November / Month of the Sonata – 23
.jpg!Large.jpg "The treachery of images (This is not a pipe), 1928 - 1929 - Rene Magritte")
Richibi’s Weblog
Just another WordPress.com weblog
Tag: tempo
November 20, 2023
November / Month of the Sonata – 20
“Double Self-Portrait“
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner
________
Ravel’s Violin Sonata no 2, of 1927, is a
long way from the Romantics, though I
usually settle Ravel among the
Impressionists, this piece seems rather
to reflect the later Expressionists in art,
see above, for its virulence and eccentric
tonalities and performance techniques
in both the violin and the piano, the age
had given us the First World War, and
would soon lead to the Second
the three Classical imperatives of tonality,
tempo, and repetition are maintained still,
but their descendants are unruly, willful,
bold and impervious, there are no holds
barred here, they take no prisoners
listen
R ! chard
March 4, 2023
how to listen to music if you don’t know your Beethoven from your Bach, X
“Joseph Haydn” (1791)
Thomas Hardy
_______
though I’ve focused especially, during
this introduction to Classical music,
on Mozart, a second great pillar of
that era is Haydn, 1732 – 1809
here is one of his 62 piano sonatas,
which expresses more than anything
you’ve heard here yet the definition
of what music was at the time, or
should be, tonality, as I’ve earlier
said, tempo and repetition were
tantamount
listen for or the rigidity of the tempo,
the consistent melliflousness of
the melody, and therefore tonality,
and the repetition of all the
component tunes
I remember going to a drum recital
once, here in Vancouver, a guy was
expressing his artistry in a formal
venue, I was sitting in a forward
row, saw him set up his music on
his music stand, and I thought,
he’s going to have to turn the
pages, which he did, a drummer
that’s all I remember of the
presentation, but that was enough,
an entire revelation
in this Haydn sonata, the pianist
turns the pages of his score, back
and forth, an interesting visual
expression of the imperative of
repetition in that era’s music,
having to return to what had
been written on the previous
page
also note that trills abound
note too in the second movement,
the adagio cantabile, the sudden
introduction of arpeggios,
transcendent, as though angels
had just appeared
which prefigures the metaphysical
aspirations of the Romantic Period
which ensued, see, for instance,
Chopin
note also that we’re on fortepiano
here, a period instrument, a cross
between the harpsichord and the
modern instrument
thoroughly enjoy
R ! chard
August 20, 2015
“Three Movements from Petroushka” – Igor Stravinsky
“Ballets Russes“ (1912)
__________
Donald, I said to my friend, the
musicologist, what’s the plural
of tenuto
I’d been lining up what I call my
“articles of pace”, the musical
notations that indicate tempo,
tempi
rubato, of course, for time stretched,
the bottom of a dip when your partner
pauses at the end of your arm where
you steal a private moment during
otherwise waltz time, or tango
rubato must be in the middle of a
bar cause a stolen moment needs
space to return to its more natural
rhythm, equilibrium
a ritardando, or rallentando, slows
down but at the end of a bar, or
musical statement, often at the very
end of a piece, for an introspective,
say, ending
an accelerando is its opposite,
speeding up the beat, and will
continue till it reaches its apogee,
climax, as it were
a tenuto holds, caresses, one note,
or one chord, only, before proceeding
any further
all of these words, incidentally, are
adverbs, not nouns, but through
usage have assimilated the idioms
of nouns, therefore singulars and
plurals, articles and adjectives
apply
what’s the plural of tenuto, I’d
asked
Donald, always a sport, answered
tersely, tenuti, grinning
you’re kidding me, I replied, boy,
will I have fun with that
two tenuti, three tenuti, four tenuti,
five, six tenuti, seven tenuti, eight
tenuti, jive, I continued, racking up
immediate levity, not to mention
momentum, and cadence
count the tenuti in this masterpiece,
Stravinsky‘s “Three Movements
from Petroushka“, a programmatic
piece, Petroushka is a puppet in love
with a ballerina, but she’s in love
with a Moor, more about Moors later,
maybe, it could get controversial
Petroushka, distressed, challenges
the Moor, but the Moor kills him
Petroushka returns as a ghost, but
ineffectually, cause he’s really only,
finally, a puppet
Vaslav Nijinsky played Pertroushka
in the original production with
Diaghilev‘s Ballets Russes, June 13,
1911, in Paris, the rest is history
in 1921 Stravinsky wrote an arrangement
for virtuosic, he specified, piano, using
three scenes only from the ballet as
pivot
1 – Danse russe (Russian Dance)
2 – Chez Pétrouchka (Petroushka’s Room)
3 – La semaine graisse (The Shrovetide Fair)
they’re fast, very fast, prestississimo,
you’ll miss the breaks if you blink,
where you’d be likely to find, if any,
tenuti
good luck
Richard
Richibi's Weblog 