considering all the debates that go on around here, i'm surprised i haven't seen much discussion about this yet.

it seems to me that some pianists never deviate from the script when it comes to low notes (three that spring to mind immediately are Pollini, Ashkenazy and Kissin), some of them practically make love to the lowest octave of the keyboard (think Horowitz, Sultanov, Cortot), and some will toss in a low octave here and there, but they keep it in moderation (Rubinstein, Cliburn, Li), but for the most part, it seems that pianists who have reached a certain level of musical and interpretational knowledge have at SOME point in their playing taken a low, accented B1, and doubled the B0 below it (or something like that).
What's your take on that sort of thing? Do you think it's a freedom that we should be allowed to take, or do you believe it disrespects the composer's intentions? What if the composer physically couldn't include a note that low? Would you play a Bb0 at the end of Chopin Sonata 2, for instance?

personally I don't mind it, and I will do it occasionally, mess around with octave doubling in practice and whatnot, but i'll only do it in live performance or recording if I've thought it over for a long time and come to the conclusion that it feels and sounds right.

Depends on the music; I take an octave lower in Liszt's Chasse-Neige when the alternating octave skips come in and land on an E flat. But those who double the B flats everywhere in Chopin's 2nd sonata confuse me...it doesn't really make sense when I think of Chopin as a composer of clarity, not orchestral sounds. Though that doesn't stop me from taking a G flat octave lower in the Heroic Polonaise when the polonaise rhythm returns after the E major section.

I don't know, a case-by-case analysis is really needed to determine whether it's appropriate or not.

I play d flat octave instead of the one d flat in the minute waltz and Barenboim does this too i think it sounds more correct. Cause the one d flat cant give the true enthusiasm at second turn of the piece. After playing 4 notes in turn 6 times you know BAM effect needed.

Chopin had poor judgement?

I wondered this about the third movement of the Beethoven Op. 53, where in the left hand there is the E-E-A-B-C-D-E E-D-C-B-C-A-E. On the low E's, there are just single notes, while every other note is an octave. I presume it was written that way just because Beethoven didn't have an E that low at the time, and he would have done it if it were there (since Beethoven liked using the lowest note of the keyboard, even going back to the Op. 22 sonata in multiple moments).

However, I don't play that low E with an octave. I play it with just the single note. I sometimes think if Beethoven REALLY cared enough to have that be an octave, he would have asked a piano make to make them with one more key. After all, other composers (although, much later on, like Busoni) specifically asked Bosendorfer to make a piano with keys lower than A0. I think Bartok wrote for extended lower range, as well as Ravel in "Une Barque sur l'Ocean." Somewhere I thought I read also Debussy? I could be wrong there...

Haha, this sounds SO much like what someone else here would say.

Although I don't disagree with either that. When I played that waltz, I didn't play a lower D flat.

did he actually write the low G#, or did he just write a low A, with the implication that it probably should be a G#?

re: minute waltz - i'll double that Db sometimes, but not all the time. depends on my mood and the setting.

Haha, you're walking through my exam repertoire from last year!! I also don't play that low E in the Waldstein. I feel it'd sound too dark or just give the wrong mood in general..I guess Beethoven not writing in the E gives me enough justification not to play it.

And about the Ravel, the G# is there, but at that range, the notes aren't clear anyways. I mean, in his left hand concerto, there's a passage where a low A and a low B flat are played as a bass note and it doesn't even sound that dissonant..

Absolutely NO. We dont know how he interprets his piece maybe we have poor judgement.

I occasionally do it. I think I play the low octave in Rach G# minor prelude in the same place horowitz does. I also did it somewhere in my most recent beethoven sonata, though I cant remember where.

Lisitsa does it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yRDcgjvjj2E&t=2m24s

I'm all for it.

Never, never, and never !!!
Who are we to change a comma in the score of great masters ?!
If the composer wants it, that's explicitely written, otherwise that's not. The effect is just very crude, and disrespectful.

However, I feel that composers like Liszt would not have really disapproved ... but I am definitely not Liszt ........

I would personnally never change anything in the masters' scores. The exceptions being when I am not able to play it physically (e.g. arpeggiate chords).
For the great pianists it's different. Some feel that they have the right to do it, e.g. Horowitz or Cziffra. Some consider the score sacred.

Salut Okay!

Wow! Why is it there are so many variations on the same piece? If everyone followed the composer's suggestion to the letter there should only be one definitive performance. A composer might give a suggestion for the tempo but I can still use my own judgment.

If we really wanted to be anal, the Word of God (I'm an atheist, by the way) would only be written in His original language and not translated. Sorry, I've been in a very long discussion with someone who believes there's only one way and you reminded me of him.

I can't play a particular mordent as well as I like so I can either slow down the tempo or leave it out.

If you want to make an arrest or issue a summons on behalf of the musical police, be my guest.

How about if you had an opportunity to play a Bosendorfer Grand Imperial. Would you not extend some obvious octave runs that the composer ends where a "normal" keyboard ends, continuing only the upper notes?

I'm thinking particularly of "Great Gate", but there are many others. I will extend the octave runs when playing the Bosie, (probably the principal reason I'm learning the piece, can't resist the opportunity) seems obvious to me that Mussorgsky would have written it that way had he had a keyboard with the range. But I am deviating from the written score.

Now that is a rather particular case. I would agree with you on this one. I only wish I had the opportunity to play on a Bosen Imperial some day...

I've given two recitals on a Bosie Imperial and it was glorious. Can't say I ever had to make use of the extended range, though.

There are a few pieces where the author actually wrote for the Bosen Imperial (e.g. Ravel if I remember correctly). But most of the time, I think the extended range is especially worth it for the sympathetic resonance that it adss to the adjacent lower strings, supposedly giving the instrument extremely rich bass notes.

Were the extra notes(I'm assuming they were covered up with the black cover)at all visually disconcerting/distracting?

I only played an Imperial once for about five minutes. The dealer said that Yundi Li had been there the day before "with his entourage" to try it out, which made me even more ill at ease. Too bad the store, Bosendorfer New York, eventually closed. It's really a lot of fun to go to a store with 10+ Bosendorfers to try out, and the owners were known for being extremely gracious.

Even staying within the composer's markings there is still a big range for interpretation.

Yes I think Ravel intended certain bars in scarbo to be played lower than written, although I rather like the dissonance hehe

The point is that you can have 10 very different interpretations of the same piece, with all pianists playing precisely what is written !
Hopefully there is not one way to go, and respecting the text already raises so many questions...

Adding something else to the urtext is changing the score, that's well beyond interpretation, and that makes a huge difference.
If you think that a bass should be bold, well, go for it ! but please play a single key if no octave required ... you can play it louder, in taking more time to emphazise, playing softer the other plans, etc ... you have so much to make it stronger, other ways than taking freedom with the composer text.

For the tempo, that's a different topic. Old indications are sometimes weird (I am currently working Beethoven op106, and believe me, I don't want to push the first mvt at 138 as in the urtext, even if I probably can - Same for Chopin opus 10#1 at 160 ... while I cannot here !).
However, you don't have to play presto if that's allegretto, just because you find it fun. But your allegretto can be suitable at various tempi if your playing is consistent with the piece spirit.

Hope that I clarified ...

I actually heard that there is a case of Beethoven's marking of 138 being a mistake on his part.

a little tangential, but the whole score fidelity thing always reminds me of this post by Le Denk.

http://jeremydenk.net/blog/2006/07/09/alone/

I can't find it now, but I know that I once read a scholarly paper to that effect. I remember that it made a good case, based in part on stuff in the conversation books that Beethoven used for communication.

If you think that a bass should be bold, well, go for it ! but please play a single key if no octave required ... you can play it louder, in taking more time to emphazise, playing softer the other plans, etc ... you have so much to make it stronger, other ways than taking freedom with the composer text.

I wonder how much of earlier piano music was written with octaves in the left hand just because the piano itself was sorely lacking in bass.

The ear should make the final determination and not necessarily the printed score.