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I recently started playing Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata (1st movement) much more slowly than I used to. I think it is so much more beautiful this way, but I almost always hear people playing it faster. What would you say is the ideal tempo for this piece?
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I play it as slowly as I possibly can while maintaining a feeling of two beats to each measure. (It's in cut time.)
"If we continually try to force a child to do what he is afraid to do, he will become more timid, and will use his brains and energy, not to explore the unknown, but to find ways to avoid the pressures we put on him." (John Holt) www.pianoped.comwww.youtube.com/user/UIPianoPed
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The ideal tempo is one that you can be the most expressive playing. Tempo will vary from performer to performer, so this is not something that you must compare yourself with others unless it is obviously outside what the composer intended (i.e., playing adagio when the composer says allegro). Personally, I think many people play with a faster tempo because they don't know how to actually be expressive with it at a slower tempo, and at least at a faster tempo they can keep your attention better.
private piano/voice teacher FT
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If you haven't seen this video about Moonlight Sonata and the comments people post about it on YouTube, check it out! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bd5bl4e--KU
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Just to add another point of view, listen to this commentary by Andras Schiff. He actually does the entire set of Sonatas too.
http://music.guardian.co.uk/classical/page/0,,1943867,00.html
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Moonlight tempo? Roughly 186,282.397 miles per second, I'd say.
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Originally posted by whippen boy: Roughly 186,282.397 miles per second, I'd say. So 1.2 seconds communication with the Moon? Beethoven was on to something.
Jason
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I prefer quite fast, so that you can hear the melody in the left hand. Try playing only the left hand; at the tempo that sounds good add right hand accompaniment. The right hand arpeggio's are nothing more than accompaniment to the left hand melody.
A clear LH melody is more expressive than the sentimental motionlessness which we hear often.
Robert Kenessy
.. it seems to me that the inherent nature [of the piano tone] becomes really expressive only by means of the present tendency to use the piano as a percussion instrument - Béla Bartók, early 1927.
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I don't prefer it the very slow way if you ask me. I try to make it flow and bring various aspects of melody in both RH and LH just to avoid it being turned into mere arpeggios if it stagnates too much out of my control. Choose your prefer tempo. As Morodienne says, it will vary. Did Beethoven leave a metronome marking? I haven't played it for a while too, I'll go revisit it now. Got to think of it, playing this piece leaves me tired at the end. It is emotionally draining, even if the notes are easily at your fingertips.
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My 2 cents worth
TEMPO The signature is adagio sostenuto (slow, sustained). I have a couple of different volumes of the Beethoven sonatas. One gives a metronome setting, the other doesn't The one that does (edited by Arthur Schabel way back in the 1930's) give an MM of 63 (could be 68 I left my spectacles in the office). Prior to checking this I was thinking around 60 would be good.
BEETHOVEN AND THE METRONOME A guy called Johann Mälzel patented the metronome in 1816, allthough somebody else was the first to invent it. Maizel was a business associate of Beethoven (allthough being a business associate with Beethoven was a risky enterprise...) Beethoven did not put an mm setting on the majority of his piano sonatas, even after it had been invented. He did go back and add it to some pieces of music years after he composed them. Beethoven died in 1827 so the metronome was only known to him for the last decade of his life, which explains why pieces composed prior to 1816 (Moonlight composed in 1801 I think)would not have had an mm setting
TEMPO (again) One forum member talked about "sentimental motionlessness", another mentioned "stagnates too much". I can relate to both these comments (by virtue of my own bad playing/at times), BUT I disagree with the proposition that this is the result of a slow tempo. Further I disagree with the comment "The right hand arpeggio's are nothing more than accompaniment to the left hand melody". That erroneous statement is the entire reverse of actuality.
Robert Taub in his book "Playing the Beethoven Piano Sonatas 2002 - "The triplet accompaniement assumes a more melodic role and can be shaped accordingly as it is developed beginning in m 32. Tension increases as new harmonics are explored, the bass remaining insistently on the G octave (the dominant) and the top line temporarily abandoned in favor of the searching qualities of the triplets. In the short coda the portentous dotted rhythem is heard for the first time in the bass (but exclusively on G sharps) as it exchanges registral placement with the triplets. The right hand trilets come to the fore, however, in mm 62-63 when the crescendo-decrescendo markings are intended for the right hand only. This situation is reversed in m64-65 as the passage is repeated but with the crescendo and descrendo markings now in the left hand
Or more succintly put by Dennis Mathews, Beethoven Piano Sonatas 1967 - But the quiet triplet accompaniement pervades all: in the development it holds the stage alone and climbs aloft in sequences: at the end it vanishes into the darkest regions of the bass
My experience . First I just want to repeat that last sentence from Dennis Mathews "at the end it vanishes into the darkest regions of the bass". If you play this piece, you MUST hear this transition from right to left hand.
I believe this is one of the most wonderful pieces of music ever. I have played it badly for 20 years. If I play it a dozen times a week MAYBE just MAYBE I will enjoy it myself on one of those occasions. I have to be in the mood and really get into the soul of the music. I know instantly when it is going to be good - my fingers tell me. When I am on form (not often enough!) my fingers are light and playing the piece is seemingly effortless. At other times the harder I try to play it, the more difficult it is. Natural/relaxed is good for me
Finally on this rather long post. A key word for me with this sonata is the word "RESTRAINT", don't go charging ahead, this is a soft/subtle composition. I recall my piano teacher 25 years ago stating that many people introduce "false accentuations" when playing this piece (perhaps over emphasizing the left hand, perhaps not having a legato in the right hand/triplets (legato is sooo important with those triplets) , perhaps too much weight on the first note of the triplet, or the last of the triplet etc, perhaps too loud with the theme above the triplets in the right hand. I make all these false accent mistakes. This is an incredibly difficult piece to play well, but magic when you play it well
Finally, Pedalling, Beethoven stated this piece was to be played with the dampers raised throughout the entire movement (that would have been ok on his 1800's piano, weak/sustain etc), but on a modern piano/more powerful, keeping the sustain pedal throughout down is not good.
Sometimes I get real frustrated with myself, I play it 12 times and don't like my own playing. Then maybe on the 13th time, I am physically, mentally and emotionally ready for it and I re-discover the thrill, joy, pleasure this movement provides.
If you want another Beethoven challenge, listen to and try playing his final sonata #32 opus 111. Wonderful wonderful arieta, and a finale with triple trills - Beethoven the master
Beethoven is THE master. He's on my wall beside my piano glaring down at me when I play. I only dare look back at him about once every dozen attempts and smile at him; He still glares at me..So I guess I got a lot of improvement to make
Steve
SSGT
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Ease of playing the opening 8 RH triplets can result in unwittingly settling for too fast a tempo ... I know when I've found a happy medium ... it's when the last G# in m5 and 6 are "DISTINCT"... that final G# in each measure (flagged as a 16th note/semiquaver) is sounded fractionally LATER than the 3rd triplet note.
The difference is equivalent to half a triplet duration.(sixth)
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Of the 5-6 pieces which I have been learning up to now, there is no one which I would play at the tempo I hear in the CD recordings, always preferring a slower tempo even if I were able to play it as fast or as slow as I wish.
It seems to me (at least in the cases I have met up to now) that a slower tempo allows the magic of the melody to fully emerge, and gives the author more possibility of being expressive and give the piece his personal stamp.
The most extreme example I have found up to now is schumanns "from strange lands and people", I have heard it played so fast it banalises a wonderfully tender, magic melody into a race against the clock.
Another example would be, in my eyes, Chopin Op. 28 #7. I am hypnotised by the slow, obsessive, drum-like repetition of the LH; I picture Chopin silently crying for the bleeding wh.. ehem for george sand, the LH slowly, inexorably marking the climax of the RH's piercing despair. It gives me goose bumps even as bad as I play it. What I hear around is generally much faster, with irregular "beats" of the LH (the first one of every measure detached from the others), personally I think it takes much of the drama away.
Might change idea in the future, but the experience surprised me. Speed is a delicate matter.
"The man that hath no music in himself / Nor is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds / Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils." (W.Shakespeare)
Kemble Conservatoire 335025 Walnut Satin
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Originally posted by Robert Kenessey: I prefer quite fast, so that you can hear the melody in the left hand. Try playing only the left hand; at the tempo that sounds good add right hand accompaniment. The right hand arpeggio's are nothing more than accompaniment to the left hand melody.
Are you denying the existence, then, of the right hand melody - the one above the triplet accompaniment figure? That is, indeed, bizarre! Regards,
BruceD - - - - - Estonia 190
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I guess it is very difficult for anyone Bruce to negate the right hand melody. In fact when I play this, not only the right hand has a melody (that above the triplets) but the triplets themselves can have melodies in themselves. I always emphasize on particular notes in different areas .. these notes may exist in the bass, melody or even these triplets to get an integrated whole of sound effects. This is to be guided by one's ear and conception of the piece. I think ignoring one of these three components is not giving the piece the chance to show all what it's got. And it got a lot. Attention should be given to the three.
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