what you say with your music

[lmpianist]

When I start working on new pieces and bring them to my teacher for the first time for advice and comments, it's not unusual that the first question I'm asked is, "so what do you want to say with this piece?"  There are times when I have a clear idea, or picture in my mind of what's going on behind the scenes for at least a few passages - particularly if the music is very romantic and brings to mind images of that sort, or there is already a program inherent in the work (e.g. Schumann's Carnaval, Liszt's Mazeppa, Debussy's Children's Corner, etc, none of which I've learned by the way  ).  But aside from cases like these, I rarely sketch out an entire program for what the music might represent unless my teacher asks me to.  I was even asked to do this for a Bach prelude from WTC and it seemed very artificial.

I usually have a better idea of how a piece should sound musically (e.g. how passages should be phrased, where to slow down, where to accent, what themes to bring out, etc).  I think this comes mostly from intuition and experience with a particular composer's works (or the time period of the music) rather than formulating a story to convey through the performance.  I think this does expose a weakness in the way I go about learning pieces, though - I can't always defend the interpretive choices I make, so this could potentially provide an alternative means of doing so.

What are your thoughts?  Do you think it's always necessary to devise a program like this for each piece?

[thalberg]

Interesting question!!

Well, a *story* is not always appropriate.  Lots of times, it is appropriate, but as you discovered with your Bach prelude, sometimes it just doesn't fit.

The reason why a story didn't fit with the Bach prelude is because that was not what Bach was going for.  In Bach's day, they had this idea that a piece of music should communicate one emotion, or affection, and that musical figures could affect the emotions in predictable ways.  Triplets, for example, were supposed to produce Joy (Jesu Joy of Man's desiring, all gigues, etc). 

So a more appropriate question for a Bach prelude would be, "what affection is Bach trying to convey with this piece?"  It's also important to note that Baroque affections are not personal and subjective, but rather are universal and objective.  Bach tried to communicate joy in general, not his personal joy.  Sadness in general, not his personal sadness.  This may seem strange, but if you compare him to someone like Rachmaninoff, who was very personal, you can get the idea. 

For example, the Bach Prelude in D major from Book I communicates intense joy in my opinion.  Prelude in C major communicates peace, I think.  So this is different from a story.

Around Mozart's time, people (like philosopher Daniel Webb) were writing about how pleasurable it was to have contrasts of emotions in music--even to have gradual transitions between emotions.  In a Mozart sonata, it would be good then to identify several characters or emotions and see how you can make them contrast.  And, since Mozart was such an opera genius, it might not hurt to imagine scenes to go with the music.  Not stories, just scenes.

Beethoven was more philosophical and metaphysical.  In a Murray Perahia masterclass, he talked about this.

Programs or stories would go better with the romantic composers, I think.

And even some 20th century ones.  I know that visualizing Prokofiev's Ist movement of the 7th sonata as a march of the communist army really helped me play it better.

[opus57]

What are your thoughts?  Do you think it's always necessary to devise a program like this for each piece?

Absolutely NOT! Music has to come and go trough your "soul" and heart and if there is a "story" in it, it will come automatically to you or there is none. If you want to find a "story" or some other content in a piece, the spirit of music can easily be lost. when I listen to music or when I try to compose something, I never try to find a "subject" or a "story" in it. BUT: if something jumps to my mind accidentially I use and enjoy it... 

[pianochick93]

I usually have a better idea of how a piece should sound musically (e.g. how passages should be phrased, where to slow down, where to accent, what themes to bring out, etc).  I think this comes mostly from intuition and experience with a particular composer's works (or the time period of the music) rather than formulating a story to convey through the performance. 

I do pretty much the same as you. I also like to imagine a scene which would fit the music well.  I now can't help but imagine the Halo 3 trailer for Raindrop Prelude, as I lack any other ideas for what could fit it.

[counterpoint]

As Mendelssohn said, the musical message is too concrete to put it into words - not too vague.

Just let the music speak and don't fantasize so much about a relation to the "real" world.