Pedal through rests

[amanfang]

When is it ok to "pedal through" rests?  I am disagreeing with my teacher about this at the moment.  Personally I think it should depend on the character of the passage and how one wants to work with it.  One particular passage would be the Mendelssohn Variations in d minor, Variation 7.  On the arpeggios - I prefer to hold the chord for the arpeggio (not to the point where everything becomes mushy), but my teacher thinks it should be only the arpeggio sonority and the preceding chord (with the bass).  Does this make sense?  There are other passages in this piece, and I'm not completely consistent between variations with how I treat rests.  There are others in some Beethoven that I'm playing.

[pianolist]

The use of the sustaining pedal has changed very much over time, and from the late nineteenth century onwards there are enough recordings (both piano roll and 78) around to be able to hear the variations. When it was first introduced, it must have been a real novelty to be able to sustain notes in this way, and I think initially it was used as a coloration device, rather like an organ stop, and without too much concern for the blurring of harmonies.

You can hear the remnants of this style in the playing of some older French pianists at the start of the twentieth century, and of course Debussy based part of his music on the clouding of harmonies. I'll post a recording of him playing his "Soirée dans Grenade" to the Editing of Piano Rolls thread, which I keep updating, and which is split between the Performance and Audition Room threads, for explanatory text and mp3 files respectively.

There is a recording of Karl Reinecke, whom Mendelssohn helped in his career, at:

http://www.pianola.org/reproducing/reproducing_welte.cfm

You'll need to scroll down the page a little, which is still work in progress, as I get time. It's not Mendelssohn's music, alas, but a Beethoven Ecossaise. Reinecke is the earliest born pianist ever to have made piano roll recordings, and he was born when Beethoven was still just alive, so his style of playing is one of the very earliest that we can hear clearly. He would have acquired it at the time Mendelssohn was active. When he recorded, he was over 80, and so a little shaky, but the essentials are still there.

Your piano teacher may tell you that piano rolls are unreliable, but this is only because there were many poor recordings of them in the past, so that they acquired a dreadful reputation. If you need ammunition, get your teacher to listen to some of the other recordings in the Editing of Piano Rolls thread. The De Falla Montanesa was recorded for Welte-Mignon, the same system that the Reinecke roll comes from, and is clearly a good example, also with wonderfully atmospheric pedalling.

I know this hasn't answered the detail of your question, but I hope it will give you some food for thought.

[counterpoint]

  One particular passage would be the Mendelssohn Variations in d minor, Variation 7.  On the arpeggios - I prefer to hold the chord for the arpeggio (not to the point where everything becomes mushy), but my teacher thinks it should be only the arpeggio sonority and the preceding chord (with the bass). 

In this special case, I would play all 8th chords staccato and make a minimal break (no pedal!) between the chord (on beat 1) and the arpeggio. Pedal only while playing the arpeggio.

[amanfang]

That is what my teacher likes.  I have several recordings and have heard it both ways.  It just seems so dry to me that way.