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Topic: Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2  (Read 8332 times)

Offline jinfiesto

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Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2
on: July 21, 2007, 06:22:52 PM
Again... Not so difficult.... Cool piece though. The divided hand deal is a little hard.
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Offline pianistimo

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Re: Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2
Reply #1 on: July 21, 2007, 06:52:37 PM
lots of musicality here.  i feel the very beginning now needs just a slight bit of 'freedom' from being 'too precise.'  are you a vocalist, too?  it's really lovely in the 'feel' and it's like you know the words to this piece.  you express whatever is being expressed with understanding.

Offline jinfiesto

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Re: Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2
Reply #2 on: July 21, 2007, 07:03:32 PM
Yeah... I hear you about the beginning. Hahaha and I can't sing to save my life, although to get the phrasing and stuff just right on this piece, i did sing along. Much to the dismay of my family... and the dog... the dog hates me... hahahahahahaha..

Offline rachfan

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Re: Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2
Reply #3 on: July 21, 2007, 11:09:37 PM
You put this piece over very convincingly.  Nice interpretation, command of touch, dynamics, and expression.  I think you and I are the only ones who post Mendelssohn pieces on this forum.  Again, a fine rendition.  Thanks for posting it.
Interpreting music means exploring the promise of the potential of possibilities.

Offline jinfiesto

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Re: Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2
Reply #4 on: July 22, 2007, 08:14:38 AM
Only ones who post Mendelssohn? That's depressing... Hahaha, I think it's cuz Mendelssohn is hard to play... not annoyingly... hahahahaha. I'll post my Rondo Cappriccioso as soon as I get around to recording it!

Offline rachfan

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Re: Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2
Reply #5 on: July 22, 2007, 09:23:54 PM
Hi jinfiesto,

I actually have mixed feelings about Mendelssohn.  I've posted many of Mendelssohn's Songs here--but not because I'm crazy about his compositions, although I believe I play them fairly well.  I learned them (a self initiative) and added them to my repertoire more as a duty to be a "well rounded" pianist.  My sense is that Chopin, Liszt  and Schumann revolutionized music for piano and created the Golden Age of the Romantic Piano.  Brahms and Mendelssohn are considered to have been Romantic composers too, of course, but Brahms, although he admittedly did some daring things, was still rooted in Classicism.  Mendelssohn went beyond Brahms and was actually the activist representative of Classicism in his own time, although he put a Romantic tinge on it.  His revival of J. S. Bach (although Baroque era) and his own Preludes and Fugues is an example of his looking back to the past for inspiration. 

Also, unlike his peers, Mendelssohn was well off and never had to struggle financially to become established.  Aside from the death of Fanny, his sister, he didn't experience much tragedy in his life either.  Thus, that sense of tragedy that so moved the other composers is not really infused into his composing--it's not palpable.  His themes are nearly always upbeat.  His music is orderly and many melodies, harmonies and cadences are truly banal or shallow.  Some of his piano pieces like the Fantasies remind me of high velocity spinning pinwheels on the 4th of July.  But once they end, somehow they are not too memorable.  I think others experience that also. 

Very tellingly, Mendelssohn well knew his own limitations in writing piano music.  When his publishers would request new pieces, he actually agonized over it and dreaded it, as he knew it was definitely not his best genre--he was much more successful as a symphonic composer.  So in short, he was not a Chopin or a Liszt.  I believe that's why he's not well represented on this forum--his music is probably deemed less complex, interesting, or deep in emotional content, so is not performed as frequently as that of the other Romantics. 

But we should remember too that Anton Rubinstein considered the Songs without Words as the very best test of a pianist's mettle.  When he would audition a new student, he did not want to hear bravura pieces; rather he wanted to hear a couple of the Songs in order to judge musicality and musicianship.  Nevertheless, if I had to guess, I would envision that decades from now Mendelssohn's piano output would likely go the way of the piano works of Carl Maria von Weber.  That would be a bad outcome.  For that reason, although Mendelssohn might not have been the most dynamic of the Romantics, I think we should all include him in our repertoires to better appreciate what he did accomplish and to share it with others.     
Interpreting music means exploring the promise of the potential of possibilities.

Offline jinfiesto

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Re: Mendelssohn-Lieder Ohne Worte Op67 No2
Reply #6 on: July 23, 2007, 04:56:46 AM
I suppose I agree to one degree or another, However, it's my opinion, that Mendelssohns music is extraordinarily complex, both musically and to some extent technically. Mendelssohn was one of the great child prodigies, and had incredible technical faculty. As for the shallowness of his composition, I really agree for the most part, but there are a few, The Songs Without Words aren't all up beat, and to me, they all seem a little bit melancholy with the exception of that god awful spinning song. Most annoying piece ever... hahahaha. Anyways, there is a lot to learn by playing mendelssohns music. Lyricism and playing with a divided hand most notably. It's also hard to play Mendelssohn, because it sounds really busy unless the melodies are voiced just right, I think that's why Mendelssohn's music doesn't enjoy as much popularity as the great romantics, not necessarily because he was any worse. Despite the great lack of tragedy in his life, I don't think that made him any less of a composer, tragic music isn't the only noble music in the world. I agree with Rubinstein, that the songs are an excellent way to judge a student technically and musically. I certainly  hope that mendelssohn doesn't go the way of Carl Maria Von Weber... That would certainly be tragic. At least in my opinion.
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