Rachmanonff Prelude G Minor Op 23 No 5

[paolo]

Does anyone have any tips or advice on learning or performing this piece?
Thanks

[Dazzer]

don't play it too fast.

[Bacfokievrahms]

I advise you not to use the 124-5-14-5 fingering for certain parts of the second section. 

Watch your left hand on the jumps at the end of the second section. Make sure you have a nice sense of dynamics in the fourth section with the arpeggios in the left hand.

Release your tension after every few chords. Make sure your chords feel as effortless as possible.

[sonatainfsharp]

Most people play it too slow.

[Bacfokievrahms]

I like

First section - Fast little pedal use
Second section - Faster more pedal use
Third Section - Slower than first section and loud and lumbering
Fourth section -  A speed that agrees with rest of piece
Fifth section - Starting at first section speed then increasing of course
Sixth section - Faster than second section with deeper pedal than second
Seventh section - Faster than first section, loud and smoothly undulating.

[rohansahai]

This happens to be my favourite Rachmaninoff prelude. I'll copy paste Bernhard's plan to learn it, so you can use this to get the notes, accuracy right and bring it up to speed :
On Rachmaninov's Prelude in G minor op. 23 no. 5:
Here is how I would teach it so that anyone who has been learning (with me) for 6 months – 1 year would be able to get grape juice out of it after 3 – 4 weeks.

Step 1: Make an outline of this piece. This means simplifying and reducing the pieces to its skeleton. I do that for my students, however this is a great opportunity for you, since doing outlines (you will have to do it by trial and error until you get the hang of it) is one of the greatest ways to get to know a piece back to front. You will need to decide all of the fingering in advance, so that you keep the original fingering in the outline (this should not be a problem since you already can play it). This way when you play the piece as originally written all of the movements and fingerings will already be ingrained.

Take the first bar. Get rid of the thirds in the right hand and the fourths in the LH and you have your outline.

Go through the whole piece reducing all octaves to either the top note or the bass note. In the second part do not play the arpeggios in the left hand, just the bass note. Don’t play the full chords on the RH, just the octave, or reduce it even further by plying just a single note (either the top one or the bottom one). Keep taking away layers and fillers until you are left with the bare essence of this piece. you get the idea

Write a score with this outline (keeping all of the original fingerings though). This may take you a couple of weeks of hard work at the score – but this is also practice – perhaps more important than what you do at the piano (by the way no one wants to do it – even though its benefits are staggering). Of course since I usually do all that for my students (in the beginning – later on they must do it themselves) it saves them a huge block of time.

This simplified version should be so easy that even a total beginner should be able to master it. So make it that easy: grade 1 easy.

You should be able to learn this outline in 2 – 3 sessions (20 minute sessions) at the most.

Now you can either go straight to the piece as originally written , or (which I recommend in this particular piece) you can write another score with a more complex outline, where you add one of the layers you subtracted.

You can keep adding layers to your outline until you have the music as originally written.

If you decide to go straight to the piece after mastering the basic outine, here is how I would go about it:

Step 2: fill in the outline and play the piece as originally written:

First break the piece into manageable passages. I believe that the suggestion below is manageable by anyone who – like yourself – has got to the level of playing op. 49 no. 1:

Practice session 1: Bars 1 – 9
Practice session 2: Bars 9 – 16 (bars 10 – 13 = bars 1 – 3)
Practice session 3: Bars 1 – 16
Practice session 4: Bars 16 – 24
Practice session 5: Bars 1 – 24
Practice session 6: Bars 24 – 32
Practice session 7: bars 1 – 32 (first part learned)

Practice session 8: bars 48 – 55 (keep working at bars 1 – 32: at this point this really means playing it and working on the musicality)
Practice session 9: Bars 55 – 62 (keep working on bars 1 – 32)
Practice session 10: bars 48 – 62 (keep working on bars 1 – 32)
Practice session 11: bars 48 – 69 (bars 62 – 69 = bars 17 – 24)
Practice session 12: bars 69 – 76
Practice session 13: bars 48 – 76
Practice session 14: bars 76 – 84
Practice session 15: bars 48 – 84 (third part learned)

Practice session 16: bars 32 – 36 (add first beat of bar 37 – keep working on the 1st and 2nd parts throughout the next practice sessions)
Practice session 17: bars 37 – 39 (add first beat of bar 40)
Practice session 18: bars 32 – 39 (add first beat of bar 40)
Practice session 19: bars 40 - 43 (add first beat of bar 44)
Practice session 20 : bars 32 – 43 (add first beat of bar 44)
Practice session 21 : bars 44 – 48 .
Practice session 22: bars 32 – 48.

Practice session 23: the whole piece.

Each of these practice sessions is about 20 minutes long. So you could learn this whole piece in about 23 days (a bit over three weeks) practising just 20 – 30 minutes a day.

It will probably take even less than 23 days, since almost half of these 23 sessions are devoted to joining passages (e.g practice sessions 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 18, 20, 22, and 23).

What do you do during these twenty minutes? You do not just repeat blindly the passage of the practice session over and over hoping for the best. To start with they are probably too large to be tackled straight away. So you break them further (use the 7 repeat rule). You work with hands separate. You do rhythm variations. You do repeated note-groups (particularly appropriate for your difficulty in memorising chord progressions). In short you use all of the practice trickery I have described in over 2000 posts and Chang has described in his book. By the end of the session you should really have that passage learned (grapes stage).

Next day start by playing it. Can you do it? Probably not. So repeat the whole practice session you did the previous day. You will go back to your previous state of mastery in a fraction of the time, even though at the beginning the difficulty seems to be the same. You will be able to do it in 5 minutes instead of 20. So use the remainder of your practice session to tackle the next passage. On the 3rd day, you are going to spend the whole 20 minutes joining both passages, so go through the learning stage once again doing all the steps and not skipping any part of it. Again it will take you only a fraction of the time so you will have plenty of time left to work in seamlessly joining the passages. By then the passage is large enough for you to start working on the musicality of it.

By day 7, you will have worked on the first passages on seven practice sessions. By then you do not need to work on them anymore, just play through the first part. If there is any point that is giving you trouble, identify it and single it for special practice. Likely it will be just a few notes, so five minutes work on it should be all that you need.

In this piece most bars are similarly difficult. So I organised the learning of it from beginning to end. However, in pieces where there are clearly identifiable bars as particularly troublesome, start at those in the very first practice session, This way, by the time you learn the whole piece you will have practised that difficult section the most. Difficulty is usually personal, so it is really up to you to organise the learning of your piece in a way that is personally best suited to you.

In my teaching I can tell straightaway how to tailor the teaching strategy to the student. In a forum I can only point out general principles and give examples that may or may not be applicable to you. So take the ideas here as illustrations, and modify them to suit you personally.
So you have worked for 20 – 30 minutes on your prelude. You still have the whole day free. So put in another 5 practice sessions. What should you do in these 5 extra practice sessions? New repertory of course. But not just any new repertory. Select pieces that will add to your main piece which is the Rach prelude. Here are 5 pieces that address similar technical problems, are worthwhile pieces in anyone’s repertory, and are easier (technically) than the prelude (in progressive order of difficulty):

1. Prokofiev – Melody in Eb – Like the prelude this is in ABA form, but the other way around: large span arpeggios on the LH on the first and third part and chords in the second part – but much easier without all the skips.

2. Mendelssohn – Song without words op. 62 no. 3 (Funeral march) – addresses chord playing and skips although not as drastic as the ones in the prelude.

3. Alexander Tcherepenin – Bagatelle op. 5 no. 6 - – addresses fast arpeggios in the left hand but with a much smaller span than the arpeggios in the second part of the prelude.

4. Mendelssohn – Song without words op. 53 no. 3 – addresses fast arpeggios in the left hand with chords in the right (just like the second part of the prelude) but not as difficult.

5. Chopin – Polonaise in A (op. 40 no. 1). addresses chord playing and skips although not as drastic as the ones in the prelude.

These pieces are easier than the prelude, and yet use similar figurations. Moreover their character is musically very similar, so working on the musicality of these pieces will inform your work on the prelude as well.

However you may find these pieces – although easier than the prelude – still challenging. So here is another list of four worthwhile pieces that will pave the way to the prelude and yet are very easy:

1. J. S. Bach (attrib.) – Musette – from the little Book of Anna Magdalen Bach – excellent for skips where both hands must jump together to a new location (as in the first part of the prelude).

2. Robert Vandall – Prelude no. 15 in Cm - the same sort of “staggered” chords as in the Rach, with a second section with LH hand arpeggios on a much more manageable span.

3. Stephan Heller – Etude op. 45 no. 15 – Excellent for huge chords and skipping between them.

4. Ludovico Einaudi: I giorni – especially good for large span arpeggios in the left hand and chords spaning a tenth. Musically this is of a very different character from the prelude though. This is minimalist, lyrical writing, more akin to new age.

Now, my opinions on the interpretation of the piece:
Here is what I visualise as the "story" behind this piece:
1st part: Napoleon Bonaparte marching with his army to conquer the all elusive-Russia !! Picture the GRAND ARMY marching, swords drawn, all set to take up the challange and conquer Russia. The first section has to give a terrifying, scary atmosphere. Then you have the big e-flat major chords: ATTTACCKKK !!!!!!! The army is at the borders....fighting with the russians...thunderbolts, canons, guns blazing all over !! Then the powerful return to the initial theme => signifying that the napoleon's army has won the first battle and has defeated the border forces and entered into russian soil.......their morale is up and they march ahead !!
MIDDLE SECTION:
The Russians act smart !! They retreat and suck the french army into Siberia, and cut their supplies off. The winter has set in and all which can be seen is death, disease (due to the extreme cold) and pathos ! Prisoners being taken across in the dark , cold nights , on the lonely, deserted Siberian stretches......the french army is severly weakened and almost finished.
THE RECAPITULATION:
Now, the russians start to regroup. The forces slowly get together (as indicated by the gradual crescendo) , the troops join in from all sides, and build up their force again !
THE RUSSIANS ATTACK:
Big E-flat major chords again: THE RUSSIANS' turn to attack the paltry french army remaining. Canons blazing again, and the Napoleon's army has no answers: Each of their troops are being killed, and the others being driven out............ !! First in large chunks, then small individual groups. >>Imagine the final leggiero as the lone french-man being chased away by the russian troops.

This is the way I go about the piece. I am yet to hear a recording of this piece which satisfies me fully (Richter comes the closest, but he disappoints in the middle section).
Probably, Richter's outer sections and Ashkenazy's middle section put together would somewhat be the ultimate performance of this true masterpiece of a prelude !!!
ENJOY PLAYING IT !

[rohansahai]

Just to add:
In accordance with the above background, in musical terms i do the following:
1st part: A decently quick tempo , mostly soft, but with some sharp grandations in dynamics:
2nd part: Powerful, dramatic , fast (if possible) .
middle section: Highly emotional, long-drawn notes, heavy use of intonatsiia (i mentioned it in one of my earlier posts.) The left hand should work as a fine network of notes and should not interfere much with the right hand melody ....the middle layers which crop up should be given utmost care.
recapitulation: gradual build up. guard against making it too loud too soon......it should gather pace and power around the modulation to c minor. The loud powerful section (e flat major chords should be slighttttllllyy more powerful than the same section in the first half.
The finale is, more or less obvious.... !!
This is the way I interpret it, you have full license to differ !!!! 

[paolo]

WOW!!!!!
Thanks a lot!!!!!!!

[paolo]

On the subject of recordings, I have a version with Horowitz playing live.
I'm sure he hits some bum notes, but he doesn't half thrash out those bass notes & octaves.
He also teases with the tempo & the crescendo in the recapitulation.
Much prefer this to Ashkenazy's.
Haven't heard Richter's but would love to hear Kissin playing this live!

[rohansahai]

P.S. I only like Ashkenazy's middle section of the prelude. He really draws out more melancholy and poetry than anyone else. I have the horowitz recording you are talking about, and although its quite good, you just HAVE to listen to Richter (the outer movements) !!! Here is the link:
https://classic.manual.ru/mp3/Rachmaninov/Rach_Prel_Richter_23-05.mp3

[rebel1ns]

i played it last year..to me it took a while to learn cuz of the jumping all over the place, but its not too bad once u get used to it.. but i guess the key is the voicing
if you can play it fast, play it fast, itll sound impressive but if you can't, then don't worry about it
slow down the middle section, i think that contrast is definitely needed for this piece, and once the original melody comes back in slowly get back into the speed you started with

good luck

[pizno]

Wow, where was Bernard when I played this piece?  I could have used those practice tips.  What I did that helped was learn the middle section at the same time I was learning the beginning.  That way it wasn't such a big deal when I got to it.  I found that with this piece, one of my big problems was muscle tension.  It is hard to remain relaxed with all those stretchy big chords and jumping around.  I found it fairly physically demanding to practice it for long periods of time.  Also, I found that it took constant maintenance.  I had to work at it a bit each day to maintain accuracy and stamina.  In the middle section, it is so important for those 'under voices' to come out, and that also takes a lot of work.  Good luck and have fun!

[rohansahai]

I found that with this piece, one of my big problems was muscle tension. It is hard to remain relaxed with all those stretchy big chords and jumping around. I found it fairly physically demanding to practice it for long periods of time. Also, I found that it took constant maintenance. I had to work at it a bit each day to maintain accuracy and stamina.

Aah, so i'm not the only one to have this problem. It is actually quite tough to play any piece after playing this prelude.....my arms tend to shiver a little for the next few minutes and that can create trouble if there is a fairly difficult piece to follow it. I always make sure that I never play it in the beginning or the middle when playing for someone.
Actually, it is almost impossible to remain relaxed, since it tends to cut away some of the power and drama which is an integral part of this piece. A "held-back" kind of performance can sound very dull and unimpressive! My advice: Play this piece as the last of your 'encores', but do not hold back a bit !!!