The piano, as distinct from the harp

Beethoven on the development of the piano as an instrument in its own right:

There is no doubt that so far as the manner of playing it is concerned, the pianoforte is still the least studied and developed of all instruments; often one thinks that one is merely listening to a harp.  And I am delighted, my dear fellow, that you are one of the few who realize and perceive that, provided one can feel the music, one can also make the pianoforte sing.  I hope that the time will come when the harp and pianoforte will be treated as two entirely different instruments.

Beethoven, in a letter to Johann Andreas Streicher, 1796.

Anderson, Emily, ed. (1961) The Letters of Beethoven.  3 Vol., London: St. Martin’s Press.  Letter 18.  Cited in: Marek, George (1969) Beethoven: Biography of a Genius.  London: William Kimber, p.161.

Posted

in

by

Greg

Tags:

, , ,

Featured Content

The political function of music
“There can be no music without an idealogy. The old composers, whether they knew it or not, were upholding a political theory. Most of them, of course, were bolstering the rule of the upper classes. Only Beethoven was a forerunner of the revolutionary movement.” – Dmitry Shostakovich Cited in: Nettl, Paul (1969) The Book of […]
Musicians in Dresden in 1720s
”There was rivalry among the musicians in Dresden in the 1720s.  Daniel Heartz describes some incidents: Silvius Weiss, the famous lutenist, saw his livelihood threatened when he was attacked by a French violinist named Petit, who attempted to bite off the top joint of his right thumb.  On 13 August 1722 Veracini jumped to the […]
Joe Hisaishi on the score of The Boy and the Heron
“I did not want to describe emotions or scenes through music. I wanted to be at a certain distance from the story and the characters, and I wanted to be in between the actual story and what we see on the screen, and the viewers, in terms of writing the music.” — Joe Hisaishi T. […]
I Will Walk in the Presence of the Lord – Psalm 115 (116b), Psalm 114 (116a)
Title: I will walk in the presence of the Lord Text:     – Psalm 115 (116b):10, 15-19 (R. Psalm 114 (116a):9)     – Psalm 114 (116a):1-6, 8-9. R. v.9. Composer: Greg Smith Instrumentation: SATB and piano Product medium: PDF Score and part Sample:
Tale
TITLE: Tale COMPOSER: Greg Smith INSTRUMENTATION: Bassoon and Piano PRODUCT MEDIUM: PDF score and part PRICE: $11.95 SAMPLES:
Language at its most powerful
Language is at its most powerful when it disturbs, not by arriving at insights/understandings, but by creating possibilities. – Thomas Ogden T. Ogden, Reveries and Interpretations: Sensing Something Human, Lanham, Roman & Littlefield, 2004, p. 219.
Life experience
“Knowledge about life is one thing; effective occupation of a place in life, with its dynamic currents passing through your being, is another.” – William James, American philosopher and psychologist W. James, Essays in Pragmatism, United Kingdom, Free Press, 1970, p. 113.
Woodwind
Bassoon
A lesson with Beethoven
One fearful winter’s day in Vienna, in 1794, the snow standing deep and still falling fast, the traffic almost entirely suspended in the streets, Countess Teresa Brunswick, then a girl of fifteen, was waiting for Beethoven’s arrival, to give her her pianoforte lesson. Weather never stopped him; but when he appeared it was obvious that […]
Schoenberg’s composition class
An account of Arnold Schoenberg teaching a composition class: Well, first of all there was composition class, in which he analyzed in brief the first sections of several Schubert sonatas. How he adores Schubert! “Many people say,” he remarked, “that Schubert is too long. He is long-yes-but for me he is always too short!” Such […]