Greatest quicklearner?

[sevencircles]

Who is the greatest quicklearner in the world of piano as far as you know?

Learning by ear or from the page.

[thalbergmad]

I am sure i read somewhere that John Ogdon learned one of the Brahms Concertos in 1 day and played it perfectly without the score.

Not certain on this. Hinty will know.

Thal

[schubertiad]

The anecdote I read about Ogdon doing the Brahms was that a soloist due to play it was ill, and the conductor asked Ogdon to stand in. Ogdon agreed, but asked for a page turner. It was only afterwards that he told the conductor he'd never played it before, and had just sightread Brahms I. He also learnt the 3 bartok concerti from memory in 3 consecutive days. I guess he'd have to be in the running for greatest quick learner.

[chopianist123]

Leslie Howard

"He is one of the few artists in the world today who can improvise publicly on an unseen theme, and he has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the repertoire. He can make an instant transcription of any symphony or opera, whilst continuing conversation from the piano.

Howard has perfect pitch, and a photographic memory. He can memorise many pages of manuscript music from a single read-through, and can play back a piano piece note-for-note after hearing it just once."

From Wikipedia

[etudes]

Robert Levin 
John Ogdon
Richter
Gieseking
Volodos
Rachmaninov.

[nicco]

I read Rachmaninov learnt Scriabin etude Op.42 No.5, and thought it was pretty hard since he had to spend 1 hour on it.

 

[sevencircles]

Ian Pace seems to be one hell of a quicklearner if you look at his repertoire list.

He is rumoured to be one of the best sightreaders in the world too

[leonidas]

The 3 'R's - Read Repeat Recall.

The ability to memorise a piece swiftly is all about the person's capacity for recalling.

The most advanced people can recall vast amounts of information upon just one exposure.

We can actually all do this to a degree, but we must train our brains to be able to recall larger chunks of musical/pianistic information.

Anyway, it's impossible to say who is the best at this, and while it is an impressive facility which allows a pianist to have a large repertoire, most people care more about how the music is actually played.

[thalberg]

I heard Rachmaninoff learned and memorized the Brahms Handel Variations in two days.

Martha Argerich never learned the repertoire for a round of a competition until she found out if she made the next round or not. 

Jorge Bolet said he could learn a particular Liszt piece in 6 hours.  His companion said it was impossible.  90 minues later Bolet played it from memory up to tempo for him.

I wish I were like this......but then again I wish a lot of things.

[sevencircles]

I heard Rachmaninoff learned and memorized the Brahms Handel Variations in two days.

Surprises me actually

Rachmaninoff sometimes said that he wanted to compose and conduct more but he didn´t have the time since he had to practice at the piano.

[richard black]

There are loads of stories about quick learners. Busoni apparently once met a former pupil on a train from London to Brighton (even in those days barely over an hour's journey). The pupil showed Busoni his latest composition, which Busoni handed back before the train arrived. At the concert that evening, the pupil was rather surprised to hear his piece played as an encore.

I've heard the story about John Ogdon and the Brahms concerto but can't remember the details. However, here's one I witnessed: at the recording of Sorabji's 'Opus Clavicembalisticum', after John had played one particular passage, Alistair H pointed out that the score was incorrect (it's full of misprints, not surprisingly) and in fact, of the three staves on one system, one was in the wrong clef. This of course meant reconfiguring the passage completely, which many people would agree is worse than sightreading. John nailed it first time. I also suspect that John sight-read Grainger's transcription of the Tchaikovsky 'Flower Waltz' in a concert in London. The piece includes a misprint so obvious that on the first play-through any pianist would stop, pencil in the obvious correction, and never play the misprint again. John played the misprint.... Ronald Stevenson once gave John a newly-composed piece to read and was turning pages as John did it. John was nodding for page-turns a whole system before the end of the page, and when RS took this on trust he found John had indeed memorised several bars ahead.

A friend told me a story about the pianist Ronan Magill. My friend had asked RM if he knew any piano music by Woldemar Bargiel (no, I hadn't heard of him either). Magill replied that he didn't, but said he had turned the pages for a performance of the Bargiel violin sonata about 20 years before. He then played a few minutes of it on a handy piano, incorporating the violin part.

As an opera repetiteur, I earn my living (partly) sight-reading and I'm fairly handy at it. Some of my colleagues are pretty impressive. JP Gandy allegedly once sight-read the orchestral part of Prokofiev's 2nd concerto from a full score. Helen Crayford plays 'plinky-plonk' contemporary opera at sight from full score. I've heard Jeremy Limb (also a soloist) sight-read the odd piece and he's one of those whose sight-reading is not just note-spinning, it actually sounds like a performance. A few years ago, a retired singer gave me a tall full score, transposing instruments and all, and asked me to play it a minor third down: she seemed genuinely surprised when I had difficulty, so I guess she must have met pianists who could do it.

These are all aspects of quick learning. None of them, however, guarantees that the final result will be a moving musical experience!

[leonidas]

Surprises me actually

Rachmaninoff sometimes said that he wanted to compose and conduct more but he didn´t have the time since he had to practice at the piano.

Not surprising, clearly his thorough practice schedule was geared more to working on technique than memory,

[mattgreenecomposer]

Awwwwww Leonidas,
for a second there I thought we were going to have some Jerry Goldsmith on piano forum, oh well...

[soliloquy]

Chuck Norris can learn Gaspard de la Nuit just from looking at the score.


jk



But Geiseking did.  He had a photographic memory.  He could learn a piece literally just from looking at it.  He would apparently sit and just look at the sheet music to a piece for several hours, then be able to perform it from memory.


It's also said that when Liszt was starting to concertize and still play the works of others the only piece he couldn't sight-play was the Hammerklavier.



Randomly, Perlman sight-played one of the withheld Paganini Violin concerti to one of the Paganini descendents.

[ahinton]

The anecdote I read about Ogdon doing the Brahms was that a soloist due to play it was ill, and the conductor asked Ogdon to stand in. Ogdon agreed, but asked for a page turner. It was only afterwards that he told the conductor he'd never played it before, and had just sightread Brahms I. He also learnt the 3 bartok concerti from memory in 3 consecutive days. I guess he'd have to be in the running for greatest quick learner.

It was Brahms 2, apparently - and I seem to remember that the indisposed pianist whom he replaced on that occasion was Gina Bachauer. When asked afterwards how he managed to accomplish this remarkable feat, he is said to have brushed it aside with the words "oh, but I've heard it lots of times!". John Ogdon clearly did not think that this kind of thing was abnormal or revealing of any special gift on his part - but then most pianists would have to practise for many years just to be as disarmingly and genuinely modest as he was.

Richard Black's remarks here are by far the most informative and the little homily at their end is very well worth bearing in mind, for all that it may not necessarily be directly pertinent in itself to the specific thread topic!...

Best,

Alistair

[mephisto]

Chuck Norris can learn Gaspard de la Nuit just from looking at the score.


jk



But Geiseking did.  He had a photographic memory.  He could learn a piece literally just from looking at it.  He would apparently sit and just look at the sheet music to a piece for several hours, then be able to perform it from memory.

Glenn Gould would do the same thing with a Beethoevn concerto(his father said "a concerto by Beethoevn" so I don't know wich one). He stayed in his room until he had meorized the score and played it perfect from meomry afterwards.

[lostinidlewonder]

I'll mention people I have met personally, you can hear a lot of stories out there
As for the most efficient person I've met playing by ear I would give that award to my own father. He can listen to a peice once and reproduce the melody completely and it with any style of fill ins asked for. He is personally interested in South American music and can play all instruments he hears on a CD straight onto the piano after one or two listens. As a music teacher I am amazed at this godly rate learning and when I ask him how he does it he says it is just what needs to be done. He sees the sound on the keyboard and plays it, I see many music savants are the same, they don't think like us, they see the keyboard in an ultra efficient manner.

As for sightreaders the best I have seen is my piano tutor during my highschool years. She literally read a page ahead of what she was playing. How that is possibleI dont know. I didn't believe that she could do it and tested her asking her to play one of my own compositions which was several pages of my scratchy writing, after looking at the entire piece for a minute she sat down and proceeded to play it and yes reading a page in advanced. It was scary, very scary, and more scary when I asked her how she reads so fast, she says she can see the music in her minds eye that she has to play and simultaneously reads what needs to come next. Talk about multitasking!

[ahinton]

Whilst what I am about to write may not necessarily fall within the strict confines of this thread topic, it is perhaps worth pointing out the difference between those who can play brilliantly at sight and those who can actually perform at sight (in the sense that they seem somehow able instantly to offer what nevertheless comes across as a performance into which the kind of prior thought has gone that one might have expected had it been practised - and even in the sense of having considered various different interpretative possibilities without having actually had the real time in which to do so); this seems to me to be one of the principal faculties that marked out John Ogdon from others who were able to play at sight remarkably well. I have no idea how he acquired that skill, although I have no evidence that he ever consciously worked at trying to develop it (or even that it would be possible for anyone to do that).

Memory is obviously a common factor between this kind of thing and the speed of learning which is the subject of this thread. That said, I remember the soprano Jane Manning talking to me years ago about the many instances that she found where a musician's memorising ability and sight-reading prowess seemed almost mutually exclusive, in the sense that one encountered either the one or the other but rarely both in the same musician (although had she wanted to encounter both, she need only have looked in the mirror, of course). Even she, however, said during that conversation (albeit partly in jest) that John Ogdon was the only musician she had ever come across who could play at sight from memory...

Best,

Alistair

[leonidas]

Alistair, it appears that those who are great sight-readers have great short-term memory skills, and can cope with many things 'floating' in the mind at once, picking them out when appropriate in a sequence.
This is analogous with the computer component known as RAM, and it could be said that the reason, perhaps, why few people have both great short and long term(the brain's hard drive  ) skills, is because one is initially more developed than the other, and thus the ease with one becomes a crutch and overcompensates for the other, without the intent to develop it.

But Geiseking did.  He had a photographic memory.  He could learn a piece literally just from looking at it.  He would apparently sit and just look at the sheet music to a piece for several hours, then be able to perform it from memory.

This is a very valuable skill for numerous reasons, firstly it allows one to still progress without overexhausting one's technical facility with too much practice, and secondly - it demands intense concentration, which can only be beneficial to one's overall skill as a performing musician.

[maxy]

But Geiseking did.  He had a photographic memory.  He could learn a piece literally just from looking at it.  He would apparently sit and just look at the sheet music to a piece for several hours, then be able to perform it from memory.

Indeed, Gieseking was a  monster.  He said 3-4 hours at the instrument was enough.  (Though we can assume he spent some extra time studying the scores).  He supposedly spent more than 6 hours straight at the piano only once : for Chopin's etude op 10#1.
I believe him.  Richter also said to practice 3-4 hours a day, but we all know he lied. 

[ahinton]

Alistair, it appears that those who are great sight-readers have great short-term memory skills, and can cope with many things 'floating' in the mind at once, picking them out when appropriate in a sequence.
This is analogous with the computer component known as RAM, and it could be said that the reason, perhaps, why few people have both great short and long term(the brain's hard drive  ) skills, is because one is initially more developed than the other, and thus the ease with one becomes a crutch and overcompensates for the other, without the intent to develop it.

An interesting and pertinent point - thanks! There is probably some connection also with the situation where people of a particularly advanced age retain long term memory well but suffer some loss of short term memory, although I hope that this doesn't lead Elliott Carter to remember his 60+year-old piano sonata note for note but be unable to recall the piece - or perhaps pieces - that he wrote during the past month!...

Best,

Alistair

[schubertiad]

The greatest quicklearner (people seem to be making it into one word, so I'll follow suit) I have ever met is a 10 year old Chinese boy called NiuNiu. He is quite simply a phenomenon. I was playing a Scriabin prelude, and after hearing my practise it a couple of times, he sat at the second piano and played the whole thing. We're not talking about a quirky mozart piece here, but Scriabin.
Even more frighteningly, he learnt the Goldberg variations in 5 days.

[thalberg]

I also read Martha Argerich mastered a set of Ginastera pieces in 45 minutes.  And that she learned prokofiev 3rd sonata from hearing her roommate practice it.

[stucoy]

I also read Martha Argerich mastered a set of Ginastera pieces in 45 minutes.  And that she learned prokofiev 3rd sonata from hearing her roommate practice it.

It was just the third concerto, not the sonata(!). She said she learnt it when she was half-asleep whilst still in bed. This ability also comes with its disadvantages, in that she also learnt her roommate's sight-reading mistakes. I love you, Martha.

[sevencircles]

Volodos is rumoured to be the greatest quicklearner among the pianovirtuosos active today and also one of the laziest.


Hofmann and Artur Rubinstein were both outstanding when it comes to learning by ear if I am not entirely wrong.

[counterpoint]

It impresses me much more, that Michelangeli worked on op.111 for 10 years before playing it in public. More than someone who learned it in a week (or even faster). The deciding factor is not, how fast you can  learn a piece, but what's the final result.

[mikey6]

Shosty apparently learnt one or two books of the WTC in 2 weeks.
Argerich learnt Gaspard in 2 weeks according to her interview.
I know of an autistic pianist who would take a score into a practice room and in 20 minutes, come out with it learnt and memorized.

[thalberg]

Shosty apparently learnt one or two books of the WTC in 2 weeks.
Argerich learnt Gaspard in 2 weeks according to her interview.
I know of an autistic pianist who would take a score into a practice room and in 20 minutes, come out with it learnt and memorized.

No, according to her interview she learned it in less than one week.  Five days, actually.  From her interview:

On Gulda fearing she was an underachiver when she was a month with a Schubert Sonata]
"For your next lesson, five days from now, you have to bring me all of Ravel's 'Gaspard de la nuit' and Schumann's 'Abegg Variations.'"

All right, so I brought them all learned; it was not difficult because I didn't know that it was supposed to be. When one doesn't know that a piece is very difficult, one learns it easily. If you know already from everybody that this piece is difficult, then you don't learn it fast. I didn't know this, so I learned these pieces fast, and he was very happy about it.

[jepoy]

I read somewhere that Josef Hoffman met up with Josef and Rosina Lhevine a few hours before Hoffman's concert. They had a chat and Josef Lhevine played a piece which Hoffman was unfamiliar with. Lhevine told him it was a piece by Liszt.

Hoffman invited the Lhevines to his concert which went splendidly. Before giving an encore, he winked at the Lhevines and played the Liszt piece which Josef Lhevine played for him earlier, note for note.