Wagner-Brassin Magic Fire Music

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Many years ago, this was a fairly common visitor to concert programmes. Josef Hofmann made a great recording, one of my favourite piano recordings ever tbh.

Nowadays it is something of a rarity. Anyway, this is my version, from recital.

[andhow04]

terrific playing, i love this arrangement but never learned it, and of course have listened to that Hofmann recording many many times.
i feel like there used to be more people that responded to pieces liek this in piano forum but it has slowed down in that sense so i'll pick up the slack !
what else was on the program

[georgey]

Great performance of the final scene of Die Walküre!  Wotan says goodbye to Brünnhilde and sends her into an enchanted sleep. Loge, the Norse god of fire, creates a protective circle of fire around the rock where she lies. Only the bravest of heroes will be able to penetrate the fire!  I think the transcription is a very successful one and is very well performed by you.

Just a quick question if you have time: One of the most moving of all music to me is the Prologue of Gotterdammerung: Dawn and Siegfried’s Rhine Journey.  I get goose bumps and maybe some tears every time (never fails) when I hear the final Heil’s sung by Siegfried and Brunnhilde right before Siegfried takes off for his Rhine journey.  I was going to ask if this would be transcribable for piano solo but I just found the below recording of Glenn Gould’s own transcription and performance of this scene.  It does lose a lot on first listening, but I am going to listen to it some more.  My question: What do you think of Gould’s transcription and performance here?  Thanks.

Edit: Sorry for extra thoughts here!  I feel pretty stupid now  . I listened to this 3 times.  Listen to 9:20 marker - very effective but he puts in a 4th? 5th? hand here for a few seconds?!?  I can understand the temptation.  Hopefully he disclosed this trick.  Also I believe I hear extra hands in MANY other places.  But I do not hear double grunting So this MAY answer the question: Is this trascribable for solo piano?  Answer: not really.  But then Liszt transcribed Beethoven 9th symphony for 2 pianos (that Brahms and Clara played many times together) and also for solo piano.

How is that for picking up the slack? 

[ronde_des_sylphes]

terrific playing, i love this arrangement but never learned it, and of course have listened to that Hofmann recording many many times.
i feel like there used to be more people that responded to pieces liek this in piano forum but it has slowed down in that sense so i'll pick up the slack !
what else was on the program

Thanks, and yes the Hofmann recording is incredible, particularly the control he has over simultaneous lines.

The rest of the program was largely Liszt (I was making a point of doing some Wagner transcriptions, so I included his Liebestod and Rienzi fantasy), plus a few self-written paraphrases.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

@georgey re the Gotterdammerung:

yes the section around 9.20 does sound *extremely* suspicious! Of course, with Wagner, you often get really dense textures and it becomes increasingly difficult to represent everything on just one piano...

Iirc it's not quite the same material, but there is a very good arrangement on YT from Gotterdammerung by Nicolai Lugansky. There might be an arrangement by August Stradal, but offhand I don't know - he did a lot of Wagner transcriptions which are virtually unplayed and unknown, as well as being difficult; they are in the process of being recorded on the Toccata label.

[georgey]

@georgey re the Gotterdammerung:

yes the section around 9.20 does sound *extremely* suspicious! Of course, with Wagner, you often get really dense textures and it becomes increasingly difficult to represent everything on just one piano...

Iirc it's not quite the same material, but there is a very good arrangement on YT from Gotterdammerung by Nicolai Lugansky. There might be an arrangement by August Stradal, but offhand I don't know - he did a lot of Wagner transcriptions which are virtually unplayed and unknown, as well as being difficult; they are in the process of being recorded on the Toccata label.

Thanks, Ronde.

I just ordered Stradel CD vol. 1 on Toccata label (Vizcarra is pianist).  It has Siegfried Rhine journey (last 7 minutes or so of the Gould recording I gave here, but Stradel is for solo piano).  It also has the last 18 minutes of the last act of Die Walkure, so it has the same Magic Fire Music that you play.  I look forward to comparing the Brassin and Stradel transcriptions of the final 4 minutes of the opera from a listener’s point of view.

When I first listened to the Gould here, I just listened to a few large excerpts and must have missed the 9:20 spot.  In 2nd listening I noticed the spot at 9:20 that you heard.  This caught my attention to listen for other spots that are unplayable by solo piano.

I did a little research on the Gould transcription here. 

1) Gould was able to overdub, and so created versions that he played with himself in private, and shared with us.

2) This transcription is available for sale:
https://en.schott-music.com/shop/morgendaemmerung-und-siegfrieds-rheinfahrt-goetterdaemmerung-no132124.html

3) Much of this transcription is playable by 1 piano alone.  Here are thoughts of a pianist:

“And so, when you play something that teases you and suddenly requires four hands: you run into a real obstacle, as though your rocket belt suddenly has no fuel. Either you fake the parts that are missing (from the other two hands:  which some of us will do of course), or you leave something out. But there’s no question that at this point, where four hands are required, the transcriptions cease to be real transcriptions.”

Since this is not really performable except in a studio, I am no longer that interested.

Again, you gave a very fine performance of the Magic Fire Music!  Thanks for sharing. 

[ronde_des_sylphes]

It doesn't surprise me that Gould was up to tricks. Earl Wild is quite cutting about this tendency in his memoirs (going as far as to suggest some of his contrapuntal control was the result of miking keys individually). Iirc Gould also recorded a completely phony Chopin 10/2 where the rh is two hands..

Anyway, glad you liked this recording and that it led to further investigations!