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Topic: Arnold Schoenberg, Op 19 nr 1 & 2 (Read 4957 times)

daniloperusina

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Arnold Schoenberg, Op 19 nr 1 & 2

on: November 03, 2010, 04:17:25 AM

From the year 1913, imagine that it's already 100 years old!:)
Opiniate, and I'll be delighted!
Thanks

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furtwaengler

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Re: Arnold Schoenberg, Op 19 nr 1 & 2

Reply #1 on: November 03, 2010, 05:55:35 AM

Quote from: daniloperusina on November 03, 2010, 04:17:25 AM

From the year 1913, imagine that it's already 100 years old!:)

Well, not quite a hundred, but very close. Another way to look at is to go back 90-100 years from that and see that there was a revolutionary, Beethoven in his late period whose ideas would still be a revelation in 1913 as both he and Schoenberg are today...they don't age as other things do.
do.

I really enjoy your playing here. In these pieces Schoenberg shades moments with what could only be called, "beauty for the sake of beauty," and you well revel in this beauty. I thank you for sharing it with us!

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Don't let anyone know where you tie your goat.

ramseytheii

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Re: Arnold Schoenberg, Op 19 nr 1 & 2

Reply #2 on: November 03, 2010, 09:56:02 AM

On one hand I admire your very relaxed, elegant style of playing the piano. It's a good relief from seeing a lot of extraneous motion that actually contradicts the music, or histrionic display that has inevitably been seen before.

I also love these pieces. The first one I thought was too anti-climactic. It needed, in my opinion, some more breadth for two purposes: one, to bring out the polyphony more.. remember Schoenberg railed against mechanization of rhythm in performance. Your rhythm is not mechanical, but it can use a greater flexibility specifically to alert us to which voices belong where.

Second purpose for breadth is to achieve a bit more dynamic contrast in the climactic spots. They seemed too timid for this expressionist, highly concentrated emotional music.

I felt the same way about the second, though minus the comments about polyphony.

Good job and I hope you play all of these wonderful pieces.

Walter Ramsey

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birba

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Re: Arnold Schoenberg, Op 19 nr 1 & 2

Reply #3 on: November 03, 2010, 08:02:17 PM

Well, after the Schnittke, these are like playing tiddly-winks, I imagine. You play them very well. Your tone is superlative - we know that, from the Schnittke. But after you're done, it's like "Is that all there is?" It's true, they're quite insignificant in a way, like little haikus or something. You really do underplay them. But I think there's really no other way. In a programme you might couple these (all three, of course) with the Webern variations and then tear into the Wanderer or the Hammerklavier.

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daniloperusina

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Re: Arnold Schoenberg, Op 19 nr 1 & 2

Reply #4 on: November 06, 2010, 01:39:52 AM

It is music from a specific era, a time and a place, just like Beethoven's. None of them can be repeated today, of course, and it shouldn't even be attempted. But they age well and always sound fresh!

Walter Ramsey, I've been thinking about your comments on polyphony, rythm and dynamics. I did that while working on them of course, as well. For me, a performer fails with polyphony if not all voices are played with great musical care. That is not the same, though, as bringing all voices to the forefront. I beleive that even in such writing some voices can belong to the barely audible, as long as they 'speak', even if subdued to a more dominant voice. 'Barely audible' especially here, since pp and ppp occur so frequently in nr 1. In bar 14 he indicates the top voice "mf (mit ton)", and middle/lower voices with "p", while in bar 5 the middle voice gets "espressivo".

On dynamics, if the composer gives me a range between ppp and p, with one instance of mf (nr 1), or pp to p with one mf (nr 2), that's where I'll try to go. Schoenberg, as all other composers, where very capable of writing the letters ff, but here chose not to. I'm very keen to take that into consideration.
Rhythm, in nr 2, e.g, I find it unthinkable not to play in time as the staccato thirds are so carefully placed metrically in the bars. One bar has "etwas gedehnt", followed by "gut im takt".
In nr 1, there are a few ritardandi and other indications like "zögernd" "flüchtig" "espressivo" "leicht", and that's what I try to respond to.

Birba, I like what you wrote a lot! The idea of understatement, underplaying them, are for me really words that capture the essence of these utterly sensitive works of high aesthetic art.
Thanks for the programme suggestion, not so bad actually!:)

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