According to some scholarship, this practice began in Beethoven's time (see, for example, Matthew Dirst's book Engaging Bach). When justifying his interpretation of Bach, Barenboim claims that he is interested in the long tradition of playing Bach that has existed for two and a half centuries, rather than in the exact style of performance in Bach's time:

QuoteThe study of old instruments and historic performance practice has taught us a great deal, but the main point, the impact of harmony, has been ignored. This is proved by the fact that tempo is described as an independent phenomenon. It is claimed that one of Bach's gavottes must be played fast and another one slowly. But tempo is not independent! ... I think that concerning oneself purely with historic performance practice and the attempt to reproduce the sound of older styles of music-making is limiting and no indication of progress. Mendelssohn and Schumann tried to introduce Bach into their own period, as did Liszt with his transcriptions and Busoni with his arrangements. In America Leopold Stokowski also tried to do it with his arrangements for orchestra. This was always the result of "progressive" efforts to bring Bach closer to the particular period. I have no philosophical problem with someone playing Bach and making it sound like Boulez. My problem is more with someone who tries to imitate the sound of that time ...[42]
First of all, it sounds to me like Wikipedia is not exactly correct here. As far as I understand, two manual harpsichords are capable of producing dynamics - though not anything like a piano. No?
Anyway, Barenboim's isn't bad but I just think he's terribly misguided. I've been listening to his performances a bit. Like most pianists, he leans on dynamic variance a little too much. As far as his thinking, it seems illogical.

Mandryka

#923
Quote from: milk on October 10, 2020, 10:00:34 PM
From Daniel Barenboim's Wikipedia pared:

In his recording of The Well-Tempered Clavier, Barenboim makes frequent use of the right-foot sustaining pedal, a device absent from the keyboard instruments of Bach's time (although the harpsichord was highly resonant), producing a sonority very different from the "dry" and often staccato sound favoured by Glenn Gould. Moreover, in the fugues, he often plays one voice considerably louder than the others, a practice impossible on a harpsichord. According to some scholarship, this practice began in Beethoven's time (see, for example, Matthew Dirst's book Engaging Bach). When justifying his interpretation of Bach, Barenboim claims that he is interested in the long tradition of playing Bach that has existed for two and a half centuries, rather than in the exact style of performance in Bach's time:
First of all, it sounds to me like Wikipedia is not exactly correct here. As far as I understand, two manual harpsichords are capable of producing dynamics - though not anything like a piano. No?
Anyway, Barenboim's isn't bad but I just think he's terribly misguided. I've been listening to his performances a bit. Like most pianists, he leans on dynamic variance a little too much. As far as his thinking, it seems illogical.

Only in that you can couple the keyboards, so terraced dynamics with just a couple of volume possibilities. What it can't do is accentuate a note or a phrase by volume change - though as you know the illusion can be created.

Barenboim's comments made me laugh because when he talks about bringing c18 up to date, what he means is making it sound more like fucking Beethoven! On a fucking Steinway!  That's c19 music played in the most bourgeois conservative c20 way, and we're in the c21, and we're all anti conservative and we want to épater la bourgeoisie.


What I would like is someone who brought it up to date in the sense of making it sound like Brice Pauset or Enno Poppe
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

milk

Quote from: Mandryka on October 10, 2020, 10:13:58 PM
Only in that you can couple the keyboards, so terraced dynamics with just a couple of volume possibilities. What it can't do is accentuate a note or a phrase by volume change - though as you know the illusion can be created.

Barenboim's comments made me laugh because when he talks about bringing c18 up to date, what he means is making it sound more like fucking Beethoven! On a fucking Steinway!  That's c19 music played though the most bourgeois conservative c20 way, and we're in the c21, and we're all anti conservative and we want to épater la bourgeoisie.


What I would like is someone who brought it up to date in the sense of making it sound like Brice Pauset or Enno Poppe
with the ego a guy like him has, he probably can't imagine one could seriously be bored by his Bach. I'm on the lookout for pianists out of that paradigm. I think Lepauw is one who's a bit different, though I don't always like what he does. 

Mandryka

See what you make of this curiosity. IMO it is an unspeakable self indulgent monstrosity.

https://www.youtube.com/v/YH4C2uIBDSg&ab_channel=dafeneo

Much in the same vein I noticed that there's on old recording of The Goldberg Variations Francesco Tristano Schlimé  -- another anachonist.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

premont

Quote from: Mandryka on October 24, 2020, 01:34:49 AM
See what you make of this curiosity. IMO it is an unspeakable self indulgent monstrosity.

https://www.youtube.com/v/YH4C2uIBDSg&ab_channel=dafeneo

Much in the same vein I noticed that there's on old recording of The Goldberg Variations Francesco Tristano Schlimé  -- another anachonist.

Playing Bach on the piano is anachronistic in principle.

But what is the point of playing Bach on the piano if you don't make use of the "superiority" of the piano?
γνῶθι σεαυτόν

Florestan

Quote from: Mandryka on October 24, 2020, 01:34:49 AM
See what you make of this curiosity. IMO it is an unspeakable self indulgent monstrosity.

https://www.youtube.com/v/YH4C2uIBDSg&ab_channel=dafeneo

Much in the same vein I noticed that there's on old recording of The Goldberg Variations Francesco Tristano Schlimé  -- another anachonist.

Quote from: (: premont :) on October 24, 2020, 03:18:27 AM
Playing Bach on the piano is anachronistic in principle.

But what is the point of playing Bach on the piano if you don't make use of the "superiority" of the piano?

What I see and hear is a seasoned musician playing his own version of a piece of music and I'm sure that if need be he can defend his interpretive choices alright. You are just as entitled to take it or leave it as he is entitled to play it that way.

an unspeakable self indulgent monstrosity ? With all due respect this is bull.


Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Mandryka

Quote from: Florestan on October 24, 2020, 07:57:16 AM
What I see and hear is a seasoned musician playing his own version of a piece of music and I'm sure that if need be he can defend his interpretive choices alright. You are just as entitled to take it or leave it as he is entitled to play it that way.

an unspeakable self indulgent monstrosity ? With all due respect this is bull.

Well we can at least agree that it's self indulgent, surely.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

Florestan

Quote from: Mandryka on October 24, 2020, 08:14:47 AM
Well we can at least agree that it's self indulgent, surely.

Self indulgent is a meaningless term. Surely eveybody does everything the way they see fit. You do it, I do it.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Dry Brett Kavanaugh

As always, there is an artistic/philosophical gap between the authenticist camp and pluralist camp. Autheticists tend to view that there is only one true interpretation of a work. Artistic effort should be an effort to achieve, or get closer to, this true interpretation. Many, if not all, of them think that the composer's intention with intended instrument is the best/true interpretation. The pluralists tend to see that there can be several interpretations that would expand and diversify the aesthetics of works. Some, if not all, of them are relativists who think that the effectiveness of interpretations are contingent upon the listeners' preferences.

Mandryka

#931
Quote from: Florestan on October 24, 2020, 09:15:26 AM
Self indulgent is a meaningless term. Surely eveybody does everything the way they see fit. You do it, I do it.

The self indulgent person doesn't do things the way he sees fit, that's the point. He's driven by pleasure, like a child. The self indulgent person does not judge which course of action is the most fitting and then act on it. Instead he is subject to the beck and call of his appetites. Self indulgence is a weakness, a sort of weakness of the will, akrasia.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

Florestan

Quote from: Mandryka on October 24, 2020, 09:34:42 AM
The self indulgent person doesn't do things the way he sees fit, that's the point. He's driven by pleasure, like a child. The self indulgent person does not judge which course of action is the most fitting and then act on it. Instead he is subject to the beck and call of his appetites. Self indulgence is a weakness, a sort of weakness of the will, akrasia.

Are you absolutely sure that all of the above apply to Emil Naoumoff?
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Florestan

Quote from: Dry Brett Kavanaugh on October 24, 2020, 09:34:00 AM
As always, there is an artistic/philosophical gap between the authenticist camp and pluralist camp. Autheticists tend to view that there is only one true interpretation of a work. Artistic effort should be an effort to achieve, or get closer to, this true interpretation. Many, if not all, of them think that the composer's intention with intended instrument is the best/true interpretation. The pluralists tend to see that there can be several interpretations that would expand and diversify the aesthetics of works. Some, if not all, of them are relativists who think that the effectiveness of interpretations are contingent upon the listeners' preferences.

Well said, Count me firmly in the pluralist-cum-relativist camp.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

premont

#934
Quote from: Dry Brett Kavanaugh on October 24, 2020, 09:34:00 AM
As always, there is an artistic/philosophical gap between the authenticist camp and pluralist camp. Autheticists tend to view that there is only one true interpretation of a work. Artistic effort should be an effort to achieve, or get closer to, this true interpretation. Many, if not all, of them think that the composer's intention with intended instrument is the best/true interpretation.

This is completely misunderstood. What you call authenticists do not think that there is one and only one true way to interprete a given work. What they state is that there are some ways of interpretation which in relation to a given work are inauthentic e.g. anachronistic instruments. Even a piece like the f-minor p&f from book II may be interpreted in many different ways, also when period instruments are used, and it was without doubt also interpreted in different ways by different performers already at Bach's time.
γνῶθι σεαυτόν

Florestan

Quote from: (: premont :) on October 24, 2020, 11:54:39 AM
This is completely misunderstood. What you call authenticists do not think that there is one and only one true way to interprete a given work. What they think is that there are some ways of interpretation which in relation to a given work should be avoided

Should has no place in art except in the sense that art(ists) should be free.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

premont

Quote from: Florestan on October 24, 2020, 12:02:48 PM
Should has no place in art except in the sense that art(ists) should be free.

Edited, but the meaning remains the same.
γνῶθι σεαυτόν

Florestan

Quote from: (: premont :) on October 24, 2020, 12:06:37 PM
Edited, but the meaning remains the same.

So remains my reply.: Should has no place in art except in the sense that art(ists) should be free.



Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

Mandryka

The artist should be free, the performer should be truthful to the music he's playing.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen

Florestan

Quote from: Mandryka on October 24, 2020, 01:00:53 PM
The artist should be free, the performer should be truthful to the music he's playing.

Is a performer not an artist?
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini