great and undervalued piano solo repertoire #1

[michael_sayers]

Four Nocturnes by Thomas Tellefsen, here played by Einar Steen-Nřkleberg.

[michael_sayers]

In my experience elsewhere, these Nocturnes have been quite highly appreciated.  These are very nice works!

[visitor]

i agree. i have reccommended several times in the past. it seems people just disregard him. 
https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=58033.0

even proceeded to just turn around and ask for the same old boring stuff 

[michael_sayers]

i agree. i have reccommended several times in the past. it seems people just disregard him. 
https://www.pianostreet.com/smf/index.php?topic=58033.0

even proceeded to just turn around and ask for the same old boring stuff 

I wonder why they disregard him.

[visitor]

I wonder why they disregard him.

who knows, perhaps the same reason so many other greats are overlooked, ignored...just look at the competition/audition repertoire approved lists....
i've had responses back in the past when reccommending it of, well, i studied at such and such school, and my professor never told me/heard of him... blah blah blah (which then assumes that is so, that the music/composer must be subpar, otherwise how could they not have heard of them...).

[mjames]

I think you guys are exaggerating. I pay attention to your recommendations, Visitor. I mean you're the one who introduced me to the wonderful Medins and his 24 Dainas

Also, Michael please put all those recommendations in one thread lol. I think its better than making 12 separate threads.

[visitor]

I think you guys are exaggerating. I pay attention to your recommendations, Visitor. I mean you're the one who introduced me to the wonderful Medins and his 24 Dainas

Also, Michael please put all those recommendations in one thread lol. I think its better than making 12 separate threads.

hi mjamea yes you have always been one of the most open minded and I am happy some of the stuff I nerd out on makes it on your radar.


Yep. Medins is a Latvian Rachmaninoff.  Total boss.  Do listen to the piano concerto if you have not already.  Worth it. 

[dogperson]

I've honestly never heard of Tellefsen before now, and that has sadly been my loss.  These nocturnes are stunning, and are definitely on my 'to do' list.  Thanks for sharing. 

[michael_sayers]

who knows, perhaps the same reason so many other greats are overlooked, ignored...just look at the competition/audition repertoire approved lists....
i've had responses back in the past when reccommending it of, well, i studied at such and such school, and my professor never told me/heard of him... blah blah blah (which then assumes that is so, that the music/composer must be subpar, otherwise how could they not have heard of them...).

Hi visitor,

Isn't it then a simply matter to change the competition/audition repertoire approved lists?  Or maybe they think have an additional composer listed would use too much printer ink?  And why can't a pianist play music that "they" disapprove of?  This isn't the U.S.S.R. where certain ideas, facts, et c., are supposed to be banned and history is rewritten to only accept the "correct" ideas about persons, composers of music, et c.!


Mvh,
Michael

[michael_sayers]

I think you guys are exaggerating. I pay attention to your recommendations, Visitor. I mean you're the one who introduced me to the wonderful Medins and his 24 Dainas

Also, Michael please put all those recommendations in one thread lol. I think its better than making 12 separate threads.

Hi mjames,

I don't see a combine thread type function.  Maybe this is just as well as perhaps it would become confusing to discuss nine different composers and nine different pianists in one thread?


Mvh,
Michael

[michael_sayers]

I've honestly never heard of Tellefsen before now, and that has sadly been my loss.  These nocturnes are stunning, and are definitely on my 'to do' list.  Thanks for sharing.  

Hi dogperson,

Yes, these Nocturnes are extraordinary.  There are a number of not very well known composers like this with whom - and no offence intended, "visitor"! - with whom there are a few works which rise above the others as definite masterpieces.  Often is such music not on YouTube, it may not even have been recorded, and the scores sometimes are not at I.M.S.L.P. although in recent years more of these items have appeared at I.M.S.L.P. even though much there still is absent.

I am from the pre-internet days, when a person had to actually LOOK to find all of these things, LOL . . . and there wasn't some global worldcat library catalogue online to consult [and that is only for educational institution library inventories, anyhow].  I don't know if young persons nowadays would even know how to find Leschetizky's Etude Heroique without an online or a computer resource! . . . LOL . . .

Leschetizky's Etude Heroique is not at I.M.S.L.P.  But I have a copy obtained years ago and which may be here, somewhere.


Mvh,
Michael

[j_menz]

Leschetizky's Etude Heroique is not at I.M.S.L.P.  

Actually, it is. It's Number 3 of this set.

[michael_sayers]

Actually, it is. It's Number 3 of this set.

Hi j_menz,

You are right!

The copy I located years ago was a publication of it sans opus number.

Still though . . . there is quite a list of opuses by Leschetizky . . . and even works by Liszt, who is better known . . . that are not at I.M.S.L.P.


Mvh,
Michael

[visitor]

Hi dogperson,

Yes, these Nocturnes are extraordinary.  There are a number of not very well known composers like this with whom - and no offence intended, "visitor"! -...
Mvh,
Michael

no offense taken, yes there is lot of forgettable music that is understandable why forgotten., then there are gems like those of Tellefsen, and let's not forget Guntsmann (and both had a common teacher....eh hem, Chopin...)

ie
on topic of nocturnes

or this little diddy 

i tend to think it is easier to discover music like then (ie less effort required) than 'shielding' myself and limiting it to the same old standard which has been published, recorded, reprinted, re recorded, so many times...

[michael_sayers]

Hi visitor,

Some of the best piano music hasn't even been recorded yet, and maybe not even performed except in salons and private homes.  These lesser composers - and they are many in number - when they wanted to, they could scale the heights . . . with some of them it is done with only one composition, with others it is several . . . and I think that maybe one day people will weary of questions such as, "Which Chopin Nocturne should I play?" - which doesn't mean that pianists don't need to be able to play the Chopin Nocturnes . . . but some transcriptions of Bach (Tausig, Busoni, Siloti, et al.), both books of Chopin Etudes, the four Tellefsen Nocturnes, and finally Anton Rubinstein's Theme and Variations Op. 88, maybe would be a good recital.

Though Liszt's music needs to fit in somewhere . . . maybe make the preceding music the first half, and then have Liszt's Two Legendes at the end of the second half of a quite long and heroico performance!

[of course, timings for recitals need to be exact, one hour and 50 minutes with a ten minute intermission is standard for full length . . . one has to be willing to cut and paste, and think carefully, and tinker with the choice of selections to get it right and still have the programme work properly . . . in the past though, well, you should look at some of Ferruccio Busoni's mighty programmes!]


Mvh,
Michael