Tag: improvisation
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Write over improvise
If Heaven has bestowed on you a fine imagination, you will often be seated at your piano in solitary hours, as if attached to it; you will desire to express the feelings of your heart in harmony, and the more clouded the sphere of harmony may perhaps be to you, the more mysteriously you will…
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Reincken on Bach’s playing
The famous organist Reincken heard Bach play. Bach improvised for half an hour on the hymn “By the Waters of Babylon”. Reincken said: “I thought such art was dead, but I see it still lives in you.” Siblin, Eric (2009) The Cello Suites. Crows Nest: Allen and Unwin, p. 58.
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Beethoven’s contest
In 1800, an improvisation contest occured between Beethoven and the pianist Daniel Steibelt. It was agreed that Prince Lobkowitz would sponsor Steibelt and Prince Lichnowsky sponsor Beethoven, the improvisation contest to take place in Lobkowitz’s palace. As the challenger, Steibelt was to play first. He walked to the piano, tossing a piece of his own…
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Brahms at the tavern
When Brahms was young, he had to play in rowdy taverns to help support his family. Dance music was what the people in the taverns wanted, and Hannes would sometimes relieve the monotony by improvising variations on the popular waltzes of the day. But what finally made his work endurable was the discovery that while…
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Simon on improvisation
“Improvisation is too good to leave to chance.” -Paul Simon, singer & composer Cited at Aphorism.ru. Accessed 31 March 2013.
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Mozart improvising
In 1777, Mozart was having lunch with his uncle at the Holy Cross Convent in Ausburg. Mozart played a sinfoni and Vanhall’s Violin Concerto in B. In the evening, at supper, he performed his Strasbourg concerto, a keyboard prelude and his Fischer Variations (K179). It was suggested to the deacon of the Holy Cross Conen,…