Alan Walker: In Defence of Transcription

[michael_sayers]

Hi Everyone,

This is a quite interesting lecture by Liszt scholar Alan Walker and which I found at Y.T.

Mvh,
Michael

[michael_sayers]

p.s. - For the subject line of this thread I substituted "Defence" for "Defense" which appears in the video's title.

[j_menz]

Interesting talk by Alan Walker - many thanks for posting.

IMO, he is a little melancholic about the modern state of transcription. There remain to this day excellent practitioners of the art - Katsaris, Say, Gryaznov, Shchedrin and Mikashoff among them.

[ahinton]

Interesting talk by Alan Walker - many thanks for posting.

IMO, he is a little melancholic about the modern state of transcription. There remain to this day excellent practitioners of the art - Katsaris, Say, Gryaznov, Shchedrin and Mikashoff among them.

Yes, indeed, although if by "Mikashoff" you mean Yvar Mikhashoff, he died in 1993. Ronald Stevenson, who died less than three onths ago having just attained the age of 87, was not well enough to write much at all during his final years but had been a great advocate of the transcriber's art. Sorabji (who died in 1988) was also, so, given the sheer volume of music that he wrote for piano (more than most 20th century composers, in fact), it might seem odd that he devoted so little of his creative energies to transcription.

Best,

Alistair

[thalbergmad]

Katsaris keeps the flame of the romantic transcription still burning and so does Volodos.

Thal

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Interesting lecture, though he doesn't really touch on the improvisational aspects of paraphrase, and it's probably more "In Praise of Liszt" than "In Defence of Transcription".

I simply don't understand the musical snobbery which says a transcription or a paraphrase is a vulgarisation of the original. Usually it's a tribute to the original, and it also enables audiences to hear music at a piano recital which they could not otherwise experience. Suffice it to say, I'd be delighted (if rather nervous) to play an all-transcriptions programme at any famous venue, and to hell with the critics and Urtext. I know from direct experience that audiences enjoy and appreciate such recitals. I'm convinced there is a certain school of musical thought which believes that music is to be venerated, not enjoyed. Why? And why can't both be true? The very best transcriptions and paraphrases are lovingly constructed works of art in their own right.

[michael_sayers]

Even the "original" really is just a particular arrangement, and it is hard to always know exactly what constitutes the original [urtext], much less to know what philosophically is meant by that notion.


Mvh,
Michael