Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Has virtuosity overshadowed musicality?

Kreisler, thanks for that tip -- i too was unaware of Mompou and after sampling a few YouTube offerings ordered a book of (some of?) his solo piano pieces.

i personally love beautifully understated pieces. i so loved some of the keith jarrett tunes on his 'dark intervals' album that i paid to have them transcribed.

the first quote explains a lot about kissin's playing! :P I do truly enjoy many of his musical ideas (most of his Liszt is phenomenal), but there are MANY parts where I feel like he could benefit from slowing down a little.

As for Lang Lang...he's more of a circus act than a pianist. I don't find his musical ideas boring, I find them disgusting.

I think it has. In my experience listening to several recitals by up and coming, professionally competing artists, I was very disappointed to hear thundering volume, blinding speed, fabulous technique and little or no musicality. My ears were ringing and I couldn't wait to leave.

On the other hand, it was interesting to read the NY Times article about the Van Cliburn amateur competition. It said the amateur artists took risks, made changes and played their hearts out. There was plenty of musicality there. I suspect the professional competition circuit makes pianists fearful to take risks because they are playing for the juries not from their hearts.

I believe I am remembering this correctly - Arrau thought that Horowitz and Rachmaninov were deplorably shallow musicians, back when they first became famous. Although I don't agree, I can understand why he might think so.

Yes, but IMO with a "but."

As one of the competitors, of course I loved seeing that. But at least in some instances, I think the writer was being kind to us amateurs. I think some of the praised instances were actually more the performers' crude insensitivity to what sounds were coming out, a limited ability to modulate dynamics, and contrived rhythms.

While I'm sure that some of us take more good "risks" and feel more freedom to do things differently, I think that with a few wonderful exceptions (and I count our member Ken Iisaka among them), stuff like what was in that article is way overstated, and that some of the perceived admirable risks aren't what they might seem to be.

I didn't read the NY Times article, but if that summary is correct I don't particlarly agree . IMO the biggest risk that many of the amateurs took was playing works that were not quite within (or sometimes very far from)what they could handle technically...hence the numerous breakdowns from many performers. There is nothing particularly admirable in taking a risk like that. Makng some minor changes to the score doesn't require much or count for much. If the reviewer was talking about the pianist who changed the Goldberg Variations on the last page, I don't see anything particularly astonishing about doing that.

I think the "taking risks" phrase is often used to mean "they chose a far from the norm and often unjustified interpretation". I think those playing in a competition for professionals are taking a much bigger risk in a different sense...their careers are quite dependent on the results.

While I think it's probably true that in a professional competition the performers might not have as much "freedom" as in an amateur competition, I don't think that it in any way follows that the performances in an amateur competition are more musical.

Yes...The answer is yes! So many times in the M.T.N.A Auditions we heard kids that were technicians, playing things well beyond their years... and they were burned out in a couple of years. Some teachers get ahold of a gifted student and run them into the ground, don't give them time to develop musically and with a love of MUSIC, Just crash around and show off!

Bach, was indeed a show-off. He was given to boasting that he could play any music at sight, no matter how technically difficult or densely scored.

Has virtuosity overshadowed musicality?

See, Lang Lang.

For those not that familiar with Mompou, I will use this post as an excuse to post a few of my favorites among his works:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gCquIhX20w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVUIqMvcHlQ&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esLN64KKo7o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNNYEz600ns

Very nice. I'm familiar with the Hough, but hadn't ever heard Ciccolini, with Mompou. de Larrocha, also played a great deal of Mompou...and quite wonderfully (as with everything she played).

I was one of those not familiar with Mompou. I am now. That was the best part of an already very good piano day. At my very modest level of virtuosity I might even be able to play some of his music. Thanks!

I don't think so, Skorpius doesn't say that Horowitz was flashy but uninteresting but that pianists after him became flashy but uninteresting.

as they say in sports, it's not boasting if you can back it up.

ps - from clara schumann's journal, upon liszt's passing: "he was a great piano virtuoso, but a dangerous model for the young to imitate. almost all the rising pianists imitated him, but they lacked his mind, his genius, his delicacy of touch, so that now we have nothing but great masters of technique and a number of caricatures."

I never said anything about Horowitz, I stated what Dame Myra said.

I find it fascinating that a lot of what people seem to be saying here has a implicit notion that at some point in the past things were somehow "better."

+1

You hear so much about how today's virtuoso's "lack musicality" or are "so mechanical." They are human beings too, and their emotions are no less valid than the virtuosos of bygone days. IMO this problem stems from the fact that people simply do not want them to be as good as the masters of the past and are thus compelled to concoct these spurious arguments that they lack "feeling" or other rubbish of that sort. (God forbid that anyone could ever be as good as Rubenstein or Arrau!) For example, I don't particularly care for Lang Lang's playing, but I would never call him mechanical, why? Because that is not any kind of argument; it is a petitio principii, as it were. He is human too, and I am certain he cares very strongly for the music he creates. As do many other current virtuosos, one of my favourites being Till Fellner who has a Bach that is as good as anything you are likely to encounter in the past ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1njQ3Na4LA ).

Lang cares about Lang. The music is merely his transportation.

bad posture and ridiculous body movements or should I say contortions seem to be taking precedence. You can tell i'm musical because of my over stated arm gestures and those neck movements that look like ticks but are just natural responses to my super musicality.

But honestly. It is something that does annoy me with so many , too many pianists. In fact if someone starts out and I can tell they are one of those contortionists, i am totally put off. Like watching a conductor pretend he is playing harry potter. Downbeat ? Just look for the patronus,

Hey, that's the whole reason I want to take conducting, so I can pretend to be a magician! :P (jk)