Life goal: get hired as a pianist playing background music at a hotel, fancy restaurant, or high-class department store. After an hour of smooth jazz, bust out with Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues and see how quickly the room clears.
Hamelin can make anything sound melodic, catchy, and he really gets to the heart of the music! He's such an incredibly talented pianist, brilliant and cheeky improvisor and composer, and adds to any score he touches. Atonal pieces composed to mimic industrial music and being very post modern in nature aren't for everyone, but Hamelin absolutely crushes this performance and shapes and colors both pieces just so damn well. People forget about the genocide and hell of slavery and the harsh conditions of pre-union industrialism. Music, and art by extension, isn't always meant to make you feel all warm and fuzzy, but sometimes it's meant to evoke widely different emotions. Some are primal, some sadness, some depression, some hopeful bit, but also melancholy. Both pieces are beautiful and have a lot of depth. Sometimes you can just look at a work of art or hear a composition and just get what it's all about and what it's trying to say, but for some others, you really have to take your time, take it in, and, often, learn something new, and then you'll have a better understanding and appreciation of it. I also cannot stress how exceptionally well this is played. If you're an armchair critic and think you can do better, I invite you to try these piece out for yourself. Once you do, you'll marvel at the different sounds, phrasings, articulation, and huge dynamic range Hamelin achieves. Thank you for sharing this!
The Cotton Gin blues is truly extraordinary. Russian composers attempted have more or less attempted to emulate or incorporate factory noises in 1920s USSR Futurist works (e.g. “Iron Foundry” by Mosolov). But nothing comes this close to the real thing. What a spectacular rendition by Marc-André Hamelin.
I keep coming back to the third ballade. Man, Rzewski’s counterpoint in the final restatement of the main theme is just insane - It sounds like Godowsky at his absolute best. I’m so happy to have discovered Rzewski’s music :)
The last composer I heard who could get that much tonal color out of a piano was George Crumb, and this leaves George Crumb absolutely in the dust! This is tour de force writing for the piano. It's some of the most exciting new music for the piano I've heard.
I don't know what it is about Rzewski's music that attracts me to it so much. Perhaps it's because his music's perfect mixtures of beauty and the grotesque are simply fascinating to me.
Don’t want to sound racial but, could not help to hear all the suffering and hard working class people such as African, Latino Americans and Asian Americans in those time. Certainly there were also working class European immigrants, all helped to build this great nation ！
Life goal: get hired as a pianist playing background music at a hotel, fancy restaurant, or high-class department store. After an hour of smooth jazz, bust out with Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues and see how quickly the room clears.
Clears... or quiets down to really listen?
@@RikardPeterson clears, i'm pretty sure
@@cadenzalien4554 it's the audience's reaction that really amuses me. Hahahahahaha.
You might actually get a standing ovation if you play Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues!
yessssssssssss
I just finished learning Fur elise, so I should be just about ready to tackle this piece...
Hamelin can make anything sound melodic, catchy, and he really gets to the heart of the music! He's such an incredibly talented pianist, brilliant and cheeky improvisor and composer, and adds to any score he touches. Atonal pieces composed to mimic industrial music and being very post modern in nature aren't for everyone, but Hamelin absolutely crushes this performance and shapes and colors both pieces just so damn well.
People forget about the genocide and hell of slavery and the harsh conditions of pre-union industrialism.
Music, and art by extension, isn't always meant to make you feel all warm and fuzzy, but sometimes it's meant to evoke widely different emotions. Some are primal, some sadness, some depression, some hopeful bit, but also melancholy.
Both pieces are beautiful and have a lot of depth. Sometimes you can just look at a work of art or hear a composition and just get what it's all about and what it's trying to say, but for some others, you really have to take your time, take it in, and, often, learn something new, and then you'll have a better understanding and appreciation of it.
I also cannot stress how exceptionally well this is played. If you're an armchair critic and think you can do better, I invite you to try these piece out for yourself. Once you do, you'll marvel at the different sounds, phrasings, articulation, and huge dynamic range Hamelin achieves. Thank you for sharing this!
The Cotton Gin blues is truly extraordinary. Russian composers attempted have more or less attempted to emulate or incorporate factory noises in 1920s USSR Futurist works (e.g. “Iron Foundry” by Mosolov). But nothing comes this close to the real thing. What a spectacular rendition by Marc-André Hamelin.
9:10 Rachmaninoff Piano Concerto no. 2
I got that too!
@@rojavida Good catch!
Was just gonna say that… it’s unmistakeable when you’ve heard it enough
The cotton mills song literally sounds like a machine factory. perfect.
The section from 9:10 to 9:56 reminds me a little bit of the Rach 2 opening.
Surely it has to be an allusion.. the chord sequence is too famous for him to have quoted unknowingly?
yeah that's 100% a reference
@@TheModicaLiszt Especially considering the key is the same.
One of the most fun experiences I’ve ever had listening to a piano work.
I keep coming back to the third ballade. Man, Rzewski’s counterpoint in the final restatement of the main theme is just insane - It sounds like Godowsky at his absolute best. I’m so happy to have discovered Rzewski’s music :)
I remember being obsessed with that section some months ago uwu
Rest In Peace Frederic Rzewski. Your legacy lives on.
8:47 of cotton mill blues...headphones in, sounds like the piano is speaking a slur word...please tell me I'm not crazy
I will never unhear that.
11:04 Rzewski got da Prokofiev drip
The last composer I heard who could get that much tonal color out of a piano was George Crumb, and this leaves George Crumb absolutely in the dust!
This is tour de force writing for the piano. It's some of the most exciting new music for the piano I've heard.
Relentless tour de force.
Agreed. Rzewski seems to stand out as an all-time great composer even independent of the meaningfully interwoven social elements of his work.
Thank you for the upload, I probably would’ve never discovered these pieces if it wasn’t for you
Thank you for your kind comment :)
That Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues is amazing!
Weird as fuck.
@@TheRojo387 nah, it imitates a cotton mill. Cool textures.
@@TheRojo387 But not *that weird* :D
@@TheRojo387 Weird can be good. A lot of George Crumb is "weird", but it's fun for the audience and for the performers, alike.
I don't know what it is about Rzewski's music that attracts me to it so much. Perhaps it's because his music's perfect mixtures of beauty and the grotesque are simply fascinating to me.
Wow! that Winnsboro cotton mill blues takes some endurance to pull through and some acrobatics I guess...
These are great, never heard before and amazing in MAHs hands! Thanks much for sharing
how fun the blues looks
What would be really amazing to see would be a video of the piano hammers during the cotton mill piece!
There's already a video of that - played by Ralph van Raat.
The machine-like ballade imitates the factory machines that make cotton mill...
Rest in peace Mr. Rzewski
Wow! Took my breath away! Shades of Gershwin in parts.
That was dope. Thanks for sharing.
Wow! Amazing pieces of music.
Woah that was FANTASTIC!!! So boisterous and crazy! An innovative approach to these folk ballads.
8:30 my brain having a techno beat while listening to this section lol
9:09 reminds me of Rach 2nd Piano Concerto
No. 4 Awesome and very frightening! It sure scared the s*it out of me!
I don't think frightening is the right word.. more like unnerving..
It gave me chills, brought tears to my eyes. Words fail...
What a treat honestly
Wonderful...
That’s pretty durn good!
5:56 interesting notation :D
9:11, r.h. Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto in c Minor :)
Música muy ingeniosa.
Down by the Riverside is so cute!
indeed :D
It sounds like something you would have written (this is supposed to be a compliment)
Yes
Damn I see you both everywhere I go
Especially at 3:33
What I've just heard
thanks for this!
These are fantastic! Bravo!
*"North American"*
Canada: *deleted*
Mexico: *deleted*
Pretty decent little pieces.
Superlative!!!
11:57 fire
What does the first bar of the first composition reminds me??? Chopin?? please help,
Is the piano prepared during Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues? The opening note's hammer-string strikes sound extremely blunted and choked off
As far as I know, the piano is not prepared in this piece. :)
ua-cam.com/video/UNBNbHK2jgw/v-deo.html
Nope what you are hearing are tone clusters
Fantastic piece
9:09 Rach 2
nice
OK, who copied who; John Williams or Frederic Rzewski??? I hear JAWS!! 6:44
THIS IS SO COOL!!!
Great.
Wow.
It's Ives reborn.
Toll!!!
5:47
Don’t want to sound racial but, could not help to hear all the suffering and hard working class people such as African, Latino Americans and Asian Americans in those time. Certainly there were also working class European immigrants, all helped to build this great nation ！
The Irish
Cluster.
I dont like the americans composers
What is it about American composers you dont like?
ok
What?
I don't give a…
Fantastic, nothing else.
this is so bad
hi
@@WEEBLLOM hi comrade