Shortest piece?

[stormx]

Hi !!   

I wonder which is the shortest piece ever written by a WELL KNOWN composer. My candidate is a Beethoven's bagatelle (in the Op. 119 set, i beleive), that Kovacevich plays in just 9 seconds !!!  (the shortest Beethoven's piece ever, of course).

PD: please, only serious and famous composers are allowed (ie: John Cage is banned  )

[jeremyjchilds]

I thought John Cage was a famous composer...

But anyways...I would agree that your Bagatelle is a very short song...makes it easy to memorize

[nanabush]

The Chopin prelude C minor would be if it wasn't so freaking slow.  But the bagatelle 9 seconds?!  Which is it I want to see it.

[stormx]

The Chopin prelude C minor would be if it wasn't so freaking slow.  But the bagatelle 9 seconds?!  Which is it I want to see it.

It is Beethoven Op. 119, n°10. I have not seen the score, tough.

[apion]

What is Chopin's shortest piece?  Is it the Minute Waltz?

[nanabush]

Chopin's shortest piece is probably his Prelude in C sharp minor from the set of 24... I can play in about 22 seconds.  He has other preludes which are very very short too.

[hodi]

schumann - the elf
from album leaf op.124 is about 21 seconds.

[Skeptopotamus]

Ligeti 0'00".  it lasts 0 seconds.

[thierry13]

The shortest piece of my body is my little finger  The longest is...


HOoo a piece of music !!

Skepto, we talked about SERIOUS composers ^^ (ligeti is a serious composer... except for that piece ) And shortest in time, or shortest in number of measures?

[mlsmithz]

What is Chopin's shortest piece?  Is it the Minute Waltz?

Not by a long shot; a number of the preludes hover around the 30-second mark or even below if played quickly (I think the E-flat minor prelude may just about be the shortest by a few seconds), and more still are shorter than 60 seconds.  In terms of number of bars, well, the E major prelude is only 12 bars long, but it's marked Largo so it takes about a minute to play.  Same for the C minor prelude, which is only 13 bars long.

The grand champion of short preludes in the 24 major and minor keys, though, is probably Hummel, whose 24 Preludes Op.67 take a total of eight minutes to perform and vary between 10 seconds and 30 seconds in length.  I suspect they're not intended as stand-alone pieces, though.

[Skeptopotamus]

The shortest piece of my body is my little finger  The longest is...

thierry you must have tiny hands ^^  (it's a thinker)

[llamaman]

schumann - the elf
from album leaf op.124 is about 21 seconds.

Dang, you took mine. I'm considering starting that piece.