Piano Technique: A Mishap? or Cheating?

[scriabinophile]

I saw an old, much-too-long thread about pianists cheating and was surprised that no one had discussed the Schubert Wanderer Fantasy.

There is that notorious alternating RH / LH octave passage near the end of the first section of the Wanderer that hardly anyone can play in tempo.  Lang Lang at Carnegie Hall gave it a shot in tempo, but he fudged many of the left hand notes.  Then there's Kissin, who like many others, has to do a big ritardando to manage the LH octaves.

But the best (or worst?) one of all is Brendel. Check him out in this video ("Great Pianists' Technique: Mishaps") at 25:49:

Mishap?  To my mind, that's no mishap.  It's flagrant cheating.

[faulty_damper]

I don't know what you're talking about. It sounded fine to me.

Also, anyone who thinks that there can be cheating in piano/instrument performance is seriously misguided.  Unless someone walks up on stage to help play a passage, it isn't cheating.  Simplifying isn't cheating, either.

[chopin2015]

We should talk about simplifying. It is a clever way to learn a piece. Play simply, then add all the funky stuff. Also, adding notes is a similar topic.

[scriabinophile]

faulty_damper says:
...anyone who thinks that there can be cheating in piano/instrument performance is seriously misguided....Simplifying isn't cheating

Thanks for sharing your opinion. One nice thing about this forum is that it gives people of different musical ability, technical proficiency, and level of musical education a chance to interact.

Here we have a slippery slope. A composer writes something. Someone else doesn't have the technical ability to play it, so that person intentionally changes it. Is it still the same piece?  If you say 'yes', then at what point does a simplification cross a line? After changing two notes? Twenty notes? All the notes?

To give a concrete example, consider the Chopin Etude in g-sharp minor, Op 25, no 6, a piece that I find very difficult and therefore have never programmed. What if, while practicing it, I decide to simply omit all the notes I can't play cleanly, and then I program the piece that way -- without acknowledging my simplification.  Would that be honest?

By your logic ("simplifying isn't cheating"), it would be OK.

Or let me try an analogy involving language. Let's say there is to be a poetry reading of Paul McCann's "Dancing Dolphins", but the narrator has a technical limitation -- a slight lisp. So instead of reciting "Those tidal thoroughbreds that tango through the turquoise tide..." as written, the narrator goes through the passage and simply deletes all the words he can't pronounce clearly.  Again, by your logic, that would be OK.

Sorry, but I beg to differ.

Now, returning to the Schubert passage in question.

I don't know what you're talking about. It sounded fine to me.

Well, then, it's apparent that you don't know the piece well. If one has the LH technique to play this passage cleanly in tempo as written, it sounds one way. Try listening to Maurizio Pollini's recording.

If one eliminates half of the LH notes from the passage, as Brendel did, it sounds another way... and it's not the way Schubert intended it to sound.

Keep practicing and studying. Maybe someday you'll be able to hear -- and comprehend -- the difference.

[theholygideons]

simplifying is fine.. as long as you do it sensibly.
Horowitz et alia do it all the time.

[cometear]

Is this cheating? Simplifying? Is there anything wrong with this example. For the Chopin Waltz Op. 64 No. 2, at the end of the second theme, the notes are slightly different all 3 times with additions or subtractions. If someone were to just play one of them all 3 times would that be cheating? Simplifying? They are obviously not technically challenging and in need of simplifying so what would that constitute as? Forgetting? Do you also think Chopin intentionally had these 3 examples different? Is it possible he just forgot to make them the same?

[nyiregyhazi]

I don't know what you're talking about. It sounded fine to me.

Also, anyone who thinks that there can be cheating in piano/instrument performance is seriously misguided.  Unless someone walks up on stage to help play a passage, it isn't cheating.  Simplifying isn't cheating, either.

Of course there's such thing as cheating. If someone plays Chopin 's op 10 no 2 without the chords in the right hand and just does the chromatic scale with the easiest fingering, they are cheating. Perhaps you don't realise how often a great many pianists cheat, but it's not at all uncommon for lesser cheats to take place.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

To give a concrete example, consider the Chopin Etude in g-sharp minor, Op 25, no 6, a piece that I find very difficult and therefore have never programmed. What if, while practicing it, I decide to simply omit all the notes I can't play cleanly, and then I program the piece that way -- without acknowledging my simplification.  Would that be honest?

Good example. Let's say, omit the lower of the notes in every second third? Clearly, and blatantly, dishonest - it is an etude in thirds, apart from anything else. Probably not that easy to hear either, unless you listen carefully. And here we have Mr Brendel, a great advocate of putting the composer's intentions "first", seemingly playing octaves as single notes. Although, having heard his friska of the 2nd Hungarian Rhapsody, I can't say it especially surprises me. Personally I think there is a time and a place for subtle score alterations, but not if you're going to take the stance Brendel does on urtext integrity.

[chopin2015]

Hellooooo, what about simplifying to avoid injury? I see nothing wrong with changing the tempo or dynamics to suit your physical abilities, as long as it is done sensibly. Changing to where you can play the ideas that are written, even without having a 12 inch foot span. what about octave tremolo (in 3rds)? who can do that?  I would like to know.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Hellooooo, what about simplifying to avoid injury? I see nothing wrong with changing the tempo or dynamics to suit your physical abilities, as long as it is done sensibly.

That's fair enough, especially if you're not intending an international career. But the example above, an internationally-renowned pianist? He should be able to do better, lh octaves at speed should be part of your evolved technique if you're going to perform at that level.

octave tremolo (in 3rds)?

I presume you mean something like GB against GB an octave higher? I can't think offhand of any examples of that being written, certainly it feels grossly unnatural - miles more so than the Wanderer passage - and I can't do it at any where near the speed of tremolandi in octaves or thirds.. If I sat and worked at it for a week, maybe. Most composers just wouldn't write anything like that, maybe someone like Mereaux might have.

[chopin2015]

I presume you mean something like GB against GB an octave higher? I can't think offhand of any examples of that being written, certainly it feels grossly unnatural - miles more so than the Wanderer passage - and I can't do it at any where near the speed of tremolandi in octaves or thirds.. If I sat and worked at it for a week, maybe. Most composers just wouldn't write anything like that, maybe someone like Mereaux might have.

There are plenty of composers who write in a way that does not suit any kind of piano player's hand span. really, what about rolling chords? Some people hate the way it sounds, and it is unbearable when someone rolls chords that are written to be played harmonically. There are many things pianists do, that is not cheating. if so, changing fingering would be cheating. In fact, playing the ossia instead of regular rh or lh passage, instead of rh, lh and ossia, would be cheating. (in some cases, that works, but not most.)

In fact, holding a note with a pedal instead of a finger would be cheating....etc.

[scriabinophile]

nyiregyhazi writes:

Of course there's such thing as cheating.

In fact, here is Andras Schiff discussing cheating in another very famous octave passage -- this one from the Beethoven Sonata in C, Op. 53 ("Waldstein"):

audio.theguardian.tv/sys-audio/Arts/Culture/2006/11/30/21_gmaj_op53-w.mp3

The relevant discussion starts somewhere around 44:30, and at 46:12 Schiff clearly says, "It's pure cheating!"

ronde_des_sylphes writes:

...here we have Mr Brendel, a great advocate of putting the composer's intentions "first", seemingly playing octaves as single notes.

Yes. Interestingly enough, I first heard Brendel play this in Germany circa 1974, and I at that time he tried playing the octaves as written.  I know, because I distinctly recall that he had to do the old massive rallantando trick.

[andrewkoay]

Haha personally I cheat plenty, and I would dare say 99% of the listeners wouldn't be able to identify which notes I have omitted. Of the 1% who can identify the mistake, 99% of them wouldn't mind it at all.

Given a choice, would you prefer to

1) risk screwing up the section royally in a performance due to trying too hard to play just that few extra notes (this is what I call not being able to see the forest for the trees)

2) "cheat" by omitting a few notes which will still mostly preserve the musical intent and would be rather unnoticeable to the majority of the audience.

3) not performing the pieces (a valid option too, but then you would then be eliminating a lot of wonderful pieces from your repertoire)

On the other hand, I'm interested to know how would you cheat in Chopin's op.10 no.2?

[cabbynum]

spam

[scriabinophile]

Actually, it's Schubert, not Schumann.

In the Richter recording that you linked, it's the passage between 4:44 - 4:51.  
And Richer pulls it off, although you can here that's he's struggling as it progresses.

Many pianists, including a lot of very well-known ones, have a heck of a time with this passage, and it is rare to hear a live performance with the octaves played in tempo and cleanly.  Accordingly, many pianists do a rallentando that starts just before the passage and continues through it (eg: a young Evgeny Kissin, here):

Listen to how fast he is up until 5:00 and then how he slows down around 5:08 and continues to slow down through to 5:16 as the passage gets harder.

There are other places in Schubert's piano works with these sort of "damn-the-torpedoes, full speed ahead" difficult octave passages. Another one is the coda of the final movement of the a-minor Sonata, D. 784. If you take the last movement at a brisk tempo, the octaves in the last few bars can be hellish to pull off in a live performance.  I've heard many people play the ending at a completely different tempo from the rest of the movement.

[nyiregyhazi]

On the other hand, I'm interested to know how would you cheat in Chopin's op.10 no.2?

Seriously, I heard a story about someone only playing the r.h. semiquavers with an easy fingering and without the internal chords.

[cabbynum]

Actually, it's Schubert, not Schumann.

In the Richter recording that you linked, it's the passage between 4:44 - 4:51.  
And Richer pulls it off, although you can here that's he's struggling as it progresses.

Many pianists, including a lot of very well-known ones, have a heck of a time with this passage, and it is rare to hear a live performance with the octaves played in tempo and cleanly.  Accordingly, many pianists do a rallentando that starts just before the passage and continues through it (eg: a young Evgeny Kissin, here):

Listen to how fast he is up until 5:00 and then how he slows down around 5:08 and continues to slow down through to 5:16 as the passage gets harder.

There are other places in Schubert's piano works with these sort of "damn-the-torpedoes, full speed ahead" difficult octave passages. Another one is the coda of the final movement of the a-minor Sonata, D. 784. If you take the last movement at a brisk tempo, the octaves in the last few bars can be hellish to pull off in a live performance.  I've heard many people play the ending at a completely different tempo from the rest of the movement.

Ah sorry, I'm not super familiar with either so that explains the confusion.
He didn't slow down much, but it's definitely noticeable.

I had no idea Schubert wrote such difficult octave passages... Does he have any shorter pieces heavy in octaves?
My biggest strength in piano is octaves.

[scriabinophile]

I had no idea Schubert wrote such difficult octave passages...

The musicologist William S. Newman used to refer to these sorts of passages as "Schubert's blind spots".  They typically occur in Schubert's larger piano works (Wanderer Fantasy and Sonatas) in which he was thinking more orchestrally than pianistically.

Does he have any shorter pieces heavy in octaves?

Let's see.... There are some octaves in the first and third of the Drei Klavierstücke, D. 946, but they aren't thundering octave passages if that's what you are looking for. The first of the Drei Klavierstücke is the more accessible of the two. The third piece in the set is very enigmatic (the middle section is extremely difficult musically because of the odd phrase lengths).

No other short Schubert pieces with lots of octaves are coming to mind.

[thesixthsensemusic]

It's not cheating. Cheating is bending the rules in a secretive way. There's nothing secretive about a performance in whci you meddle with the scoring of the work. Anyone with good enough sheet music reading skills and a trained ear can hear what's going on.

What I consider cheating is the editing together of segments to form a complete recording, or even worse, using samples from a huge pre-recorded library. One of my acquaintances is a recording engineer and he has a hard drive with over 100.000 samples of tiny outtakes from piano and other instrumental recordings, which he uses to fix small mistakes in studio recordings to save time. When the recording artist goes on to pretend that it's only his or her work, that'd be cheating as it's not happening out in the open.

[nyiregyhazi]

It's not cheating. Cheating is bending the rules in a secretive way. There's nothing secretive about a performance in whci you meddle with the scoring of the work. Anyone with good enough sheet music reading skills and a trained ear can hear what's going on.

What I consider cheating is the editing together of segments to form a complete recording, or even worse, using samples from a huge pre-recorded library. One of my acquaintances is a recording engineer and he has a hard drive with over 100.000 samples of tiny outtakes from piano and other instrumental recordings, which he uses to fix small mistakes in studio recordings to save time. When the recording artist goes on to pretend that it's only his or her work, that'd be cheating as it's not happening out in the open.

Playing two sections note perfect and patching them together is cheating? Yet not even attempting to execute countless details that you have never demonstrated ANY ability to execute is not? You have a bizarre definition of cheating.

Your description of the editing process sounds like nonsense to me, btw, unless technology has changed most radically within a handful of years. Even with digital recording techniques, you can't just take a single note of the context of surrounding ones and dub in the right one. It's too complex to single out only one note of a texture without wreaking havoc with the sound of the other notes being played.

Your account sounds remarkably similar to the complete load of cock and bull that Hatto's husband came out with to supposedly explain complete rip-offs of whole recordings. It was a complete load of buttocks when he claimed that and no other producers are doing that either. They get enough material in the recording sessions. If they didn't, it would be very hard to splice in anyone else's recording for a fix.

PS. You should also go through and notate all of Horowitz's supposed not cheats from his recording, btw- if you seriously think that all adaptations are so obvious. People would pay good money to know about some of his numerous cunning simplifications. And they're not generally that obvious at all.

[thesixthsensemusic]

If 'cheating' means 'showing things that are physically impossible to do live' then yes it is. Showing something that the recording artist was not able to do live is IMHO cheating.

Which excludes when one is out in the open about it like Glenn Gould was, who said he preferred recording because it enabled him to deliver a better product to the listener if he edited together records from multiple takes.

Regarding the way records are edited, every producer has his own tricks but keeping a sample database to fill in voids without having to re-do passages is quite usual.

Besides, I only said this stuff happens, it's not like I condemn it. Strictly taken, it still comes down to cheating IMHO. Artificial enhancement of a record that is done without people being able to know about it.

[nyiregyhazi]

If 'cheating' means 'showing things that are physically impossible to do live' then yes it is. Showing something that the recording artist was not able to do live is IMHO cheating.

Yes, it's a cheating of a kind. But it REALLY happened. Any section that can be played that way was done for real at some point in  time, even if you pick your best bits. When you change the notes for convenience, you may NEVER have executed the passage properly. It's absurd to call a few false joins cheating but to assert that a passage that has never been played according to the notes provided has not been cheated at all.

Which excludes when one is out in the open about it like Glenn Gould was, who said he preferred recording because it enabled him to deliver a better product to the listener if he edited together records from multiple takes.

More to his musical satisfaction than any lone take. He had no problem playing note perfect though. His only real cheat involved overdubbing a third hand in a couple of recordings.

Regarding the way records are edited, every producer has his own tricks but keeping a sample database to fill in voids without having to re-do passages is quite usual.

Utter balls. Go and research sound production techniques. Or provide a source, beyond some vague rumour you heard in a pub. You're talking complete nonsense, sorry. For this to work, you'd need a passage with no pedal at all and you'd need an individual sample for every note struck, at just the right volume. And even then you wouldn't get the correct interaction of overtones between notes, if you put one top of another in separate tracks. This is total bilge, sorry. It would be overwhelmingly more difficult than simply requesting a retake. You're in the realm of conspiracy theories, not fact.

[awesom_o]

More to his musical satisfaction than any lone take. He had no problem playing note perfect though. His only real cheat involved overdubbing a third hand in a couple of recordings.

Utter balls. Go and research sound production techniques. Or provide a source, beyond some vague rumour you heard in a pub. You're talking complete nonsense, sorry. For this to work, you'd need a passage with no pedal at all and you'd need an individual sample for every note struck, at just the right volume. And even then you wouldn't get the correct interaction of overtones between notes, if you put one top of another in separate tracks. This is total bilge, sorry. It would be overwhelmingly more difficult than simply requesting a retake. You're in the realm of conspiracy theories, not fact.

nyiregyhazi is correct.

[pianoman53]

What a terribly unmusical thread! It's far worse to play the correct notes, but sacrifice musical thoughts. I bet my life that most composers much rather would have their music, rather than their notes, played.