Musicality vs. technical prowess

[chopinmaniac]

I have to ask this question only because I have so often heard in this forum people who seem to think that they are more than ready musically for a piece of music, but are afraid whether or not they are technically ready.  I find this funny only because with the musicians we listen to on a regular basis, I more often hear someone complaining about their musicality before I hear them complaining about whether or not they hit the right notes or whether or not they play them fast enough.

So I am asking, what is harder to find and also, what is more important, a true understanding of music and therefore an understanding of how to play certain pieces or extremely strong technical ability so that you can play all of the notes on any piece of music?

IMO, I have always thought that musicality was both harder to find and more important.  After all, technical ability can be taught, perhaps not musicality as much.  Not to mention, I would much rather hear a piece not played at all than one played with all of the right notes, but completely butchered with respect to feeling. 

Of course, i have neither  , so please try not to make this thread personal.  I would just like to know what you all think.

Thx

[greyrune]

Well both are obviously important.  Without the technical skills you simply can't play peices you might want to, they'd just be wrong.  Without musicality while you may be able to play a peice you'll play it badly.  If you look at it this way technical skill is more important it's the choice between wrong and badly.  I think musicality is as important though, i wouldn't put one higher than the other you need both to be a good pianist.  Whichever you are worse at work on.  I'm working hard on my technique at the moment, my musciality is better (though it needs work too).  As for which is generally harder, like i said i find technique harder, for others it'll be different though, everyone has their own problems.  I suppose you're right that musicality can't be taught so much, but it can be taught.  My teacher always complains about my phrasing and so on and makes me change bits, that's teaching musicality, but there are no excercises for it.

I now predict someone else will say musicality is far more important, i can see that point of view.  Playing a peice badly (un-musically) is as bad as playing the notes wrong and anyone can learn to play the notes right with enough practice.  I still think they're about equal though.

[ako]

IMO, I have always thought that musicality was both harder to find and more important.  After all, technical ability can be taught, perhaps not musicality as much.  Not to mention, I would much rather hear a piece not played at all than one played with all of the right notes, but completely butchered with respect to feeling. 

Of course, i have neither  , so please try not to make this thread personal.  I would just like to know what you all think.

Thx

I have been on both sides of this. WHen I was in HS, accuracy was very important to me when I hear a piece performed. I would hold it against someone if he played one single wrong note in an entire recital. Thinking back, that was very harsh of me to judge people that way, stricting on the number of notes they played correctly. My views have since changed. I think because of my current piano teacher.

When I first met my current teacher and played for her, I chose to play the Pathetique. I haven't played the piano for over 10 years. I thought I did really badly because I coudn't hit the notes...however, my piano teacher thought that I was good. I was a little embarrassed because I thought it was horrible! How could she say it was good!?! Then she said, "I could hear/see a lot of fire in you. No wonder you are frustrated about your playing. But don't worry, I can teach you the technique. That's the easy part. It's the music inside a soul that's hard to teach." With that, my view of music changed.

Now, I don't hold it against someone who play a wrong note or two. If the wrong notes are so many that they become a distraction to the piece as a whole, then it's a different story. I would say I value musicality more as an amateur pianist. But if you're going professional, you definitely need to be very strong in both!

[LVB op.57]

Classical music happens to require a very developed technique, but not all music does. Of course, this doesn't make it better or worse than any other music, just different. However, absolutely all music requires strong musicality.

[pianote]

you can play a piece from technique alone
you cannot play a piece from musicality alone
you can never play a piece well without musicality

[bernhard]

The separation of technique and musicality is a linguistic delusion. It does not exist in reality.

The moment you press a key in the piano and produce a sound, there is both technique (that is, the way you press the key, the the fingering you use and the movement patter you employ), and you also create music (that is, the sound that you produce).

It may happen that your technique is inappropriate and the sound you produce is not what you had in mind.

Some people then jump to the wrong (and absurd) conclusion that you have no technique, and you display no musicality. The correct statement is that you technique is not adequate and could be improved and as a consequence your musicality will respond better than at present.

Even a computer playing a midifile has musicality – perhaps not to everyone’s taste and perhaps it could and should be improved.

Although we can create separate words “technique” and “musicality”, and although we can use these words we have created to debate endlessly what is ultimately a non-problem, we cannot separate the reality these words model (badly). Technique cannot be separated from musicality. Nor can you have a situation where the technique is appropriate but the musicality is lacking (if so, the technique is not appropriate), or where a faulty technique results in superb musicality (it just will not happen: if the musicality is superb the technique is not faulty, no matter how much the technique displayed goes against one’s preconceptions of what good technique is).

The only piano that will allow you to play technique in isolation from musicality is a Virgil Silent Clavier. The only apparatus that will afford superb musicality without the requisite technique (on your part) is the CD player.

Best wishes,
Benrhard.

[steinwayguy]

Well I was disappointed when I came to Bernhard's post, because it is exactly what I would have said. Kudos, Bernhard.

[chopinmaniac]

Yeah.  Thx Bernhard.  I have never really thought of it that way, but after reading your post, it does make a lot of sense.  However, if they are as linked as you say they are, why do we pick people out who have either subpar musicality or technique.  How many times have we heard that Lang Lang is amazing technically, but horrible musically.  Does anyone have a right to say this, and is it in any way true?  Perhaps we can only make fine differences such as these once people are in a group far above the normal piano player.  I agree that with younger and more inexperienced pianists technique usually does directly correlate with musicality, but does this same rule apply to professionals, people who have spent their entire lives perfecting technique, analyzing music.  Can we not say that one person might be better at one than the other? 

[xvimbi]

True, musicality and technique do go together in a sense, because they are both required to make music, but I think one can evaulate them separately.

I always define technique (or technical prowess) as the ability to evoke, in a controlled, reproducible, accurate and precise way, any sound an instrument is capable of producing.

Musicality, on the other hand, has more to do with WHAT sounds one WANTS to create. That's obviously a "brain thing", not a "finger thing."

So, while some people are very good technically, they just can't come up with a good ideas or coherent thoughts to produce a musically satisfying rendition. Others do have these ideas, but can't realize them through the instrument because of lack of technique.

Coming back to the original question. It is undoubtedly musicality that is the defining criterion. Just look at top-level competitions. They are all technically excellent, so what sets them apart is their interpretations, and this is what is being judged primarily.

What musicality really means is another question.

[ted]

It is also possible for the two to be inextricably combined in the creative sense and in a very individual way. This is especially true outside the concert arena. For instance, people say that Morton's technique was inferior. When it came to playing other people's compositions and classical music it may have been. (Strictly speaking we don't even know this because he didn't make classical recordings.) However, directed exclusively to his own creative idiom it served him magnificently, and no doubt his improvisation was a continual interaction of musical impulse and physical convenience (convenient for him that is - decidedly difficult for everybody else).

I heard a radio interview in which the jazz pianist, Mike Nock, was making this very point. He said that beyond a certain elementary level your creative fluency becomes your technique.

So I think the comments of the previous posters are even more pertinent outside the area of concert playing.

[Waldszenen]

Both are incredibly important, obviously, but if I could master one first, it'd be technique - reason is, mastering technique is more difficult than mastering musicality (IMO).

[xvimbi]

Both are incredibly important, obviously, but if I could master one first, it'd be technique - reason is, mastering technique is more difficult than mastering musicality (IMO).

I think that's an illusion. There are myriads of people with excellent technique, but a lot fewer who also have great musicality. One can get very far with good technique and with little musicality, but one will never rise to the top. This is true the other way around as well, but less so.

People perceive technique to be harder to master, because it is better defined, requires several hours of practice every day for years, and there are yardsticks against which one can measure oneself.

Musicality requires development too, but it's a lot harder to define what is required and how to practice it. It's such a fuzzy concept that people usually invoke terms like "natural talent", "inborn ability", "genius" with it, but in fact, musicality can be practiced (IMO).

I am sure, the next question will be "how do I practice and develop musicality?"

[pianonut]

yes!  that is the question!  sort of like being able to do geometry well.  you have to think in 3-D with the line of the melody not always exactly matching the accompaniment (free thinking) combined with harmonies that are correct and shaded/graded/, how to bring them out and in, to manipulate things to your liking.  this is very hard and imo needs to be taught just as much as technique.

i'd like to hear more ideas!  and, i think teachers do their students a favor when they let them take home DVD's and recordings.  used to hear "don't listen to the piece you are working on"  but actually it isn't a bad idea if you don't copy it, but just glean it for ideas that you like.  it is very hard to hear some of the really good ideas unless you are able to slow the recording down or play it over and over.

[chopinmaniac]

I absolutely agree with you Pianonut.  In fact, for example, I am working on a nocturne, op.48 no. 1 and I decided that in the last section, I was not able to bring out the contrast between the upper melody line and the low octave harmony changes.  To try and figure out how I might go about doing this, I found a recording, sadly my only one, of Ashkenazy playing it, and to my surprise, not only was I unable to find the solution to my question after many slow and repeated listenings, but I found that in my opinion, Ahkenazy himself did not do a good job of separating the two.  Of course, the music itself was technically perfect, but after working on the piece myself and coming up with my own expression of how it should be played, I found Ashkenazy's way to be wrong.  Dont take this the wrong way, I am in no way saying that Ashkenazy is anything short of amazing, or that my opinion of how the piece should sound is better than his.  This is only to say that technically, I can play the notes just as well as he can, yet we both have two completely different ideas of how they should sound, just as I am sure this happens with almost anyone who plays a piece of music for a long time and really tries to perfect it.  To me, it seems that musicality has to be more important, because it is more subjective, more personal, and therefore, in the end, I believe more telling of the pianist themself.

[xvimbi]

To me, it seems that musicality has to be more important, because it is more subjective, more personal, and therefore, in the end, I believe more telling of the pianist themself.

I think one has to be careful here. Musicality is formost the ability to represent the spirit, mood and meaning of a composition. Of course, there is the personal individuality of the performer, but it must be employed in the spirit of the composition.

In other words, musicality must primarily be used to learn about the composer and the composition ("Ah, that is what the composer is trying to tell"), and only secondarily to learn about the performer ("Ooh, this is how she is telling it"). So, WHAT comes before HOW.

Ideally, the WHAT would be easily recognizable, while the HOW would be masterful, tasteful, perhaps even unique.

[ako]

This addresses the last part of nocturne Op48 No.1 specifically. I agree that everyone probably has a different interpretation of how much of the melody they want to bring out. For me, I had a sound in my head on how that secton should sound like, but my technique was not adequate for me to bring out the sound/balance that I wanted. In this case, it is a matter of inadequate technique leading to lack of musicality ...what Bernhard was saying in the earlier post.

[xvimbi]

This addresses the last part of nocturne Op48 No.1 specifically. I agree that everyone probably has a different interpretation of how much of the melody they want to bring out. For me, I had a sound in my head on how that secton should sound like, but my technique was not adequate for me to bring out the sound/balance that I wanted. In this case, it is a matter of inadequate technique leading to lack of musicality ...what Bernhard was saying in the earlier post.

Perhaps not quite so. Inadequate technique is not equal to lack of musicality. If you sang that melody, it might be just perfect, showing that you do have musicality, but you can't show it to an audience using a piano. This is different from not having anything in one's brain to start out with In other words, having excellent technique and not being able to play musically really means that person does not have musicality. Bummer! That's why I will don't ever want to acquire perfect technique. It would destroy my excuse

[ako]

I see what you mean...