Lowest Note on the Piano -- Key #1

[alzado]

I noticed the Performance Forum has a question, do you know any pieces that use the highest key on the piano --  a C? 

How about pieces using the lowest note on the piano -- which is an A.   (I.e., "key #1)

My teacher and I discovered an octave that requires "Key #1"  about midway through MacDowell's "A.D. 1620."   

Any other instances?

[xvimbi]

Beyond the lowest A, there are some pieces that require extra notes, like those found on the large Boesendorfers.

[Skeptopotamus]

does the rach 3 use every single key on the piano?

[pies]

­

[phil13]

Scriabin's Etude in A major Op.8 No.6 hits the lowest A once. So does Liszt's 'Apres une Lecture de Dante'.

Prokofiev's Toccata Op.11 hits it multiple times.

[Motrax]

Ravel's Jeux D'eau wishes pianos were built with a G# (key number 0), but it has to settle for the A in most cases.

[quantum]

Alexina Louie - "I leap through the sky with stars" requires both lowest A and Highest C

Scriabin - 6th Sonata requires D above the highest C on the piano. 

I believe some Busoni compositions might require notes below A, haven't heard any so am not sure about this. 

[mlsmithz]

The Grieg concerto hits the lowest A on numerous occasions, beginning with the ascending figure in the opening 'cadenza'.  I think it only goes up to the highest A, though, as (I presume) Grieg was writing for a piano with only seven octaves (85 keys vs. the 88 on most pianos).

The first movement of Kabalevsky's Sonata No.2 in E-flat major uses both the lowest A and the highest C within moments of each other in the development.  The sonata as a whole doesn't quite hit all 88 keys, though - as far as I can see, it never uses the highest A-flat, but I'm almost certain it uses the other 87. (In fact, I don't think either of the F major sonatas ever use the highest A-flat either.  Perhaps on Kabalevsky's piano that key was broken?)

[the_ts]

The first note of Prokofiev's Suggestioin Diabolique is "note #1". Someone once described the opening as a "Satan Belch"

[ravel]

Ravel's Jeux D'eau wishes pianos were built with a G# (key number 0), but it has to settle for the A in most cases.

lol , thats a funny way of putting it. hehe.
well even if it has to settle for the A , it works!!!!!
the magic of ravel!!!!!!

[pianote]

i thought it was an A ... hmm

[joell12068]

Brahms Rhapsody in G minor Op.79 no.2, second measure, has the low A.

[dlu]

does the rach 3 use every single key on the piano?

Yep...at least...that's what been told...

DLu

[prometheus]

It's probably a myth in an attempt to exalt 'rach 3' to even more legendary heights.

[mlsmithz]

I do know the Rachmaninov hits the lowest note at least once (just before the B-flat major episode in the first movement), but I really don't care for the piece, so I'm not interested in looking through the score and/or sorting through a MIDI to see if it hits the 87 notes above it as well.  However, it has many fans on these boards, so I'm sure someone will answer the question as to whether or not it hits all 88 keys.

Going back to the Kabalevsky Sonata No.2 (I've oft heard the Kabalevsky sonatas criticised as derivative and unoriginal - a blanket description I've seen applied to most of Kabalevsky's work, which may explain why he's not very well known next to the other Soviet composer named Dmitri - but I love all three of them, especially the slow movements of No.1 and No.3), after further perusal of the score I've noticed the first movement alone hits 87 keys - the only one missing is, as I mentioned in my last post, the highest A-flat.  There are surely pieces out there which hit all 88 keys in a single movement, but I wonder how many of them do so because the composer tailored the piece to hit every key, and how many just happen to do so anyway (perhaps that's true of the Kabalevsky?).

[Nightscape]

There are numerous pieces by Debussy that use this note.  L'isle Joyeuse, several preludes and etudes as well.  This particular note has a very powerful resonance to it that presumably Debussy very much enjoyed. 

[Dazzer]

last note of ravel piano concerto gmaj 3rd mvt.

1 + 7#
A + G#

[janne p.]

Busoni's arrangement of Bach's Chaconne for solo violin ranges from the lowest A to the B flat just below the highest C. A great transciption, I might add.

[Barbosa-piano]

I see one in Rachmaninoff's 3rd piano concerto- 3rd movement. It is in the ending, right after the Vivace part, where there are fast descending chords. I believe there are more, though.

[janne p.]

Oh yeah, I forgot: Brahms' Rhapsody in G minor, op. 79 no. 2 also has the lowest A.

[ckprbnh]

Scriabin - 6th Sonata requires D above the highest C on the piano.   

... and the 7th uses the highest C, as said in the other thread.

Scriabin's sonatas no. 1, 2, 5, 6, 7 and 8 use the low A.

This is nothing exceptional, I think you could find hundreds of pieces that use it. The highest C is more unusual.

[Barbosa-piano]

Villa Lobos' Danca do Indio Branco (Dance of the white Indian)- uses the lowest note several times. I think you wouldn't find those easily- if at all- in Chopin's music, except if he composed on other pianos. The lowest note on his Pleyel piano was a C, I believe.

[apion]

I noticed the Performance Forum has a question, do you know any pieces that use the highest key on the piano --  a C? 

How about pieces using the lowest note on the piano -- which is an A.   (I.e., "key #1)

My teacher and I discovered an octave that requires "Key #1"  about midway through MacDowell's "A.D. 1620."   

Any other instances?

The first note uttered by the piano in Brahms 2nd piano concerto is KEY #2 (B FLAT).  I don't know of any other piano composition whose first utterance is that low on the keyboard.

[janne p.]

The first note uttered by the piano in Brahms 2nd piano concerto is KEY #2 (B FLAT). I don't know of any other piano composition whose first utterance is that low on the keyboard.

Rachmaninoff's Prelude in B flat major, op. 23 no. 2 begins also with the lowest B flat.
Scriabin's Prelude in B minor, op. 13 no. 6 comes pretty close, key #3 (B).

[rocketman]

Samuel Barber - Ballade Op. 46 #1 uses that A

[apion]

Rachmaninoff's Prelude in B flat major, op. 23 no. 2 begins also with the lowest B flat.

Is that a single note or part of a chord/octave?  Brahms' PC2 is a single note - - B flat.

[janne p.]

Is that a single note or part of a chord/octave?

An octave in both the Rachmaninoff and the Scriabin piece.

[sharon_f]

One of the Tcherepnin Bagatelles Op. 5 uses it.

[janne p.]

I do know the Rachmaninov hits the lowest note at least once (just before the B-flat major episode in the first movement), but I really don't care for the piece, so I'm not interested in looking through the score and/or sorting through a MIDI to see if it hits the 87 notes above it as well.  However, it has many fans on these boards, so I'm sure someone will answer the question as to whether or not it hits all 88 keys.

I looked through the score yesterday, and it hits 86 out of the 88 keys. The only two missing are the lowest B and C of the piano, eg. keys #3 & #4. I couldn't find them anywhere anyway, and I searched through the whole thing once just for those notes but didn't find any.

Myth = BUSTED

[Waldszenen]

I looked through the score yesterday, and it hits 86 out of the 88 keys. The only two missing are the lowest B and C of the piano, eg. keys #3 & #4. I couldn't find them anywhere anyway, and I searched through the whole thing once just for those notes but didn't find any.

Myth = BUSTED

You actually went through the entire score to see if it hit all the notes?

Sheesh.


Anyway, lots of Brahms compositions use the bottom A, and I know for a fact that the Grieg concerto does too.

[janne p.]

You actually went through the entire score to see if it hit all the notes?

Sheesh.

Didn't take long, I just wrote a "key map" and marked every note that had been played.

[cadenz]

Didn't take long, I just wrote a "key map" and marked every note that had been played.

relax. there's no need to defend our sanity here 

[alzado]

MacDowell's "From Puritan Days" also uses it -- about 2/3 of the way through.

[clariniano]

The piano part of Malcolm Arnold's Sonatina for Clarinet and Piano, requires the lowest A in the last movement, and in fact even requires the G below that. Don't know the exact bar number it's required, but I did it for an audition (on clarinet), and my pianist told me about that...

Meri

[moose_opus_28]

Ravel's Concerto for Left Hand uses the low A quite a bit.  And I added it into the Scriabin fantasy and it's in the Bach Chaconne....2 or 3 times in my version 

[phil13]

My sonata for piano and violin uses the lowest A three times near the end of the 2nd movement, and it almost uses the highest C... the closest it gets is the highest B, key #87, in the final recap of the 3rd movement.

Phil

[ahinton]

Many of Sorabji's mature works for solo piano use not only the piano's bottom A but also notes below it - in other words those additional notes to which an earlier contributor referred when citing the Bösendorfer Imperial Concert Grand; they also generally tend to explore the entire register of the piano and occasionally overstep that top C. Michael Finnissy's piano works also explore the entire register of the piano with similar frequency and abandon. I'm sure there are plenty of other instances, although the contributor who implied that most composers would be unlikely to include every one of the piano's notes in a composition deliberately for the sake of so doing had an important point...

Best,

Alistair

[janne p.]

The contributor who implied that most composers would be unlikely to include every one of the piano's notes in a composition deliberately for the sake of so doing had an important point...

Maybe they want to put some pressure on the piano technician; every key has to work and every string has to be in tune!

[Etude]

I noticed in the middle of the Fantasia of OC there was a C sharp above the highest C on the keyboard.  I thought maybe it was one of the many errors in the publication of OC, so I replace it with a C natural.  There isn't really much else thats possible, although Madge's solution to the problem was quite interesting.

[ahinton]

I noticed in the middle of the Fantasia of OC there was a C sharp above the highest C on the keyboard.  I thought maybe it was one of the many errors in the publication of OC, so I replace it with a C natural.  There isn't really much else thats possible, although Madge's solution to the problem was quite interesting.

This, I fear, is one of a not insubstantial number of issues which remain to be dealt with one of these fine days when someone eventually tackles the task of preparing a corrected edition of OC; I'm not certain when that will be, although someone in Australia did once begin work on finding and listing all of the the many errors that remain in the "Working Copy" publication after Sorabji had inserted his handwritten corrections.

Are you learning the entire work and do you intend to perform it? If so (in either or both cases), may we wish you the best of luck!

Kind regards,

Alistair

[pita bread]

Many of Sorabji's mature works for solo piano use not only the piano's bottom A but also notes below it - in other words those additional notes to which an earlier contributor referred when citing the Bцsendorfer Imperial Concert Grand; they also generally tend to explore the entire register of the piano and occasionally overstep that top C. Michael Finnissy's piano works also explore the entire register of the piano with similar frequency and abandon. I'm sure there are plenty of other instances, although the contributor who implied that most composers would be unlikely to include every one of the piano's notes in a composition deliberately for the sake of so doing had an important point...

Best,

Alistair

Mr. Hinton,

If you don't mind, could you list examples of some Sorabji works that require the keyboard-extension provided by the Bosendorfer? Thank you!

-Peter

[arensky]

The first note of Prokofiev's Suggestioin Diabolique is "note #1". Someone once described the opening as a "Satan Belch"

                                              LMAO!!!!

[ahinton]

Mr. Hinton,

If you don't mind, could you list examples of some Sorabji works that require the keyboard-extension provided by the Bosendorfer? Thank you!

-Peter

Please forgive me that I simply do not have the time to do this right now - and it would take quite a while, I assure you! What I can nevertheless tell you is that a fairly large proportion of them do so, although, even in those works, passage-work in that extended area is uncommon.

Best,

Alistair

[espresso]

Prokofev's 3rd piano sonata has the lowest A, just before the ending i think

[Etude]

Are you learning the entire work and do you intend to perform it? If so (in either or both cases), may we wish you the best of luck!

Kind regards,

Alistair

I plan to learn several individual movements of the work.  I've already learnt Introito and am almost finished with Preludio-Corale and the Fuga I.  I've done a bit of work on the Fantasia but I've been mainly concentrating on page 29 for quite a while.  I've found that many movements of OC aren't as difficult as I imagined they would be.  I, like many people, have been misled by Madge's recording.  I thought learning this piece would mean spending decades working out countless tone clusters.  Then I got the score and as I was looking through it thought "when do these huge clusters begin?" hehe.  When they never did begin, I realised what Mr. Powell meant by inaccuracy when he posted on the pianoforum last year.  He said:

I must stress that I would advise no-one to judge the merits (whatever they may be ...) of the piece on the strength of the two available recordings, simply because they are both hugely inaccurate. I strove to learn all the notes, and in my humble opinion, the piece doesn't sound random and ridiculous (which it does on those recordings) when played pretty accurately and with decent phrasing, pedalling, sense of proportion etc.

I thought that he meant that the performers who made the recordings saw that the piece was filled with huge clusters and 'took shortcuts', in that they didn't play the specific clusters that Sorabji wrote.  But when I got the score I realised that the clusters were ADDED BY MADGE! For reasons beyond my comprehension, he essentialy improvised substantial amounts of the piece.  But that is for another thread.

Part of the reason I began learning movements was to hear what this piece actually sounded like.  I found that it makes so much sense if you play the right notes and give some basic interpretation to the music.  I don't plan to learn the entire piece anytime soon, although it can certainly be something to aim for.  A far more difficult task than learning the piece may be to find the opportunity to perform four hours of music.   

[prometheus]

The number of statements of the subject and its two countersubject, be it complete, incomplete, with minor derivations, or retrogarde/mirrored, in the first fugue is stunning. Obviously it's very structured.

[Etude]

The number of statements of the subject and its two countersubject, be it complete, incomplete, with minor derivations, or retrogarde/mirrored, in the first fugue is stunning. Obviously it's very structured.

I agree.  It's also wonderful when this subject returns in other movements.  Examples: Fantasia, Fuga II, Cadenza I, Fuga III, and the Coda-stretta.  It's absolutely packed with themes, yet some people don't seem to realise this:

To be honest: for the amount of thematic material presented, and the way Sorabji uses it, I think this piece is about ten movements too long.

24 themes (excluding inversions, retrogrades and retrograde-inversions) for 12 movements doesn't seem so bad.  It's how or whether the themes are presented in performance.

[ahinton]

A far more difficult task than learning the piece may be to find the opportunity to perform four hours of music.   

Well, it may not be an easy task to do the latter, but several pianists have so far managed it nevertheless!

Good luck with both your learning of the piece and your securing of performance opportunities once it is learnt.

Best,

Alistair

[prometheus]

Didn't Sorabji say that the OC may only be performed complete? Not that I don't think everyone has the freedom to do what they want with it.


The piece is just too long. It's not the theme ratio per measure or time that is the problem for some people. It's that the themes aren't obvious and that its just too long. Just like the Beethven 9th is too long. The quality makes it more amazing and interesting.

[Etude]

Note: Seperation and performance of any section or subsection apart from the whole work is absolutely prohibited

The work is only intended for pianist-musicians of the highest order - indeed its intellectual and technical difficulties place it beyond the reach of any others - it is a weighty and serious contribution to the literature of the piano, for serious musicians and serious listeners only.

However, according to the interview with G.D. Madge.  He discussed with Sorabji the possibilities for performances of individual movements.

The movements that may be played seperately are:

Introito
Preludio-Corale
Fuga I
Fantasia
Interludium Primum
Interludium Alterum