Interesting Repertoire

[Spatula]

List down all the unique repetoire you can think off: Like the OC for the longest, the 4'33" for the most umm quietest.

Has there ever been a piece that used ALL 88 keys?  How about a piece that only used one key and one key only ...for example middle C (you can't count those kiddie exercise books)...

[shasta]

-Chopsticks
-Heart & Soul
-the leitmotif of "Jaws"
-that "black-key-only-knuckle" thing

The most infamous tones to ever emanate from every single upright currently in existance...

[claudio]

there is a piece composed by Erik Satie called "Vexations". i have not played
the notes myself yet but Satie gave the specifics that it is to be repeated
840 times. that would give it a total playing time of 24 hours.

i heard it was some kind of revenge for being fired from university 

[liszmaninopin]

There are a number of pieces that have used all 88 keys.

I am sure Violette's Sonatas 3,5,6, and 7 have.
I think (but have never checked) that Ligeti's etudes 6 and 13 use all the keys.

Longest piece-I think it's Sorabji's Sequentia Cyclia Super Des Irae; but I've also heard that his Opus Archimagicum (or something like that) is of comparable length.  Truthfully, these pieces also probably use every key on the keyboard.

For shortest piece, I vote Ligeti's 0'0".  I recall reading that he "composed" it to make fun of Cage's 4'33".

[Goldberg]

I heard that Satie wrote "Vexations" as a facetious "study" on meditating, which is quite typical of Satie...

Also, don't forget John Cage's sonatas for prepared piano...some are actually pretty cool, but one can't listen to them without realising how bizarre they are, for the most part.

There's a Mozart piece out there somewhere that requires the pianist to use his nose to play all the notes (I've always wanted to play that one!).

[amanfang]

How about this for the longest performance??

This comes from:  https://www.npr.org/programs/pt/features/2003/sep/aslsp.html

As Slow As Possible

Composed in 1987, avant-garde American composer John Cage (1912-1992) adapted Organ²/ASLSP from his 1985 work ASLSP for solo piano. The title is derived from Cage's direction to play the work "as slow as possible." The John Cage Foundation has taken the composer's directive quite literally; the Halberstadt performance is scheduled to end in the year 2640.

As Dr. Michael Betzle, the project's organizer, explains, "We stretch out a piece that might take 20 minutes, to last 639 years. And so, when I extend a piece in this way, then one sound will stretch out to two or three years."

In a 1982 interview with NPR, John Cage revealed that he wanted to make his "music so that it doesn't force the performers of it into a particular groove, but which gives them some space in which they can breathe and do their own work with a degree of originality. I like to make suggestions, and then see what happens, rather than setting down laws and forcing people to follow them." In other words, Cage's work is completely open to interpretation.

Several years after Cage's death in 1992, Betzle and a group of musicologists and philosophers from around the world discussed the possibility of a performance of ASLSP that would truly be in the spirit of John Cage. Exactly how slow is "as slow as possible"? The group decided that the duration of the work would be the lifetime of an organ, 639 years, "for as long as the organ can sound, and make sounds, or even stand upright," according to Hans-Ola Ericsson, professor of organ at the University of Lulea, Sweden. Ericsson was one of three organists who pressed a key on the first chord of Organ²/ASLSP.

The first modern organ, the Blokwerk organ, was built for the Halberstadt Cathedral in 1361, 639 years before the turn of the millennium. A brand new organ was built specifically for the Halberstadt performance of Organ²/ASLSP. The Cage Organ is based on the simple structure of the original Blokwerk organ, to lessen the chance of possible failures. Since no one person can perform this rendition of ASLSP, for obvious reasons, lead weights fill in for the fingers of the organist, while each note change will be played manually on the fifth day of the month, in remembrance of John Cage's birthday.

The next two notes, joining the sound of the first three, will be played on July 5, 2005.

 

[Brian Healey]

There are a number of pieces that have used all 88 keys.

Ahh....., but if your piano is a 96-key Bosendorfer, then that still leaves 8 keys unused!


In response to the John Cage thing, it was interesting reading, but why are they even bothering to do that? Some people just have too much time on their hands.

For most unique, my vote goes to any of the works of Henry Cowell. Hey Henry, most people like to play the KEYS of the piano!

[Spatula]

There are a number of pieces that have used all 88 keys.

Ahh....., but if your piano is a 96-key Bosendorfer, then that still leaves 8 keys unused!


In response to the John Cage thing, it was interesting reading, but why are they even bothering to do that? Some people just have too much time on their hands.

For most unique, my vote goes to any of the works of Henry Cowell. Hey Henry, most people like to play the KEYS of the piano!

Why? Does he compose music for people to stomp on the pedals or knock the wood of the piano lid? or pluck the strings?

[amanfang]

Doesn't 'The Banshee' by Cowell use the performer strumming the strings or something while someone else holds down the pedals?

[Brian Healey]

He also has a piece where the performer holds keys down (without sounding the notes) in order to raise the dampers, then plucks the strucks inside the piano to make the sound. It sounds like a harp. In fact, it's called "The Aeolian Harp". It actually sounds very cool. He also has other compositions that use similar, non-traditional methods of performance.

The majority of his compositions are played with keys, but these are still far from "normal". Cowell was a fan of thick clusters. Very thick clusters. To the point where using your whole forearm (or sometimes a block of wood) to mash a ton of notes is a commonly used technique.

[Spatula]

This guy makes Sorabji looks sane.

[Spatula]

I want to compose a piece that is so brutal to play that it's almost guaranteed to break your wrists, even played properly.

It's going to be rapid chords and insane cross over hands for almost every bar.

I'll call it "Die Handgelenkunterbrecher" (The Wrist Breaker).

[Spatula]

Another one will be "Krieg der Hände".

[liszmaninopin]

This guy makes Sorabji looks sane

The techniques you mention really aren't all that uncommon.

Cage had his "prepared piano pieces" which use all sorts of interesting ideas to achieve sound effects. (was he not the one who would stick bolts and such between piano strings to alter their sound, etc.?)

Ligeti wrote this awful etude, Touches bloquees, in which you must silently depress and hold keys with the left hand.  Then, one must play rapid chromatic scales over and around it with the right hand, using leftover fingers from the left hand to strike staccato notes.  Very challenging-the fingers always want to slip or release the depressed keys.

Clusters can be fun to play-Rautavaara uses them alot.  Also, there is one section in Violette's seventh sonata in which there are 283 (I think) clusters, each one notated precisely.

[Spatula]

I'm going to write a song where you gotta use your toes to play. 

[Spatula]

And another one where you smash keys with your forehead.

I'll name the piece, "Headache". 

[Spatula]

And another one, dare I say, where you have to sit on the keys to play.  And another where your entire body is on the keys, and you squiggle around like a snake and perform very unusual maneuvers to produce what sounds like a dying elephant. 

[Spatula]

By the way, are there pieces where it calls for totally random smashed up notes and "chords" where the sheet music will say random notes or whatever and its up to the pianist to smash the keys to their whim?

COOL!

[liszmaninopin]

It's quite possible, but I've never seen any that just say "smash any chord" or whatever.

I have seen chords marked "with fist" before.  I think that was in Antheil's Sonata Sauvage.

[DarkWind]

How about this piece, although it's not for piano

[Antnee]

Haha That's funny. I wonder what that would actually sound like... 

[Brian Healey]

What, are you saying that you can't sight-read that?

amateur........

[Spatula]

Well duh, you put your head on the G, your left foot on the C, your crotch on E.... etc etc etc

[Spatula]

I want to print what Darkie posted...but its too big a jpg file...

how to squeeze it down for 8.5 by 11 paper?
Nevermind...I'VE GOT IT!

now to print of the opus clavidumb dumb

[cziffra]

HAHAHAHAHAH!
If you can't play this why don't you call yourmommy!"
HAHAHAH!