I'm actually dumbfounded by the needless hostility in your post, which started in the one previous to this. All I did was state my opinion, and nothing in it was personal, but you mount a personal attack here, which is shameful, and also, adding insult to injury, you get your facts wrong. Enjoy!
You did not. Your exemplary sophistry has already been proven ineffective more than 2000 years ago by Aristotle. Hasn't any "teacher" taught you that?
I will let that quote speak for itself.
One word: collaboration. This would require for people collaborating to be large enough to eat their own words, ie "students of the truth". When Tchaikovsky went to Rubinstein with his first piano concerto, the only thing that Rubinstein did not do was to shoot and bury him. Nevertheless, things changed after a while and Rubinstein understood what had originally been done with the work. As Tchaikovsky wrote in one of his letters:
"... I had written a Piano Concerto. Not being a pianist, I considered it necessary to consult a virtuoso as to any points in my concerto which might be technically impracticable, ungrateful or ineffective. I had need of severe critic, but at the same time one kindly disposed towards me."
Sorry, you lost me in your eagerness to display your command of oft-repeated historical anecdotes. Are you contradicting my point in some way? Once again you seem to be subtly insulting teachers: " This would require for people collaborating to be large enough to eat their own words." I'm assuming you mean teachers are arrogant and dictatorial in general. In fact I never said my teacher had to eat words. Who is eating words? If a teacher encourages a student to study an esoteric piece, who is eating words? You are not making any sense.
Read what I wrote again and again, until practice makes it perfect:
There is a definite, irreplaceable need for a teacher when you need to reach a standard quality level of playing and there is no doubt about that. But it will not get you any further.
What you wrote is uninteresting to me. I am not interested in limits as a viable point of view, I am only interested in potential. The person who starts from limits, is the person who views the situation negatively to begin with. If one is always thinking, "This teacher can only get me so far," one had better go to a teacher that actually provides inspiration.
The notes are. Dynamics is the word you are trying to find here, and dynamics may differ after composition time, with the composer himself changing them in live performances of his own works. This is an argument that has been thoroughly discussed in the literature, but at it stands, "harmonics" has always the override on "dynamics" since dynamics becomes dependent on it. The same goes with the tempi you have to follow. Another example comes from romantic pianism vs Scriabin when it comes for example to the later Scriabin works. This is why, we find unusual italian words garnishing the scores like ... "legendaire". By using a tautological argument you prove no point.
The word you are searching for here, my dear, is not italian but French. Perhaps you have rejected your language teachers as unnecessary?
If you think that harmonics is "more important" than dynamics, then play a bunch of chords at indiscriminate levels of volume and see if anyone cares.
But you still haven't addressed my original point, which was that the interpretation of a piece of music comes not from objective criteria that are forever carved into stone, but from lifetimes of experience and knowledge, knowledge not only of the work at hand, but the whole body of a composer's work, and the music before and after it. All these things bear on interpretation, and if a student brings esoteric pieces in to the teacher who has no knowledge of this music, the advice they are going to get is necessary limited. And teachers freely admit this, at least the intelligent ones do.
Nobody said they were doing this, but when I added my own opinion to this thread, the personal attacks made it necessary to explain my point further.
I admit that this is mandatory, but when we "study" the works, it is not the dynamics that is of most importance but the harmonics, who always come first and impose themselves on everything else. Previously addressed in this reply.
I like the quotes around "study," as if you don't believe such a thing is possible. Well... enjoy your "studying!"
You are limiting yourself to simple technique - related issues, I have said over and over again: fully trained. And that is what my "treatise" was about.
No, because a good teacher can improve the technique of a student from any piece, whether the teacher knows it or not. I am actually opening up the consideration to include the musical issues at stake in any piece. It was you that imagined these lessons to be based solely on piano playing: "Quality of piano playing can be showed even through pieces you have not heard before."
Rosenthal was not Liszt. You have avoided the Rach/Horo question btw, so here comes another one for you: Horowitz feared that a pianist studying with him might end up a Horowitz clone, so the sessions were not publicized and Horowitz insisted "I am not teaching you. I give you tips." Again, read as well the Ravel comment before.
Horowitz had students, and this was known publicly. In addition, he did create poor Horowitz clones, and damaged their psyches. You need to read up more on Horowitz's excursions into teachings before you try and "learn" someone else.
I see that you take pains as well as to understand the difference between a teacher and a master. A teacher may never be a master, but a master may also be a teacher. Since some are obviously making a living out of this, it is crucial to understand that they will always be needed up to a certain point, once they understand this, they will also understand when to, put it bluntly, "butt" out. Read again what I wrote before:
There is a definite, irreplaceable need for a teacher when you need to reach a STANDARD quality level of playing and there is no doubt about that. But it will not get you any further.
"For those who have eyes to see, and ears to listen". Again, you totally misaddress the issue.
Likewise, for you unconsciously do this exact thing.
Basically, I am uninterested in your bland and essentially useless idea that "a teacher is only needed up to a certain point." Who cares? What matters is the potential of the teacher to influence and assist the student. Addressing this, I believe it better that a student bring works that the teacher knows well, and has a lifetime experience that they can impart on to the student. So that's what I advised. Then you freaked out, called me all sorts of names, and put on an admittedly hilarious air of pretension and bombast.
Somehow we see a lot of this kind of behavior these days on piano forum. But I will continue to go against the grain, because I enjoy being anti-establishment, and the establishment around here has definitely shifted in favor of the esoteric. Unfortunately, an exclusive focus on the esoteric usually comes without the benefit of hard-earned knowledge; the esoteric remains forever on the surface of things, only searching for what is new or unusual, and avoiding at all costs depth of knowledge.
Walter Ramsey
Topic: I need help choosing a sonata!