20/ 21st century tonal piano pieces?

[pianoplayjl]

EDITED:

What are some great 20/ 21st century piano pieces? I don't know of any. Most of them are atonal music, as far as I know.

JL

[retrouvailles]

What's your threshold for tonality? Not all of them are atonal. However, none of the good ones are conventionally tonal in the Romantic/Classical/Baroque period sense. Times have changed.

[costicina]

Ludovico Einaudi is an Italian composer very appreciated abroad. You can listen to his Divenire pieces, very captivating...

[camstrings]

You might try some sonatas by Tippett, Barber, Copland, Prokofiev
Your reaction to these might indicate what you would define as tonal/atonal.
I rather like Tippett's First Sonata as recorded by Stephen Osbourne & Prokofiev's 7th(Gould )

Best, Ian

[thorn]

Define 'atonal'. A lot of people ignorantly use the term "atonal" to refer to anything that isn't in a major or minor key. Same with the term "non-functional harmony"; I remember one of my music teachers using that term about Debussy's music and I frequently used to argue that his harmony was serving a function in the context of the piece. Obviously, his harmony isn't textbook regurgitation, but "non-functional" really isn't the appropriate term.

Anyway, Messiaen wrote some beautiful music. I deliberately choose him because again his music is not textbook standard, yet a lot of his music is based on his modes of limited transposition- to me this very much qualifies as tonal.

[ahinton]

Yes - the need first to define tonal - or at least what the term might mean to you - is of vital importance before any repertoire choices are considered. It's a very loose term and can encompass works that include tonal references that may have few if any tonal centres - have a look, for example, at scores of piano works by Sorabji in which there are plenty of scale passages and common chords but which generally eschew tonal centres and explore tonal relationships quite differently to the ways in which composers did so before the 20th century, although the roots of the loosening of tonal bonds dates back into the 19th century and beyond. "Tonal" is also a comparative term to the extent that it means different things to different pairs of ears, according to aural capacity and experience.

That said, there's plenty of worthwhile piano music from the present and previous centuries that involves tonalities and tonal relationships in one way or another - in Russian music alone, there's ample work by Medtner, Prokofiev, Shostakovich and dozens of other lesser-known composers and some of it is expertly written for the instrument, too.

Best,

Alistair

[redbaron]

have a look, for example, at scores of piano works by Sorabji

I thought there'd been complaints about you dropping his name into things far, far too often?

[thalbergmad]

I thought there'd been complaints about you dropping his name into things far, far too often?

I think we are used to it by now.

If there was a thread on Medieval brass rubbings, good old Sorabji would manage to sneak in somehow.

Thal

[fftransform]

Not atonal:

Atonal:

As such, please be more specific.

[ahinton]

I thought there'd been complaints about you dropping his name into things far, far too often?

I am not aware of there having been any complaints per se - and what if there have been? That's surely a matter for Nils. In the context of tonality and piano music of the past century, what exactly is wrong with writing of a composer who used common chords and familiar scale patterns frequently but whose works generally do not fall into the realms of tonal centred music? I drop Sorabji's name into a topic if it has a place to be there, which in this case it certainly does.

Best,

Alistair

[ahinton]

I think we are used to it by now.

If there was a thread on Medieval brass rubbings, good old Sorabji would manage to sneak in somehow.

I'm not sure what it is that you're telling people here that "we" (whoever that may be) are used to, but if anyone here really wanted to bring Sorabji's name into a thread about Medieval brass rubbings, there would first have to be such a thread and someone else would have to do it as I know little about that topic or indeed of Sorabji's knowledge of and interest in it.

Best,

Alistair

[fftransform]

What are some great 20/21st century piano pieces?  Almost all of the great ones are atonal, but I am wondering what some of the tonal ones are.

Here, I fixed your thread.

[thalbergmad]

I'm not sure what it is that you're telling people here that "we" (whoever that may be) are used to, but if anyone here really wanted to bring Sorabji's name into a thread about Medieval brass rubbings, there would first have to be such a thread and someone else would have to do it as I know little about that topic or indeed of Sorabji's knowledge of and interest in it.

https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=45336.0

[redbaron]

In the context of tonality and piano music of the past century, what exacetly is wrong with writing of a composer who used copmmon chords and familiar scale patterns frequently but whose works generally do not fall into the realms of tonal cantred music? I drop Sorabji's name into a topic if it has a place to be there, which in this case it certainly does.

[/q

It smells ever so slightly of self promotion considering you are the curator of the Sorabji Archive...

[retrouvailles]

Ludovico Einaudi is an Italian composer very appreciated abroad. You can listen to his Divenire pieces, very captivating...

Ludovico Einaudi is new age, though, not classical. You can't play his music in an academic and/or concert setting.

[j_menz]

Ludovico Einaudi is new age, though, not classical. You can't play his music in an academic and/or concert setting.

Probably true for academia, but in a concert setting you can play what you like.

[thorn]

Einaudi has a problem with his score editing software. Whenever he uses the Ctrl + V function, it sticks and goes on for 5 pages  

Sorabji is relevant to this thread. What does it matter who brings him up?

[retrouvailles]

Probably true for academia, but in a concert setting you can play what you like.

Yeah, and I could also play a concert naked if I wanted to, just like Friedrich Gulda. But will I? No, because it is best not to, so I keep my dignity. Same goes for Einaudi.

Sorabji actually would be a great suggestion. His pastiches are suitable for mere mortals and would be a great place to start.

[fftransform]

These are some of the "great pieces," 1945 through present:

etc., etc., etc.  There is plenty of great music from this period.  If this is not the type of music that you want to play (are you honestly saying that you can play this type of music, by the way?), then you don't want to play the "great music" of this period.  Because this is what the "great music" of this period is.

[ahinton]

In the context of tonality and piano music of the past century, what exactly is wrong with writing of a composer who used common chords and familiar scale patterns frequently but whose works generally do not fall into the realms of tonal centred music? I drop Sorabji's name into a topic if it has a place to be there, which in this case it certainly does.

It smells ever so slightly of self promotion considering you are the curator of the Sorabji Archive...

Leaving aside your apparent error in the use of the quote facility here, my understanding of English usage makes its hard for me to figure out how "self promotion" of Sorabji could be achieved other than by Sorabji himself, which would in any case be very difficult, since he's been dead for more then 23 years, so it would appear that your olfactory capabilities are substantially different to those of the rest of us.

What matters, however, is the justification or otherwise of Sorabji's appearance in this thread and, for that, I refer you to the comments of others as well as to my own.

Best,

Alistair

[ahinton]

These are some of the "great pieces," 1945 through present:

etc., etc., etc.  There is plenty of great music from this period.  If this is not the type of music that you want to play (are you honestly saying that you can play this type of music, by the way?), then you don't want to play the "great music" of this period.  Because this is what the "great music" of this period is.

Well, not quite; this is just "some of" what it is. The initiator of the thread wants to know about important tonal piano music of the past 122 years or so and, leaving aside the issues that have been aired already as to how (and even if) one can meaningfully define "tonal" to suit all possible contexts in which it might be used, it would surely be misleading to suggest that the composition of great tonal piano music ended around 1900, would it not?

Best,

Alistair

[retrouvailles]

Yeah, most of those pieces might sway people away from 20th/21st century music and most of those should be left for people like me, Alistair, the original poster of those videos, and other people that are very familiar with that sort of music. It isn't for someone just getting their feet wet.

[j_menz]

Yeah, most of those pieces might sway people away from 20th/21st century music and most of those should be left for people like me, Alistair, the original poster of those videos, and other people that are very familiar with that sort of music. It isn't for someone just getting their feet wet.

So you're basically saying (as Mark Twain did about Wagner), that this sort of music isn't as bad as it sounds?

[ahinton]

So you're basically saying (as Mark Twain did about Wagner), that this sort of music isn't as bad as it sounds?

This reminds me of one Harry Zelzer, the Chicago-based impresario, who is reported as having declared that "good music isn't nearly as bad as it sounds".

That said, it has become a sad fact of life that most if not all of the works re-posted above have entered the area of contemporary specialism and will almost certainly remain there until we're sufficiently far removed in time from the era of their composition to be able to refer to them instead as falling within the area of latter 20th century specialism; whilst pianists who explore such repertoire do, of course, play other things, their reputations tend for the most part to rest upon their performance of such repertoire. Pianists such as Pollini who play Boulez and Stockhausen (albeit not much of either's work and not all that frequently) are notable exceptions to this in that they're far better known for performances of earlier repertoire. In the light of all the earlier orchestral repertoire that Boulez has conducted, one might speculate as to whether his piano music might have entered the repertoires of more pianists had he regularly performed it himself (which by all reliable accounts he could have done had he chosen to do so), but I guess that we'll never know for sure. I find myself questioning the extent to which such specialism, however unintended, can reasonably be regarded as a healthy trend, just as I have done for years during which the Arditti Quartet, for example, have rarely played anything other than relatively recent music, particularly in their earlier days when their repertoire was almost exclusively confined to post-WWII works. The risk of unwelcome ghettoisation - perceived or real - seems all too great.

All that said, the important fact here is that there are indeed 20th and 21st century piano works that are very different to those re-posted above and, if that's what the originator of the post is more interested in, then there should be no difficulty in finding works to explore.

Best,

Alistair

[thalbergmad]

I can understand a thread asking about 21st century tonal works, but since romanticism still blossomed throughout the 20th century a list of tonal works good or bad would number in the thousands.

Hundreds of romantic style piano concertos were written in the 20th century, but there were undoubtedly more plinkers.

Thal

[ahinton]

I can understand a thread asking about 21st century tonal works, but since romanticism still blossomed throughout the 20th century a list of tonal works good or bad would number in the thousands.

Hundreds of romantic style piano concertos were written in the 20th century, but there were undoubtedly more plinkers.

Leaving aside what might or might not be meant by this great favourite term of yours, "plinkers", the conclusion in your first paragraph is beyond argument, as is the first half of your second; however, tonality and Romanticism do not always go hand in hand and a tonally based work does not necessarily have to be of Romantic bent (as we know from the Minimalists to the cost and chagrin of some of us)...

Best,

Alistair

[thalbergmad]

tonality and Romanticism do not always go hand in hand

Indeed not, I have heard some works that are probably up to a P4 and still romantically inclined.

Thal

[pianowolfi]

Indeed not, I have heard some works that are probably up to a P4 and still romantically inclined.

Thal

What is P4? is that something like the Richter scale applied to atonality?

[thalbergmad]

Indeed you are correct. P4 is Plinker level 4.

Thal

[ahinton]

What is P4? is that something like the Richter scale applied to atonality?

Je ne comprends pas; what's Sviatoslav got to do with this?

Best,

Alistair

[j_menz]

Indeed you are correct. P4 is Plinker level 4.

Oooooh.... I'd love to see the whole Plinker Scale explained. 

[retrouvailles]

So "plinky" =  atonal? I can think of tons of atonal pieces that don't conjure up the word "plinky". Oh thal, your ignorance is hilarious sometimes.

Also, why are threads about modern/atonal/whatever piano music always derailed? Can we please get back to the topic? I'll start by suggesting that you play some Carl Vine. Lots of tonality, but some atonal techniques mixed in.

[ahinton]

I have railed against - or should I more discreetly say questioned - the use of the term "plinky" here on several previous occasions and it is invariably Thal who has recourse to it. Since it has no obvious (if indeed any) meaning in technical terms when applied to piano music, it has to be accepted/rejected as a personal opinion of certain music that seeks to offer no explanation as to why it is held, let alone what its use supposedly signifies, in the contexts in which it tends to get placed.

My copy of OED does not include an entry for it in the main section but the word "plink" does appear in the third of its supplementary volumes, as follows:


plink (pliŋk), v. [Imit.] a. intr.  To emit a short sharp metallic or ringing sound; to play a musical instrument in this manner.
...{here follow some examples from literature of its use as above}...
b. intr. and trans.  To shoot a gun at a target; to hit (a target) with a shot from a gun
...{here follow some more examples from literature of its use as above}...
So pli∙nking ppl. a. and vbl. sb.
...{here follow some more examples from literature of its use as above, one of which might be of especial interest to Thal as it runs
1977 J. Cleary High Road to China iv. 139 The General practising his banjo..the plinking of the strings)}.

plink (pliŋk), sb. [f. the vb.]  The sound or action of plinking; a sharp metallic noise. Also quasi-adv. and as int.
...{here follow some more examples from literature of its use as above}...


Now, since there is no expectation of any involvement of guns or gunshots in the music that Thal so describes and since it is certain piano music rather than banjo music to which he attaches this term and its derivatives, we remain none the wiser, I fear; synonymity with atonality is even harder to perceive than any other non-reason for its use here.

Best,

Alistair

[commissiona]

So "plinky" =  atonal? I can think of tons of atonal pieces that don't conjure up the word "plinky". Oh thal, your ignorance is hilarious sometimes.

Also, why are threads about modern/atonal/whatever piano music always derailed? Can we please get back to the topic? I'll start by suggesting that you play some Carl Vine. Lots of tonality, but some atonal techniques mixed in.

I may be going out on a limb, here, but I wouldn't say thal's ignorant of atonal music, just has a very strong distaste for it, which I can understand.  

I'm very inclined toward the atonal 20th century works (love Xenakis, Penderecki, etc), but I do have my own threshold.  If the Pn thing is a scale P1-10, mine would have to be a 9 or 9.5, whatever.  

Above that, Cage's music scored for a voice and pile driver, Stockhausen 'Helicopter' where a string quartet is played with each musician performing in a different chopper, how am I supposed to listen to that?!  I suppose maybe some of those works aren't really meant to be listened to as much as appreciating how much of a spectacle a composer can make of himself.

  But your right, enought mucking up this guy's thread, he just wants to expand his repertoire and appreciate some new music he doesn't know about.  I very much like Ligeti's Musica ricercata (early 1950s), an 11 movement sort of study of 'tonality' (hehe, Ligeti tonality) for piano, at the same time very experimental.  Never attempted to play it, but massive fun to listen to and study, for me.

[ahinton]

I may be going out on a limb, here, but I wouldn't say thal's ignorant of atonal music, just has a very strong distaste for it, which I can understand.

No, of course he is not "ignorant" of atonal music and I would never suggest that he were so; my remarks were strictly confined to his persistent use of the term "plink" and its derivatives when writing of music for which he evidently has, as you put it "a very strong distaste" and I remain unclear as to whether and how this "plinky" word as used such a context is supposed to apply only to atonal music.

I'm very inclined toward the atonal 20th century works (love Xenakis, Penderecki, etc), but I do have my own threshold.  If the Pn thing is a scale P1-10, mine would have to be a 9 or 9.5, whatever.

I simply don't get the entire principle of the Pn thing, at least not in Thallish terms.

Above that, Cage's music scored for a voice and pile driver, Stockhausen 'Helicopter' where a string quartet is played with each musician performing in a different chopper, how am I supposed to listen to that?!  I suppose maybe some of those works aren't really meant to be listened to as much as appreciating how much of a spectacle a composer can make of himself.

You are supposed to listen to it with your ears -and then make up your mind what you think about it - just like any other sounds.

But your right, enought piss-staining this guy's thread, he just wants to expand his repertoire and appreciate some new music he doesn't know about.  I very much like Ligeti's Musica ricercata (early 1950s), an 11 movement sort of study of 'tonality' (hehe, Ligeti tonality) for piano, at the same time very experimental.  Never attempted to play it, but massive fun to listen to and study, for me.

Ligeti, piano music and tonality go together in a number of instances, as certain numbers in his series of studies well demonstrates.

Best,

Alistair

[commissiona]

You are supposed to listen to it with your ears -and then make up your mind what you think about it - just like any other sounds.

This is an excellent point about this kind of music, in fact key; you can't listen to them the same way you listen to Mozart, Stravinsky even.  Get past that, and that's a huge genre for you to explore and appreciate - you can't go wrong, there.

(But for those I mentioned, I've have listened them,  , and I think they're a pretty unpleasant experience (pile driver, ouch), sort of like in the same way listening to a baby scream.  But there is a threshold, and we have all drawn out our own lines to what that is to some extent. For some it's just a certain level of dissonance.  Mine is simply pain.)

Yes, there's more great Ligeti keyboard music to go 'round other than ricercata , check them out!  Also (back to tonal), since I mentioned him, tonal and beautiful (in the traditional sense) Cage?!  It exists, try 'In a Landscape' and 'Dream', late 1940s.  I've played both of these before, so that means they are very easy to learn.

[thalbergmad]

I may be going out on a limb, here, but I wouldn't say thal's ignorant of atonal music, just has a very strong distaste for it, which I can understand.  

That is very generous of you and I cannot help wondering if in my attempts to appreciate atonal music I have actually listened to more of it than those who actually like it.

Incidentally, I was recently fascinated with a work by Lachenmann which reached an incredible 9.6 on my plonkometer.

Thal

[pianowolfi]

Je ne comprends pas; what's Sviatoslav got to do with this?

Best,

Alistair

Not Sviatoslav, but Charles Francis.

[pianowolfi]

T
Incidentally, I was recently fascinated with a work by Lachenmann which reached an incredible 9.6 on my plonkometer.

Thal

Now, I admit, I am entirely confused. Should it not read "plinkometer"? 

[ahinton]

Not Sviatoslav, but Charles Francis.

I was as aware of that as you are that it's not a very good joke...

Best,

Alistair

[ahinton]

Now, I admit, I am entirely confused. Should it not read "plinkometer"? 

What was that piece by Leroy Anderson? - Plink, Plank, Plunk?  - and it's tonal! It's no wonder that you're confused!

Best,

Alistair

[pianowolfi]

What was that piece by Leroy Anderson? - Plink, Plank, Plunk?  - and it's tonal! It's no wonder that you're confused!

Best,

Alistair

Yes, and I stay so, as there is still no "plonk" in it  

@pianoplayjl perhaps Thomas Larcher might be something for you? Just google him up.

[minor9th]

Where does Carl Vine's music fit in the tonal continuum? I don't have the scores, but his Sonatas strike me as freely chromatic rather than downright atonal, and he certainly isn't a 12-tone composer.

[retrouvailles]

Where does Carl Vine's music fit in the tonal continuum? I don't have the scores, but his Sonatas strike me as freely chromatic rather than downright atonal, and he certainly isn't a 12-tone composer.

I'd characterize it as freely tonal and highly chromatic, with lots of quartal and quintal harmonies. There are some atonal sections, but it is never downright atonal.