Rameau on the piano

[pianissima]

I've recently gotten interested in Rameau's keyboard works and would like to learn some of them, but I've hit the inevitable roadblock of performance practice. How faithful do you all think one should be to the accepted French style - the "notes inégales," the ornaments, etc.? It sounds great on the harpsichord but kind of silly on the piano. Or does it? I've heard some nice performances on piano where the pianist doesn't do any of those things (e.g., Marcelle Meyer), but is this now considered completely unacceptable? Has anyone here learned some of this music and gotten feedback one way or the other?

[lelle]

Different people have different opinions so you're not going to please everyone regardless of the approach you take. Harpsichordists might think pianists don't know what they're doing when they play baroque music in general, but it's just different practices/traditions on both instruments. As a very crude generalization, during the 20th century, style has moved from quite alive but also quite romantic baroque, to a more "scientific" cold mechanical baroque style, and now to trying to be as authentic to baroque performance practice style as we can, which is again more organic and alive but no longer an extension of the Romantic playing style.

I would not worry so much whether what you do will be considered "unacceptable" by someone. Rather do your research on the style, listen to several recordings both by harpsichordists and pianists, try out different approaches, and decide what you want to do that is the most honest towards yourself and the musical result you believe the composer was after.

I enjoy playing many of his keyboard works. I don't do much of the notes inegales, but I do all the ornaments because I think they add a lot. My understanding of notes inegales is that they don't have to be super prominent, sometimes it's just a subtle swing feel. It depends on the piece.

Would you say this guy plays notes inegales? Why or why not?

[pianissima]

@lelle - That didn't sound like notes inegales to me! I was listening to some recordings today, and it seemed the inegales effect was used more in slower pieces than in the faster ones (like in the video you shared).
For example, I've been starting to learn the A minor suite from the Nouvelles Suites, and in the Allemande and Courante recordings on harpsichord I was listening to today, the notes inegales was all over both of them to the point of being annoying. But then in the other pieces it was not there at all.
But then this one on piano (which I like a lot) does some nice ornamentation but basically follows what is in the Dover edition (by Saint-Saens).
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[lelle]

@lelle - That didn't sound like notes inegales to me! I was listening to some recordings today, and it seemed the inegales effect was used more in slower pieces than in the faster ones (like in the video you shared).

I'd agree. I think he does a tiny bit of holding the first note and playing the second note more staccato in some of the figures but that's about it. For contrast, here is an interpreter I really like in Rameau (Céline Frisch) who does notes inegales in a way that I think works well for this piece:

[pianissima]

One ornament I'm having trouble understanding is the one that looks like a parenthesis (sometimes on one side of a note or the other, sometimes on both sides). I've looked at Rameau's table of ornaments, but I don't get from it how to realize this marking.
I can see this is going to require a lot of patience ...

[lelle]

I don't have those ornaments in my head but I know them when I sit in front of my grand with my Rameau book lol. I'll check and get back to you.

[lelle]

One ornament I'm having trouble understanding is the one that looks like a parenthesis (sometimes on one side of a note or the other, sometimes on both sides). I've looked at Rameau's table of ornaments, but I don't get from it how to realize this marking.
I can see this is going to require a lot of patience ...

Allright, I had some time to check my Rameau repertoire finally.

Paranthesis on the right side of the note, i e ")" is like a mordent basically. So if it's on a C, you play C-B-C, for as many or as few repetitions as you like.
Paranthesis on the left side of the note, i e "(" is basically an appogiatura https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appoggiatura with the important thing to note is that the note in the score before the marked note determines if the appogiatura is above or below the marked note. So if the score says E and then (C, you play E D-C, and if the score says A and then (C, you play A B-C.
Paranthesis on both sides, you combine the appogiatura (adding a short note, either above or below depending on the context, before the written note) and mordent (trill with the written note as the upper note) into one ornament.

[pianissima]

@lelle - thank you!

[pianissima]

Allright, I had some time to check my Rameau repertoire finally.

Paranthesis on the right side of the note, i e ")" is like a mordent basically. So if it's on a C, you play C-B-C, for as many or as few repetitions as you like.
Paranthesis on the left side of the note, i e "(" is basically an appogiatura https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appoggiatura with the important thing to note is that the note in the score before the marked note determines if the appogiatura is above or below the marked note. So if the score says E and then (C, you play E D-C, and if the score says A and then (C, you play A B-C.
Paranthesis on both sides, you combine the appogiatura (adding a short note, either above or below depending on the context, before the written note) and mordent (trill with the written note as the upper note) into one ornament.

After trying this out, I have more questions. What do you do when the ( is in between the same two notes? Do you play the note twice? For example, if this is notated: C (C) D - what do you play? Is the appoggiatura on the beat? Also, what if there are ornaments in two voices - for example, the ) stacked on top of a trill symbol in another voice, or if there are ) symbols in two parts an octave apart?

Thanks very much for your help!

[lelle]

I'll take a look, can you post the names of the pieces where the examples you mentioned occur? It'll be easier for me to picture with the score in front of me

[pianissima]

I'll take a look, can you post the names of the pieces where the examples you mentioned occur? It'll be easier for me to picture with the score in front of me

There are examples of all of these in the Allemande of the Nouvelle Suite in A minor (the piece Sergey Tanin is playing in the video I posted), at least in the urtext.

[lelle]

Sorry, can you give me bar numbers or screenshots? I'm looking in my urtext and am not able to locate the examples.

[pianissima]

Sorry, can you give me bar numbers or screenshots? I'm looking in my urtext and am not able to locate the examples.

This is in the Baerenreiter:
This is everywhere, but for example, in m 1, 3rd beat - do you repeat the E before playing the F?

MM 8 & 9, 2nd half of 1st beat, do you double the mordant at the octave?

M9, 2nd half of 2nd beat, how do you play the pince on top of the trill or mordant in the left hand?

Thanks for any insight.

[lelle]

This is in the Baerenreiter:

I got Baerenreiter as well so I believe we are synced then!

This is everywhere, but for example, in m 1, 3rd beat - do you repeat the E before playing the F?

Yes! You are still approaching the F from below, so the appogiatura is also below. In this case it ends up being the same pitch as the preceding note. If you listen to the video with Sergey Tanin he does this. In fact, as far as I can tell on a somewhat cursory listen he does all the ornaments properly and IMO with good taste.

MM 8 & 9, 2nd half of 1st beat, do you double the mordant at the octave?

Theoretically I believe you can do that. The lovely thing about baroque ornaments is that a lot of the finer details of execution are left to the taste of the performer. Another alternative is to do the right hand ornament short and quick, and the left hand longer and with more repetitions, since it's on a longer note. I'd suggest checking some harpsichordists' recordings and hearing what they do for inspiration!

M9, 2nd half of 2nd beat, how do you play the pince on top of the trill or mordant in the left hand?

Second beat right hand is E E (F) G, so you do an appogiatura before the F followed by a mordent, so something like E E EFEF G

Left hand is a trill so you start on the upper note, DC#DC#

If you play four quick notes like this you could sync these two ornaments between the hands if you like, but other approaches are also possible.