I distinctly remember the first time I heard Träumerei as an 8 year old. Tears ran down my face. You did it to me again. That was hauntingly beautiful, Wim. Thank you.
Applied practically, the double beat-single beat problem just seems to be much clearer now that I actually get to hear the difference! Thank you for this video.
I've been waiting for you to play on your Erard and you finally did! It sounds great and you play it great too! Thanks Wim and for this lesson on Schumann's metronome markings.
My grand-uncle was the autor Wolf-Ferrari Ermanno and my father the conductor Manno - thanks for Your wonderfull channel, it's a pleasure for me and a surprise, good work :)
Beautiful on the Erard, Wim! And I just listened to half a dozen other versions of the `Knight of the Hobby Horse' by famous performers. My God, everyone else's playing of it is so insanely fast! Thank you for your efforts to return some sanity to the world of music.
Schumann is a real genius ! What a beautiful music he composed ! It doesn't matter how fast it goes as long as it's there and ready for a speed of anyone's liking. Thank you for the video
It is not as though we have a choice as it stands. Generations of music lovers have been deprived of the opportunity to hear the music of the great masters performed as they were intended by their creators. For example, more musicians cite J. S Bach as the greatest ever composer, but I devoted hours last Christmas season in an attempt to find just one recording of the Christmas Oratorio that had not been treated as a opportunity to to display musical virtuosity for its own sake, often by racing through it as quickly as possible.
I find your explanation of the metrical metronome theory extremely convincing, and it will certainly influence my interpretation of the works of these composers. My question is: when did the metrical reading give way to the 'literal' reading? Why and how did the change occur?
It shouldn't surprise us why no-one explicitly wrote on single-double beat etc, since both existed along each other. Even Vincent Novello in ca 1820 used single beat MM for his Mozart editions/ Surprisingly (or not- not to me), those MM are about half of those used by Moscheles for Mozart, the two lived in the same city, gave concerts in each others houses, even with Mendelssohn, and not a word on tempi issues. Novello was one of the first, if not the first btw, to use single beat as a speed indication, the metronome of course (as Maelzel even describes) was used as a timekeeper as well. But even later, see the vids we had with Marcel Punt, on Reger. Reger and Straube, friends, both editing Reger's work, Reger's MM double of those of Straube, and not one word of confusion until... some generations later when we started to look back on history. Don't forget: looking back is an absolute novelty, it was never done in history at least not with a reconstructive attempt! ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
Also for consideration is the issue of how 6/8 and other similar time signatures are to be counted. Are they counted in macro beats in triple groupings, or are they counted as single eighth notes? For example, if you have a piece in 6/8 and the tempo marking says "andante," do you play the dotted quarter note at walking tempo, or do you play the eighth note at walking tempo? The results can be quite surprising sometimes if you take the eighth note approach as opposed to the common dotted quarter note approach.
But what would life be without Schumann's music? His music is truly difficult to play but he tried his best to put his racing thoughts on paper. A genius nonetheless.
Very interesting to hear about the double beat use of the metronome by Schumann. It certainly provides a much more precise tempo indication to pianists, particularly on slow pieces. Your comment on "unequal" tempo was quite valuable as well. Thanks
Usually, I do not bother much about metronome tempi; nevertheless, in case of the "Träumerei", I have intuitively come quite close to your interpretation. So, I think it is not only a rationally, but also an emotionally convincing solution.
I find this whole discussion of the tempo of music relevant to the Metronome quite fascinating and, perhaps unlike some other of my fellow musicians, am more than happy to hear out the reasoning and evidence of others, such as that which Wim presents. It seems to me that there are a number of lines of evidence which can be brought to bear on this topic, but before I list some of those, let me express a sort of 'background of musical history' thought here first: Prior to the invention of the Metronome, which made possible the mechanical-numerical measurement of the speed of the passing of pulsatile phenomena associated with music, musicians relied upon SPOKEN/WRITTEN LANGUAGE DESCRIPTIVE TERMS for the same purpose. Grave, Largo, Adagio, Andante, Moderato, Allegro, Vivace, Presto (and some other terms and then of course combinations of two terms-e.g., "Allegro moderato"-to designate an 'in-between' tempo) all were, and still are, used for this purpose. And, using just such language words for tempo designation MUSICIANS MANAGED PRETTY WELL for a long time. If the tempo said "Allegro," the performer/conductor would give the music their best, informed musical judgment as to how fast "fast" should be, and would adapt that to the practical needs of the performers involved, including the venue/acoustincs in which they were playing. It has likewise struck me as an Organist-because no two historical Pipe organs (before the era of mass-produced electronic instruments with 'model' identifications and identical features/sounds)-were ever very exactly alike-that Bach characteristically left comparatively few indications of REGISTRATION for his Organ pieces. Some people wonder "Why not?" and the likely reason is that there was no special point in doing so, since: 1. Organists were routinely their own 'orchestrators' anyway, and part of their training was to understand an Organ's sonic capabilities using various combinations of sounds and so they could be, on the whole, both trusted and expected to choose registration for music they performed which would be appropriate and suitable to the music and the occasion for which it was being performed. The judicious and tasteful choice of registration was part of an Organist's responsibility and 'tool box.' 2. Beyond the very basic TYPE (Diapason, Flute, Reed, etc.) and OCTAVE (32', 16', 8', 4', 2', 1', and various Mixtures) specification, there was little point in writing down a very detailed registration because it either might be unavailable-at least in part-or, for some reason, unsuitable even if available, on any particular instrument. There is also the matter of published pieces which are given very detailed registrations by their composers or by music editors being considered by Organists who are not yet fully confident in their own registration choices who, seeing a gross 'mismatch' between the printed/suggested registration and 'what's available on my instrument,' may feel daunted by the difference and simply choose other music rather than try to convert the printed registration into something roughly 'equivalent' that will both work and be true to the printed page. In other words, for Bach to have included lots of detailed registration would, given the role of the Organist and the varied resources offered on various instruments from place to place, have been somewhat wasted and needless effort. And good organists can and routinely do fashion their own registrations as part of their regular practice routines and and performance situations anyhow. Back to the Metronome. The "lines of evidence" I spoke of above include: 1. (Since there are no widespread audio recordings before the later 19th century), written evidence of how the Metronome was used, and understood to be correctly used, by musicians prior to the recording era is important. Thus, composers' own extant written statements, descriptions of performance practice (and there were even pocket watches and other timepieces before the Metronome, so people attending musical performance had SOME sense of the passage of time) by witnesses of the period, musicological research of various kinds, and of course published editions of sheet music and manufacturers' printed instructions issued with Metronomes, all have some valid part to play in this discussion. (If the world ever sees the invention of a reliable Time-portal Television display whereby modern people can WITNESS events of the past and see/hear past Metronomic practice in action, then of course that would help immensely! I don't hold out much hope for the 'Remote Viewing' crowd in this respect, but have been surprised before in life…) 2. What's humanly possible, in terms of tempo of performance. Nutrition and medical practice have improved greatly in the past 300 years due to science, but the human body remains essentially the same as it always was, and the human hands of accomplished modern Pianists can, other things being equal, do the same thing now as did Pianists in the past. Bach's hands worked essentially the same as Beethoven's and as ours. 3. Likewise, the human EXPERIENCE of life's various 'stations' is essentially the same as before. We know what infancy, childhood, teenager years, young adulthood, middle age, and old age are all about now just as people also did hundreds of years ago. All, or at least virtually all, humans sleep, have experienced dreams, and so would have SOME degree of common understanding of what a piece titled "Träumerei" would and should be about, if Schumann is as skillful in depicting it for us as we think he is. Perhaps in the case of this particular piece, our common human experience of a dream-expressed in music for us by Schumman-will play a rather major role in helping us to decide issues of 'proper' tempo-if for no other reason than because the piece will make CLEARER SENSE as the 'right' expression of such a title/program for a piece as compared to that common human experience at one tempo vs. another that's twice as fast. Granted, the (more subjective) metric here is the human psyche rather than a word designation for a tempo (some of which words are also linked to common human experience-such as "Andante," which is linked to a leisurely/casual walking speed) or a scientifically/numerically measured tempo (such as the Metronome provides), but I still think such a programmatic title left by the composer which relates to a common human experience is a worthwhile and valid clue and merits some consideration. 4. Human beings, including composers (who are sometimes rushed and working on deadlines of various kinds, or who might be tired and paying less attention than they should on a particular day) can vary in the stringency of their metronomical specification for their own pieces-and not only according to their time of life, but even according to the TIME OF DAY. For example, I've often readjusted the tempo settings of pieces I'm composing in my Finale music software program according to my personal preference AT THAT TIME OF DAY. There have been evenings when, while working on the VERY SAME PIECE, I thought that a particular tempo I'd chosen THAT SAME MORNING for that piece was now 'not right' and needed to be altered-merely because I was myself re-experiencing the piece differently in the evening than I had in the morning. Some composers are knowledgeable and meticulous in all of their score specifications for all musical parameters (dynamics, articulation, tempo, slurs and phrasing, tempo variations, emotional characterizations, etc.) while others are rather more unsure or even 'sloppy.' Probably most composers are, on the whole, quite careful about such things and fall somewhere in-between. My own work as a music editor for the typography of my compositions and arrangements has made me a MUCH more careful composer, in terms of the specification I now place on my scores, compared to how I did that, say, thirty years ago. And thirty years ago I already THOUGHT I was pretty careful! Also, the wise and careful specification of musical parameters on a score is a LIFELONG LEARNING PROCESS, and something that diligent composers keep improving on as they write more and more music over time. My younger self was a less knowledgeable and careful music editor than my older self is, but my younger self had a quicker mind for thinking and for catching mistakes. So the nature of the aging process can be somewhat of a factor too.
My mind is just going BOOOOM ! Here is what I naturally thought, as it were, in a single thought, after watching this enlightening video. Everything Winters says makes complete sense, because the metronome is a derivative of the PENDULUM, which is an attempt of the human being to create a form of constant, PERPETUAL MOTION. In order for that to happen, a pendulum makes use of the force of gravity, and the little lateral movent, back and forth. Which means, it HAS to swing, otherwise it cannot move! The metronome is the same thing, recreated in MECHANICAL FORM. In other words, the schlag MUST include TWO movements, otherwise how can the device function? My Korg metronome does it by making a BEEP digitally, but the original metronome had to mechanically swing back and forth, like a pendulum. But the two movements is a "forced consequence ", a physical obligation, NOT a part of the musical 'beat'. Yet it must be there. The conductor's gesture too is a recreation of the pendulum. Conscious or unintentional, I don't know. But that is how it works, I think. It all makes sense!
Lovely video, thanks Wim! The character of Ritter vom Steckenpferd is quite different in the original tempo, and you almost get an image of children running and hopping around with their hobby-horses, which you don't with a very fast tempo. The same with Hasche-Mann in your previous video, which has a very playful character in the original tempo.
It is clear from recordings by 3 of Clara Schumann's pupils (Adelina de Lara, Fanny Davies and Carl Friedberg), of Kinderszenen, that they observed the metronome indications by Robert Schumann according to a SINGLE beat interpretation, not according to a double beat interpretation. In fact, only "Traumerei" is played significantly slower. "Kuriose Geschichte" and "Glückes genug" are even played faster than Schumann's metronome indications by all three, if interpreted according to a single beat interpretation. They play all pieces much faster than than indicated if you assume they interpreted the metronome indications by Schumann using a double beat interpretation. Of course they could have increased their tempo radically later in life, but how plausible is that given that they were so proud of their education. Clara Schumann did not allow her pupils many liberties in how they played the piano. For instance, they were not allowed to use the una corda pedal or use fingering to make a passage easier. Therefore, it is inconceivable that they were allowed to play the pieces by her own husband in a tempo twice as fast. Do you really believe Clara Schumann played twice as fast as her husband? See ua-cam.com/video/FgrBgbPILuA/v-deo.html
@@the_wrong_note Assuming they used the double beat interpretation, then they have increased their tempi for all the other pieces of Kinderszenen by a considerable amount (some pieces more than double). That's even harder to explain. I know few examples of muscians who increased their tempi when they grew older (Toscanini was one of them, but only marginally, not 2x). Let's take the simplest explanation as more likely.
Thanks for posting it. Your videos about this subject are truly fascinating and helping me out a lot. I was always told and taught that the first metronomes owned by those composers were inaccurate, as if they were badly made or regulated. So, what teachers always told me to do was to ignore those tempi marks and hear different recordings to try to find my way through it. What always happened was that it brought a lot of confusion because the recording are generally too fast and even those players are unable to play those tempi out in every situation throughout their whole careers. Schumann's Traumes Wirren always intrigued me because the tempo given by the composer was impossible if read as single beat and the recordings are too fast even in a much slower metronome (in single beat). But the point is almost every recording of it sounds too fast with no time to be expressive respecting the composer's articulations. Same thing with Schumann's Op. 17. The recordings are way too fast to the point where some parts cannot be played a tempo, so the players have to abuse of rubatos, ritardandos and suspending the time giving to the music a floating time character or even "arrhythmic" sometimes.
My music history class called him "Crazy Schumann". I honestly didn't know that he didn't know what he was doing tempo wise. I wished my music teacher noted that to us. Thank you for bringing it to the forefront. Oh, ok, so the triplet meter in the ductus for No. 9 "Ritter von Steckenpford" is doing a "three against two" ductus. That makes sense. I like your performance of the No. 7 "Traumerei". Thank you for showing us these things, Wim.
I see, again, conclusive evidence against the proposition that we misunderstood the metronome markings, in the very example chosen here: Traumerei. Obviously the thesis is that by the second half of the century (Godowski was born in 1870 and in 1879 he would have had plenty of exposure to metronomes, 1879 being very important as I will explain). There is one person who would have known very well if Schumann's metronome was faulty, Clara, his wife and celebrated pianist. Well, she did actually say that the metronome was faulty and too fast, but only be around 5-10% if I recall. But, more importantly (since we are dealing here with variations of far more than 5-10%), she famously edited, together with Brahms Schumann's music and her edited version with her edited metronome markings appeared for the first time in 1879. The speed indicated is 80, i.e. a little slower than Schumann's original, probably reflecting Schumann;s faulty metronome. But essentially she kept to the same overall level in terms of tempo. SO the question is what did she mean by 80? If we take Wim's theory and she meant by that, essentially, 'half speed' then how can a boy, which by 1879 was giving concerts around Europe, not have understood the same exact practice? Or conversely, if by 1879, when Godowski would have matured in his understanding of tempo, the prevailing understanding on hwo to count beats had shifted, why would Clara and Brahms persist with the "old" approach and confuse the edition. Further, if there were such rivalling potential interpretations of metronome markings (i.e. Clara had one understanding and young Godowski had another) why does the meticulously edited Clara and Brahms edition not provide a clarification - especially when Clara spent time to amend all the metronome markings? I think the answer is simple: because in 1879 Clara and Godowski had the same understanding of metronome markings, which was similar (but slower) than Robert Schumann's and, by extension, similar to a modern performance.
Clara was often criticized for being at the 'virtuoso' side, instead of on the 'classical' side as she was trained. She destroyed also late revisions and works of her husband.
Good evening. I thought about the numbers on the metronome scale, for example 100, which indicates that in one minute the metronome makes 100 ticks, but, if they had reasoned according to the logic of the two ticks as a complete unit, it would not have made more sense that they had written instead of the number of ticks per minute (100, in this case), the number of complete units in one minute (50, therefore)?
Ammiro il bel pianoforte un suono chiaro che rimane riflesso nella memoria uditiva.Schumann acquista ed eseguita con tanto sentimento.I miei sinceri complimenti 🍾🎊🎈
18:44 wait, why would a composer indicate the tempo for half a bar if the time signature is *uneven* ?? Then there would be a tick between the first and the second quarter note - as if the metronome was a duplet. This would be very confusing for untrained ears, and it would not make any sense if everyone was supposed to count every second tick and divide the interval into triplets, if you could just count the whole bar, so one dotted half note - Schumann's indication.
Hugo: Schiff has developed into one of the finest teaching performers around today. He has devoted a great deal of his focus on what the text has to say, especially with Bach and Beethoven; in the case of Beethoven, Schiff gave a superb series of public lecture performances in Wigmore Hall and in those performances he has a great deal to say about tempi. Wim has started a most wonderful dialogue and has opened our eyes to the important issues of tempi. I do not know what Schiff would say in particular about the pieces Wim was discussing. I was just imagining how even more exciting it would be to get his input.
Yeah, I actually know this and absolutely adore it, but wondered if you had something to say about his Schumann. I'm actually looking for a recording of his Bach conference on the Goldberg variations. He gave a conference last year in Berlin but don't know if they have published it in any way as of now.
What I had to say about Wim's Schumann? It sounded quite convincing. Horowitz was renowned as a Schumann interpreter. However, he also was not overly interested in what the composer actually indicated for tempi. Horowitz was not a cerebral interpreter like Gould was. He played the romantic composers very emotionally and when you hear the thunderous and rapturous applause you know that he played to the crowd. Argerich however, is one of the most precise and analytical performers and is not prone to technical indulgences or flashy bits of technique. I would think her tempi would be uneventful. You listen to Wilhelm Kempf or Brendel or Schiff and they play the romantics in a conservative and balanced manner. I am not familiar with any new Schiff lectures but if they are in English I would enjoy hearing him speak.
fred houpt it was in English, and I asked the venue back then if there would be a recording which they said there would. But actually they have not answered to my questions since, so I have no idea if they have published it in any way...
This is a fascinating subject. What are the implications for the old metronomic approach on the tempos of Beethoven's Hammerklavier? Do you already have a video about that? Thanks so much!
It is inconceivable that someone as talented as Schumann was clueless when it came to using a metronome, or that his was somehow defective and he did not realise it. I am sure someone would have noticed the discrepancy quite quickly if indeed there was one. Alternatively there has to be a simple and rational explanation of the metronome numbers which you have highlighted perfectly. Your playing (excellent as always) of these pieces in these tempi can only be taken as conclusive proof of the theory. Nice to hear the piano for a change although I do prefer the clavichord and thought scenes 1 - 6 were remarkably good.
It is because I admire your clavichord playing so much that I have been longing to hear you playing other instruments: and yes, that's a paradox, but paradoxes are wonderful things, in life as in literature. And so, at last, the Erard: it's a beautiful piano, and you play it (of course) beautifully. Can we possibly tempt you to play that organ, whose pipes are tantalizingly visible in the background? Seriously, to hear some Bach played first on the clavichord and then on the organ (as Bach surely played in private and in public, respectively?) would be so revealing. Your goal was to inspire other musicians: you succeed every time. I can only echo all the other comments on how valuable this channel is: I so wish I'd discovered it right at the start. Thank you!
Thank you so much John. The organ is not in a very good shape at the moment, and however it served me so well here in our house, its sound is really big for the room, it could use a... little church
It's interesting that in my edition (Wiener Urtext) Joachim Draheim writes in the critical notes that the MM were not from Schumann, but appeared in the first edition after Schumann had corrected the proofs. He was aware of the markings in the published version, but never objected to them. He also notes that other MM were later added by Otto Böhme and Clara Schumann. So, there seem to be 3 different MM for each piece with the exception of the first, which has only 2 - Clara's is the same as the first edition.
Very nice playing. My thoughts went to the Schumann house where dad was musically telling the children - in bed - their bedtime story so as to fall asleep (and wooing his wife Clara in one go). Then, another day, he told Clara, have you seen our child bump-hopping around on his stick horse? And "paints the picture" to her.
Listening to this again as I'm reviewing these as pieces to assign students, I think your reading of them sounds more right than the guessed at but unconsciously almost correct tempos of the great pianists on their recordings. I am totally convinced that your theory of Schumann's MM markings is entirely correct.
Given Brahms' relationship with the Schumanns, I wonder if he was a metrical composer as well. From what I know, he never gave metronome numbers, but his pieces are pretty dense and seem to require a slower tempo than commonly performed.
Brahms pieces do not sound as dense on the straight strung pianos contemporary to his time, (which are clearer) of which he had owned. Brahms was interested in the Baroque composers, plus Brahms owned a clavichord, with credible provenance that the instrument had belonged to Mozart. Brahms last compositions were Chorale Preludes for Organ.
I really enjoy all the tempo related videos on this channel, the topic is just so interesting! One question I am curious about is, are there any historical sources that describe both the single and double beat approaches in the same text, and compare and contrast them in some way? If the double beat interpretation was once dominant, then a shift from double to single beat must have happened sometime during the 19-th century, and at some point both interpretations must have been equally widespread. What did the people at the time thought about this shift? Were there any textbooks that warned music students about potential confusion that could result from applying the wrong kind of metronome interpretation? Or something similar to that?
The double beat interpretation is nonsense and I do not find a single credible reference to this anywhere. It's almost a google bomb: I find three references to this, one is a discussion thread in 2017 that has a dead link to some article on this and the other two are videos in this channel here. Even when Brendel was writing his essay of why he thought Beethoven's metronome marks for the Hammerklavier sonata were wrong, he blamed it on a defective device and never once mentioned this double beat bogosity. Evidently, he wasn't aware of it either. Wim Winters is clearly not a dumb guy but he needs to start focusing on something else. Find any of his videos where he plays from a Beethoven sonata and his choice of tempi are laughable. It's not justifiable. According to him, no fast tempi exist in music.
@Tassilo: I love it when people see right through the complexity of history as a simple cartoon story! But hey, do me a favor, just play me Czerny's opus 299 (for students) in his tempi, and no, they were not goals, Czerny wants you to play them exactly in the MM he gave. Just do it. And then sit and reflect 5 minutes on those 1000's of MM that are waiting for you similar to these. But... it'll take you a bit more effort that Mr Google. I'm studying this now for over 25 years, have collected around 1500 books in German, French, English (yes, you'll have to understand those first), so ... o, and I never said fast tempi did not exist. If you would stand next to a pianist (don't even know if you play the piano) who played you Chopin opus 10 in his tempi (metrical) your mouth would fall open. It is really fast/
It shouldn't surprise us why no-one explicitly wrote on single-double beat etc, since both existed along each other. Even Vincent Novello in ca 1820 used single beat MM for his Mozart editions/ Surprisingly (or not- not to me), those MM are about half of those used by Moscheles for Mozart, the two lived in the same city, gave concerts in each others houses, even with Mendelssohn, and not a word on tempi issues. Novello was one of the first, if not the first btw, to use single beat as a speed indication, the metronome of course (as Maelzel even describes) was used as a timekeeper as well. But even later, see the vids we had with Marcel Punt, on Reger. Reger and Straube, friends, both editing Reger's work, Reger's MM double of those of Straube, and not one word of confusion until... some generations later when we started to look back on history. Don't forget: looking back is an absolute novelty, it was never done in history at least not with a reconstructive attempt! ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
Your claim basically is that there were two competing ways of interpreting metronome markings in the days of Moscheles and both were used. Yet the whole point of these indications was to disambiguate the choice of tempi. So why did no one ever think of disambiguating the metronome markings themselves? You also seem to be implying that Czerny's metronome numbers were in double-beat. Where would he have gotten that from? Surely not from Beethoven because if he had used double-beats in his Hammerklaviersonate, the slow movement alone would take 30 minutes. Did Mälzel give different instructions to Czerny than to Beethoven? So op 299 consists of many pieces. I see for example half notes of 108. It consists of 16th notes throughout but the tempo is also presto. I see no issue with this. If this was double beats it wouldn't really be much of an etude. As for the Punt videos, I've seen those. You and him are the only two people in the world that propose this double-beat theory. I do not a single historic document that would support it. It's merely something you are conjecturing.
*Finally your piano! I can't wait to hear future videos of you playing Beethoven, or Mozart on your great new instrument! I hope to share with you soon some of my music too. Greetings from Mexico Maestro Wim!*
The slower tempos enable one to also perform chords with a certain kind of “non-coordination”, deliberately not playing chords together at certain times for heightened expression. Sometimes it was a form of rubato in the early 20th century used by such performers as Vladimir dePachmann, Ignace Jan Paderewski, Ignaz Friedman, F. Planté, Josef Hofmann, Dame Myra Hess, etc. This interpretation of playing was extremely interesting and certainly not boring.
What were Schumann's 'marketing' considerations when choosing his tempo? Feeling under pressure to sell music, might he have decided (in a moment of weakness) to increase the tempo number to fit current musical fashions and make his music seem more exciting?
It shouldn't surprise us why no-one explicitly wrote on single-double beat etc, since both existed along each other. Even Vincent Novello in ca 1820 used single beat MM for his Mozart editions/ Surprisingly (or not- not to me), those MM are about half of those used by Moscheles for Mozart, the two lived in the same city, gave concerts in each others houses, even with Mendelssohn, and not a word on tempi issues. Novello was one of the first, if not the first btw, to use single beat as a speed indication, the metronome of course (as Maelzel even describes) was used as a timekeeper as well. But even later, see the vids we had with Marcel Punt, on Reger. Reger and Straube, friends, both editing Reger's work, Reger's MM double of those of Straube, and not one word of confusion until... some generations later when we started to look back on history. Don't forget: looking back is an absolute novelty, it was never done in history at least not with a reconstructive attempt! ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
Seriously, I listened Schubert and Schumann recently and thought about your channel, how Schumann would sound like in historical tempo, and second thing I found your Kinderszenen video, and couple days later - this one.
Personally, I do not believe that every great composer was a complete genious. It would not surprise me if one of them were somewhat "lacking in judgment in deciding the speed" of their music. But as you demonstrate, Schumann's tepi seem to work just fine when read the authentic way, which makes Godowski's words seem exaggerated if not completely misguided. Thank you for sharing this!
I think in the case of the Ritter vom Steckenpferd the double beat tempo does not work. I assume that Schumann meant this piece to represent a child on a hobby horse. I'm an old fogey and as a child we used to play with hobby horses. The usual asymmetrical rhythm of play "riding" on a hobby horse (the steps of the child's feet) is given in the underlying bass (half note and quarter note ; yum tidum). Watch these kids on hobby horses ua-cam.com/video/gvcZ8yvWc74/v-deo.html . Incidentally, this is the same underlying rhythm used in the Peruvian dance "Marinera Norteña" whose steps are also based on imitating a horse. ua-cam.com/video/kMqP0gL5-YA/v-deo.html . At the speed you play it, the child would need to have the ability to levitate. If you try riding a hobby horse (you can use a broom) you will find that you can "ride" to the Argerich and Horowitz renditions but not really to the double beat speed.
Thanks for sharing! It's funny you know, my youngest daughter rides that kind of 'horse' all day long... but I believe Schumann had those wooden toy horses in mind -don't know how they were made at this time- where the horse was pulled by a rope and the head went up and down irregularly
@@AuthenticSound Nice to hear that your daughter can still enjoy that simple pleasure :-) So many kids now stay glued to their phones ! As for Schumann, I suppose we will never really know which type of toy horse he had in mind. I don't speak German so I assumed the translation of Steckenpferd referred to the Hobby Horse which is the simple stick with a horse's head type - so I may have jumped to conclusions if the word can refer to other types of toy horses. Thank you for your reply. Keep up the good work both as a musicologist and a father :-)
When I checked for any manuscrit on IMSLP, I was surprised to find none, only the first edition with the "attributed to Schumann's" metronome marks. Then, I checked the Clara Schumann Edition... those marks have disappeared. Either Clara thought that by the time she published her edition, everyone in Europe was accustomed to the right tempos and the pieces didn't need the marks OR she chose to get rid of what she thought a mere editor's wrong initiative. What do you think? Are there any proof about Schumann's intentions?
Hi Marc, thanks for this excellent question! There is so much more to be researched and put into a much bigger context. I have read (years ago) the three volumes of Clara's diaries (in German), I should have go through the dozens of annotations, but cannot remember having read much, if anything at all on her husband's MM. Also Brahms would have to be involved in that research. What for me personally is an approach in a situation like this is see if the MM are from the composer's hand. If they are and are published, as is the case here, they are a fact above all others. What Clara thought later, why she did not kept those MM is a separate research, which is interesting and could reveal a lot of information, but it would -in this case- not make me doubt Robert's own judgment. As a personal note: I really do not see why people have been complaining so much on those numbers, in the case of the Kinderscenen, in double beat, they work really fine. Clara, if I think about it further, is important to involve, she, right after Robert's death, burned some late works of him, to 'safe his legacy', the works might have been really ahead of his time. If we -just brainstorming now- would take the similar approach as to his MM, we would now say that these later works must have been terrible since they were destroyed by Clara. Which probably is a statement few would support (which on its own would be funny, since we will never know that music again). So, with the MM of Robert the same, Clara might have took another approach, which might be valid after all, as Godowski is not an idiot either, but, to close, it wouldn't change my opinion about Robert's speeds. If tomorrow there was a one time concert announced, at the same time in two halls, one by Clara and one by Robert, I'd die to hear Clara play, but would go to Robert's concert. And so we can continue a while... so fascinating!
Practicing slowly may have its merits at least with certain passages that really should be practiced slowly at first. However, one may refute this concept if an analogy might be made as to make a comparison, for example, to how a vocalist would practice based upon breath control for a lengthy phrase or, for example, how a violinist would bow a rather lengthy phrase or, for still another example, how a clarinetist would practice a certain lengthy phrase. If a vocalist or wind/brass instrumentalist needs a great supply of air for a long phrase or, If a violinist needs a certain kind of bowing that would be needed for a long phrase, there’s no way that slow practicing would help in those situations. Running out of air or running out of bow would defeat the purpose and so, therefore, slow practicing would be detrimental under those circumstances. So, about learning a piece of music for a pianist, fresh from the start; and, perhaps practicing difficult, busy, or involved passages slowly at the piano may have some advantages such as practicing hands alone slowly, for example. However, after having learned the notes, practicing any leaps with quick positioning during slow practicing, it would then be advantageous to practice in the tempo that the piece is in. Then again, I have my own ideas as to what tempo I would like to play the piece in. There seems to be a lot of controversy regarding tempos whether they are the composers indications or the editors. Also, by the way, I believe that the urtext editions should be left alone and unedited. I think I rest my case about this and hopefully the reader(s) would agree.
18:46 Ritter vom Steckenpferd- the knight of the hobby-horse. To me this tempo sounds so much more natural and logical of something a 17th century person would play.
Any clues why the interpretation of the metronome's pulse changed as dramatically as it did? It seems like however the change occurred, it must have spread rather quickly sometime in the late 19th century and/or early 20th.
Single and double use have existed along each other, single beat more for practicing (musical timekeeper), double beat from the historical way of measuring time (starting as far back as Mersenne). Even Reger/Straube's MM have a relation ship double/single beat, see also these videos: ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
It occurs to me that any sane musician will immediately gravitate towards these slower tempi. They give infinitely more space for expression and more importantly the musical characterization of these wonderful childhood scenes. One only wishes the majority of professional performers would not be so snobbish about what they consider to be true. Thanks again for another awesome video!
"One only wishes the majority of professional performers would not be so *snobbish* about what they consider to be true." And earlier: "It occurs to me that any *sane* musician will immediately gravitate towards these slower tempi." ...
I’m really fascinated by your ‘double-beat’ videos - beautiful playing and instruments too, of course! Just talking about Schumann for the moment, which movements do you consider unplayable in the ‘single-beat’ tempo given by Schumann or the first editions? I’ve come across many (in Schumann’s piano, chamber, and orchestral music) that I don’t believe can be considered possible in double beat ... Just one example: Op. 132/3, played here slightly faster than the single-beat reading (mainly because the clarinettist - a prize-winning, wonderful player - found himself pushed to extremes even in this tempo). OK, it’s said single and double beat readings might have been practised simultaneously by different and even the same musicians, but in my experience Schumann’s tempo indications do make sense in relation to each other. I certainly don’t deny that many (probably most) movements are possible (even if not right) in either single or double beat, however it’s simply not the case that everything is fast in single-beat readings - many movements are, while others are rather slow. What literature would you recommend for a more theoretical, objective exposition of the double-beat theory?
Schumann is definitely to be researched more. For me, also these Kinderscenen are a first step into a new time (after Beethoven). As for many slow movements in earlier music (Beethoven, Mozart, ...) I longtime opposed the idea Lorenz Gadient posed of applying double beat also for the slow movements. My eyes opened when playing the adagio variation in Mozart's D Major Munchen sonata, only possible -according to Moscheles' tempo) in double beat. And then, many more followed, also a new way of performing. The latter is the most complicating, since it involves our taste, experience, experiment, subjectivity. I would recommend Lorenz' book to read. As for now, I'm working with him intensely to completely rewrite that and surround it by much practical examples, setting up a kind of 'mastermind' group to discuss and create a real platform for, what I think, is important research.
Thanks, I’m reading Gadient’s book (easy to find by googling antiquariats). My impression is once people have made their minds, it’s hard to present anything in a non-partial manner ... same applies to other metrikers, as well as Miehling of course. Or maybe it’s just that to play at a different speed one has to play differently ... as you say, very true. Sure, the solution of taking single-beat figures for one (slow) movement, double-beat for the next (fast) is problematic ... So if it’s, as you say, either-or, it comes down to either some fast movements being too fast or some slow ones being too slow (like the one I showed and so many more). Until more theoretical evidence materializes, that is - looking forward! What you said above of Schiff’s Hammerklavier tempo becoming (on modern piano) 116 instead of Beethoven’s 138 I find hardly more than the kind of difference of a ‘work desk’ tempo slowing down in actual playing - in my experience and that of many others (Harnoncourt often talked about this). Why do you think it tends to go the other way with ‘double-beaters’ (like on this video, demonstrating Steckenpferd at 100+ double-beat reading...) So far, I find the work-desk explanation more convincing.
Sorry, I've been terribly busy (organ projects etc.) these days so catching up with comments is hard! It would be better to talk over email, mine is wwinters@telenet.be But I'm looking forward to talking more about this, it is all very interesting (and in need of research!)
In addition to yesterday -things finally come to a bit of slower tempo :-) at the end of this week: I was driving with Joris Potvlieghe to Zaandam -we've a collab project with Flentrop, I said we had contact through this video and he immediately answered that he still had good memories to your concert in Magnano on his Horn! As said, lot's to talk about, and yes yes yes, no-one should be opposed by definition, but a perspective does not hurt either. Looking on the 'balance of evidence' if that's possible, I'd say there is a chance that for the double beat theory the package is (significanty) larger, but that doesn't mean there is not another side. Lorenz will rewrite his book -that is really necessary and fundamentally needed. He's doing that now, and under that layer, I very much would like to organize a layer of professional musicians, just trying out things seriously and over longer periods of time. Would love to talk with you if you feel for it, a video call is easy to set up for me, an email will do and I'll reply back. Take care! Wim
Bell metronomes existed, as silent metronomes and anything you can wish for. The Bell metronome was invented around 1835 with the clear goal to be used as a time-keeper (many of the inserted instructions talk about this), which is single beat use, different from the metrical speed indications. I've an episode on this with Lorenz: ua-cam.com/video/3W5zvIoKPqQ/v-deo.html&index=16
It does seem like the slower tempos are draggy. Playing them in the restored original tempos seems better, more flowing. I wonder if the modern performances also have done this with Wagner's Tristan and Isolde because it seems to beeeeeeeeee tooooooooo loooooooooong.
In my opinion the truth lies in the middle: in Traumerei the maximum speed is actually 100 per quarter, but with the natural slowdowns and accelerations of the musical declamation. Playing that work at 50 per quarter is like dragging it to the gallows (to me).
"Leichte Stücke" can be translated as "easy pieces" in the sens they are easy to play, but alternatively could mean they are "easy on the listener and do not tell heavy emotional stories".
I really appreciate your work and it has made me think about several things. I have a question regarding tempo and the idea that the composer had of his own pieces. I’ve heard many of those welte-mignon recordings and for instance Debussy’s written idea it’s completely different of what sounds when he recorded it and it’s hard to believe that it’s correct, because it seems so clear on the score, but when I hear it the text seems very incoherent. And several other composers as well, it’s seems too fast! Could you tell us about this recordings and how is it? Maybe it’s already in another video that I haven’t watched... thank you very much! you’re definitely inspiring many musicians around the globe!
Thanks Denner, for the nice words, really appreciate them! Welte Mignon... lot's to be researched, as are piano rolls. But overall, those ca 1900 recordings only reveal something of the playing around ... 1900. Piano playing changed so fundamentally from ca 1840 onwards (see my video on Don Giovanni Tomascheck or the one on Klemperer and Bach). Much of today's 'historical informed perf.
I don't understand. Please summarize to me that if we travel back in time to see Schumann play these pieces, say, Traumerai, would we hear roughly the same tempi we hear today? is the problem the fact that markings are different in those days?
Wow. Ritter Vom Steckenpferd sounds so much better at this tempo. The versions I'm familiar with all sound like somebody cuing up a tape (some tape players had cue/review buttons where you could fast forward and rewind without disengaging the playhead.)
Dank voor wederom een interessante video. Een vraag die mij vaak bezig houdt is of in veel hedendaagse uitvoeringen 'haast' of 'ongedurigheid' die ik meen te horen ook meetbaar is. Oude opnames lijken kalmer, evenwichtiger. Het is of je de tijdgeest er doorheen hoort. Zijn er anderen die dit ook ervaren? En Wim, is dit te objectiveren? Kun je naast tempo ook andere dynamische aspecten meetbaar maken? Ik kan me bijvoorbeeld voorstellen dat in een romantische uitvoering bepaalde noten subtiel verlengd worden. Of een aanslag met een meer piekachtige karakteristiek ipv sinusvormig. Veel te ingewikkelde vraag natuurlijk maar zo hardop denkend is hij leuk om te stellen.
Heel kort: de spanningsboog over de maat heen (van sterk naar sterk) is nefast voor een 'klassieke' tempo-ervaring. Wat we vandaag nog altijd leren aan onze 7 jaringen in de solfège klassen, bv dat een 4/4 uit zwaar-licht-beetjezwaar-licht bestaat, is de basis van historisch tempobesef
Tempo is not important. The most important is the atmosphere you leave in the room, how you sing music, how you breath it. I suggest you to listen to Affred Cortot playing this piece.
I've been killing myself trying to play simple guitar pieces from that era in time all these years despite being able to shred like a thrash metal lead and now I learn it was all a waste of time lmao
Except that Clara's acceptance of the modern conventions of her husband's timing is a conclusive proof that, no, in the lifetime of Clara Schumann (and in the lifetime of any other great composer/musician) we did not have a sudden shift from one form of timing to a doubling of effective speeds. If your theory is true don't you think that Clara would have said SOMETHING about it by 1896 (and she went on playing his music until an old age)?
@@AuthenticSound You cant have it both ways: either Clara used your approach, in which case you seem to suggest that as late as 1896 metronome markings were "authentic" (as per your definition) OR metronome markings did shift to the modern meaning in which case she chose to stay silent even as she edited or played her beloved husband's music (e.g. his concerto - which she went on to perform for decades) and allowed his music to be effectively doubled in speed - and did nothing about it.
I am currently working on Schumann’s Grand Sonata No.1 in f# minor, Op. 11. I so much prefer to perform this Sonata slower and I enjoy expressing it with slower tempos. I don’t like the so-called fast tempos very fast.
Is your piano still from original parts? Hammers, felts... Sounds just a little bit woody, lacking the soft felt on the base of the hammerheads, and sounds like let-off is a bit far from the strings. Do you know what distance there is from hammers heads to the strings on "no playing" position? Kudos for using it, it is a beautiful instrument!!!
You should have a close look to it, Antoine, I'll contact you soon btw for a broken string in the bass (EE). As far as I know, it is all orginal, the recording was setup up really quick, so it might not give a true representation,
Interesting - up to a point... Ultimately, it's a question of whether the performer is an outstanding musician or not. Music is an art, and not a science, and only experience - not to mention sheer talent - can open the door to intuition and inspiration. Otherwise, we might as well just let a computer sort out all the available scientific information on tempo and rhythm and tell us the answer to the riddles of Schumann's music. Good luck with that.
I loved the video! Here's a small tip for your recordings: While you have great instruments, the acoustics as heard in your recordings does not do them justice (its too dense in the mid range), it would be smart to design the acoustics to compliment your instruments better. With great acoustics, you can use a pair (or three) of small capsule omni microphones and position them in the best sounding spot in the room for a stellar recording. good luck!
the microphone is not as important as the acoustics! great acoustics and bad mic is better than bad acoustics and great mic. the room is indeed part of the instrument
Hi Jerry, it is lower indeed, don't want to give it more stress than necessary and ca 435 works fine. It can handle 440 as well (as it can be put higher). There were many many standards in the 19th century, in Paris around 1850/5 even 455.
There are people that speculate that Schumann's metronome was faulty (that is the assumption in the research project I am working on about historical performance practice of cyclic piano works). I highly doubt that Schumann had no clue how fast his works should go or had them played at such weird tempi.
Hi Symbioticism! Well, there's also the speculation that Beethoven's metronome was broken! But since Czerny, Moscheles etc. also give remarkably consistent metronome numbers (I'm working on an online metronome number database!), their metronomes must be broken too... and so forth. Especially since it is very easy to check if a metronome is calibrated, it must go 60 times in a minute, so it is unlikely that they wouldn't have noticed. So I think there must be much better explanations than the "broken metronome" one.
I can understand where you are coming from. I think we basically have to be very careful how we treat a source. Schumann/Beethoven/whoever are not necessarily reliable witnesses to metronome marks.
But these metronomes were literally ticking on the composers pianos! If we want to reconstruct the performance practice, there is almost no more direct data than the metronome numbers.
Plus: why would we take our today's opinion on tempi of their works more seriously than their ownes? Makes no sense. Always be careful indeed how to treat a source, but reject it only as a very very very very last option. If you'd sum up all the 'misprints', 'faults', 'apperent errors',... not much is left to base any research on... I'd believe we might be off as well, and perhaps Beethoven, Schumann, Czerny, Ries, Hummel, Moscheles, Chopin, and dozens and dozens of others... just right? Bottem line: don't let yourself fool by the idea that the metronome was not working, it was precise as a digital app is today, statistically spoken anyway, since a deviation of even 5 to 10% would not make a fundamental difference.
It depends what you are researching of course. Composer intention is only one part of music research in general and historically informed practice only one form of performance. (Our research project looks at performance strategies of the 20th and 21st centuries where we of course have an audible record.) Another problem I see is just the general treatment of numerical record as evidence of a practice. Yes it is evidence, but it needs contextualizing not only to the practice of the time, but also the variation of practice that a composer/players might have had within their own playing (surely R/C Schumann used differentl tempi on different occasions). So, it is a pretty cloudy picture: composer intention, performing tradition, metronomes (and their flaws) all interact with each other. I do think research like yours is very worthwhile, I just think we should remember how difficult it is to quote tempi as the true way to play.
I love this, you definitely should play more piano. As for the MM, I don't understand the triple meter tempo inequalis (sp?). Perhaps my sense of rhythm needs help.
That makes the two of us. I listened to that bit twice, but I am none the wiser :) Also, if I may, the apparition of what looked like a holy image in the middle of the music stand was a bit unsettling :D :D Also, I have been listening to a few "knight of the hobby horse" and they are pretty much played at the same tempo, about 45 secs in total (with the exception of Lang Lang's version, 35 secs), as opposed to your approx. 55 secs. It has to be said that it does make sense listening to it. Just as well we are talking about easy pieces :D :D
Wim, Thx for the vid links; I'm amazed you respond to these posts. To me this means triple meter short notes may be shorter than written and long notes longer than written...say in 3/8 time a 1/4 note followed by an 1/8 note, the 1/8 note will be more like a 1/16th because the inequalis put more duration on the 1/4 note? No need to reply, I'll work on this with my metronome.
Speed is relative in piano works. A brilliant pianist can play much faster without it sounding rushed. I on the other hand can make medium speed pieces sound rushed even slightly below tempo. I firmly believe Schumann was capable of making his tempos sound great. It was said that he played so fast the notes blended together and created piano effects that were unheard of. I recently compared almost 50 renditions of his "Fabel" from "Fantasiestücke" and every single rendition was very distinct form the other. There was a clear winner for me that stood above all of them by quite some margin: Sophie Pacini. A lot of renditions were quite painful because they are so far off what I consider this piece to sound like it was really interesting. Especially it is ruined when played too slow and also use of too little pedal (yes that is possible) makes it less good, although it is usually the other way around.
Another "geeky physicist" explanation is that great composers -- whether Schumann or Beethoven -- emitted a strong gravitation field which slowed down time and the metronome around them.
Ok, I should have worded differently. Due to gravitational force, the time around Schumann and Beethoven will have progressed slower. That means Schumann and Beethoven would experienced the metronome moving faster than them. Thus, if they set the metronome at 60, they experienced it as 90 to 120. My reasoning also explains how Beethoven had enough time to write 32 freakin' Sonatas, 16 string quartets, 9 symphonies, and .... just one opera. Of course, I am not making a serious argument here :)
Professor A. Goldenweiser (Moscow Conservatory) did exactly what you say to Mephisto Waltz. Another professor - Heinrich Neuhaus made comments on this particular performance: "It was the best FOURTY minutes of my life".
Great explanation, thanks! BTW I liked the way you pronounced 'Argerich'. But actually an ending "ch" sounds just like a "k" ("Argerik"). Many catalan surnames lead to understandable mispronunciation: Bach ("Bak"), Bosch ("Bosk"), etc.
Really good video.. I just wanted to make a comment about misconceptions around great composers writing children's pieces. A lot of great composers were exceptionally gifted child prodigies, so I imagine when a composer writes music for children, pieces described as "easy" could be say, comparing it to a Chopin Piano Concerto played by a 10 year old. I think the average music lover can have a distorted idea of a composer's understanding of what a composer thinks is suitable for children (ie a composer could be thinking more in terms of exceptionally talented ones) Just a thought around the tempo discussion
Hi David, I would say, make of those musicians/composer, humans again. Yes, they were talented, but the 19th century has turned them into real 'god's'. And most, if not all had an active life as a teacher, so very well embedded in the culture of the 'average'.
Have I missed something here? Traumerei is clearly marked quarter note = 80 and yet you play 8th note = 80. Similarly, he marks "Ritter..." equals 76 for the entire 3/4 measure. In neither instance is the marked tempo humanly impossible. Please explain.
Wonderful playing! But I disagree about the tempos. I have played his violinsonats 1 and 2, and they are "un-musical" at half the MM. Many even play a bit faster than the markings. And I don't think that one single tempo is the correct one, if Schumann liked some faster and some slower than Godowsky it is perfectly ok for me.
I'm sorry, but i'm afraid i have to I disagree about your "un-musical", i guess you'd counted this on historically subjectivity, which in my opinion sadly occurs very often.
It takes a long time to adapt to the old metrical tempi, it is more than just changing a tempo, it comes with changing a complete culture of performance.
First time on this channel performing on the Erard!
13:40 Träumerei - reverie - dreaming
18:46 Ritter vom Steckenpferd- the knight of the hobby-horse
So the Ritter is played as quarternote=120, judging from your playing?
Please do more on the Erard!
yes
AuthenticSound ooo
Bravissimo....ciao
Incredible what I have been learning from your videos. Thanks so much.
I distinctly remember the first time I heard Träumerei as an 8 year old. Tears ran down my face. You did it to me again. That was hauntingly beautiful, Wim. Thank you.
So glad to read this, thanks!
Finally I get to hear the piano! Its really nice
Applied practically, the double beat-single beat problem just seems to be much clearer now that I actually get to hear the difference! Thank you for this video.
At 12000 subs, this channel is a real hidden gem of youtube!
I've been waiting for you to play on your Erard and you finally did! It sounds great and you play it great too! Thanks Wim and for this lesson on Schumann's metronome markings.
My grand-uncle was the autor Wolf-Ferrari Ermanno and my father the conductor Manno - thanks for Your wonderfull channel, it's a pleasure for me and a surprise, good work :)
Beautiful on the Erard, Wim!
And I just listened to half a dozen other versions of the `Knight of the Hobby Horse' by famous performers. My God, everyone else's playing of it is so insanely fast! Thank you for your efforts to return some sanity to the world of music.
Thanks Larry!
Schumann is a real genius ! What a beautiful music he composed ! It doesn't matter how fast it goes as long as it's there and ready for a speed of anyone's liking. Thank you for the video
It is not as though we have a choice as it stands. Generations of music lovers have been deprived of the opportunity to hear the music of the great masters performed as they were intended by their creators. For example, more musicians cite J. S Bach as the greatest ever composer, but I devoted hours last Christmas season in an attempt to find just one recording of the Christmas Oratorio that had not been treated as a opportunity to to display musical virtuosity for its own sake, often by racing through it as quickly as possible.
Epic! This video will be remembered, thank You as always Wim for pioneering!
Thanks Jon, also for your support!!
This is a brilliant video, thanks so much for sharing this with us!!
I find your explanation of the metrical metronome theory extremely convincing, and it will certainly influence my interpretation of the works of these composers. My question is: when did the metrical reading give way to the 'literal' reading? Why and how did the change occur?
That's a great subject for a dissertation.
wonderful - thank you!
It shouldn't surprise us why no-one explicitly wrote on single-double
beat etc, since both existed along each other. Even Vincent Novello in
ca 1820 used single beat MM for his Mozart editions/ Surprisingly (or
not- not to me), those MM are about half of those used by Moscheles for
Mozart, the two lived in the same city, gave concerts in each others
houses, even with Mendelssohn, and not a word on tempi issues. Novello
was one of the first, if not the first btw, to use single beat as a
speed indication, the metronome of course (as Maelzel even describes)
was used as a timekeeper as well. But even later, see the vids we had
with Marcel Punt, on Reger. Reger and Straube, friends, both editing
Reger's work, Reger's MM double of those of Straube, and not one word of
confusion until... some generations later when we started to look back
on history. Don't forget: looking back is an absolute novelty, it was
never done in history at least not with a reconstructive attempt! ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
Also for consideration is the issue of how 6/8 and other similar time signatures are to be counted. Are they counted in macro beats in triple groupings, or are they counted as single eighth notes? For example, if you have a piece in 6/8 and the tempo marking says "andante," do you play the dotted quarter note at walking tempo, or do you play the eighth note at walking tempo? The results can be quite surprising sometimes if you take the eighth note approach as opposed to the common dotted quarter note approach.
+Marcel Punt, That's awesome. I'm going to sign up for the newsletter so I can take a look at it.
But what would life be without Schumann's music? His music is truly difficult to play but he tried his best to put his racing thoughts on paper. A genius nonetheless.
Very interesting to hear about the double beat use of the metronome by Schumann. It certainly provides a much more precise tempo indication to pianists, particularly on slow pieces. Your comment on "unequal" tempo was quite valuable as well. Thanks
thank you!
Usually, I do not bother much about metronome tempi; nevertheless, in case of the "Träumerei", I have intuitively come quite close to your interpretation. So, I think it is not only a rationally, but also an emotionally convincing solution.
I find this whole discussion of the tempo of music relevant to the Metronome quite fascinating and, perhaps unlike some other of my fellow musicians, am more than happy to hear out the reasoning and evidence of others, such as that which Wim presents.
It seems to me that there are a number of lines of evidence which can be brought to bear on this topic, but before I list some of those, let me express a sort of 'background of musical history' thought here first: Prior to the invention of the Metronome, which made possible the mechanical-numerical measurement of the speed of the passing of pulsatile phenomena associated with music, musicians relied upon SPOKEN/WRITTEN LANGUAGE DESCRIPTIVE TERMS for the same purpose. Grave, Largo, Adagio, Andante, Moderato, Allegro, Vivace, Presto (and some other terms and then of course combinations of two terms-e.g., "Allegro moderato"-to designate an 'in-between' tempo) all were, and still are, used for this purpose. And, using just such language words for tempo designation MUSICIANS MANAGED PRETTY WELL for a long time. If the tempo said "Allegro," the performer/conductor would give the music their best, informed musical judgment as to how fast "fast" should be, and would adapt that to the practical needs of the performers involved, including the venue/acoustincs in which they were playing.
It has likewise struck me as an Organist-because no two historical Pipe organs (before the era of mass-produced electronic instruments with 'model' identifications and identical features/sounds)-were ever very exactly alike-that Bach characteristically left comparatively few indications of REGISTRATION for his Organ pieces. Some people wonder "Why not?" and the likely reason is that there was no special point in doing so, since:
1. Organists were routinely their own 'orchestrators' anyway, and part of their training was to understand an Organ's sonic capabilities using various combinations of sounds and so they could be, on the whole, both trusted and expected to choose registration for music they performed which would be appropriate and suitable to the music and the occasion for which it was being performed. The judicious and tasteful choice of registration was part of an Organist's responsibility and 'tool box.'
2. Beyond the very basic TYPE (Diapason, Flute, Reed, etc.) and OCTAVE (32', 16', 8', 4', 2', 1', and various Mixtures) specification, there was little point in writing down a very detailed registration because it either might be unavailable-at least in part-or, for some reason, unsuitable even if available, on any particular instrument.
There is also the matter of published pieces which are given very detailed registrations by their composers or by music editors being considered by Organists who are not yet fully confident in their own registration choices who, seeing a gross 'mismatch' between the printed/suggested registration and 'what's available on my instrument,' may feel daunted by the difference and simply choose other music rather than try to convert the printed registration into something roughly 'equivalent' that will both work and be true to the printed page.
In other words, for Bach to have included lots of detailed registration would, given the role of the Organist and the varied resources offered on various instruments from place to place, have been somewhat wasted and needless effort. And good organists can and routinely do fashion their own registrations as part of their regular practice routines and and performance situations anyhow.
Back to the Metronome. The "lines of evidence" I spoke of above include:
1. (Since there are no widespread audio recordings before the later 19th century), written evidence of how the Metronome was used, and understood to be correctly used, by musicians prior to the recording era is important. Thus, composers' own extant written statements, descriptions of performance practice (and there were even pocket watches and other timepieces before the Metronome, so people attending musical performance had SOME sense of the passage of time) by witnesses of the period, musicological research of various kinds, and of course published editions of sheet music and manufacturers' printed instructions issued with Metronomes, all have some valid part to play in this discussion. (If the world ever sees the invention of a reliable Time-portal Television display whereby modern people can WITNESS events of the past and see/hear past Metronomic practice in action, then of course that would help immensely! I don't hold out much hope for the 'Remote Viewing' crowd in this respect, but have been surprised before in life…)
2. What's humanly possible, in terms of tempo of performance. Nutrition and medical practice have improved greatly in the past 300 years due to science, but the human body remains essentially the same as it always was, and the human hands of accomplished modern Pianists can, other things being equal, do the same thing now as did Pianists in the past. Bach's hands worked essentially the same as Beethoven's and as ours.
3. Likewise, the human EXPERIENCE of life's various 'stations' is essentially the same as before. We know what infancy, childhood, teenager years, young adulthood, middle age, and old age are all about now just as people also did hundreds of years ago. All, or at least virtually all, humans sleep, have experienced dreams, and so would have SOME degree of common understanding of what a piece titled "Träumerei" would and should be about, if Schumann is as skillful in depicting it for us as we think he is. Perhaps in the case of this particular piece, our common human experience of a dream-expressed in music for us by Schumman-will play a rather major role in helping us to decide issues of 'proper' tempo-if for no other reason than because the piece will make CLEARER SENSE as the 'right' expression of such a title/program for a piece as compared to that common human experience at one tempo vs. another that's twice as fast. Granted, the (more subjective) metric here is the human psyche rather than a word designation for a tempo (some of which words are also linked to common human experience-such as "Andante," which is linked to a leisurely/casual walking speed) or a scientifically/numerically measured tempo (such as the Metronome provides), but I still think such a programmatic title left by the composer which relates to a common human experience is a worthwhile and valid clue and merits some consideration.
4. Human beings, including composers (who are sometimes rushed and working on deadlines of various kinds, or who might be tired and paying less attention than they should on a particular day) can vary in the stringency of their metronomical specification for their own pieces-and not only according to their time of life, but even according to the TIME OF DAY. For example, I've often readjusted the tempo settings of pieces I'm composing in my Finale music software program according to my personal preference AT THAT TIME OF DAY. There have been evenings when, while working on the VERY SAME PIECE, I thought that a particular tempo I'd chosen THAT SAME MORNING for that piece was now 'not right' and needed to be altered-merely because I was myself re-experiencing the piece differently in the evening than I had in the morning.
Some composers are knowledgeable and meticulous in all of their score specifications for all musical parameters (dynamics, articulation, tempo, slurs and phrasing, tempo variations, emotional characterizations, etc.) while others are rather more unsure or even 'sloppy.' Probably most composers are, on the whole, quite careful about such things and fall somewhere in-between. My own work as a music editor for the typography of my compositions and arrangements has made me a MUCH more careful composer, in terms of the specification I now place on my scores, compared to how I did that, say, thirty years ago. And thirty years ago I already THOUGHT I was pretty careful! Also, the wise and careful specification of musical parameters on a score is a LIFELONG LEARNING PROCESS, and something that diligent composers keep improving on as they write more and more music over time. My younger self was a less knowledgeable and careful music editor than my older self is, but my younger self had a quicker mind for thinking and for catching mistakes. So the nature of the aging process can be somewhat of a factor too.
My mind is just going BOOOOM ! Here is what I naturally thought, as it were, in a single thought, after watching this enlightening video. Everything Winters says makes complete sense, because the metronome is a derivative of the PENDULUM, which is an attempt of the human being to create a form of constant, PERPETUAL MOTION. In order for that to happen, a pendulum makes use of the force of gravity, and the little lateral movent, back and forth. Which means, it HAS to swing, otherwise it cannot move! The metronome is the same thing, recreated in MECHANICAL FORM. In other words, the schlag MUST include TWO movements, otherwise how can the device function? My Korg metronome does it by making a BEEP digitally, but the original metronome had to mechanically swing back and forth, like a pendulum. But the two movements is a "forced consequence ", a physical obligation, NOT a part of the musical 'beat'. Yet it must be there. The conductor's gesture too is a recreation of the pendulum. Conscious or unintentional, I don't know. But that is how it works, I think. It all makes sense!
great to read!
That Erard is a ragtime machine, I love it!!!
Lovely video, thanks Wim! The character of Ritter vom Steckenpferd is quite different in the original tempo, and you almost get an image of children running and hopping around with their hobby-horses, which you don't with a very fast tempo. The same with Hasche-Mann in your previous video, which has a very playful character in the original tempo.
Great spreadsheet! Very useful tool.
Thanks to you Robert!
It is clear from recordings by 3 of Clara Schumann's pupils (Adelina de Lara, Fanny Davies and Carl Friedberg), of Kinderszenen, that they observed the metronome indications by Robert Schumann according to a SINGLE beat interpretation, not according to a double beat interpretation. In fact, only "Traumerei" is played significantly slower. "Kuriose Geschichte" and "Glückes genug" are even played faster than Schumann's metronome indications by all three, if interpreted according to a single beat interpretation. They play all pieces much faster than than indicated if you assume they interpreted the metronome indications by Schumann using a double beat interpretation. Of course they could have increased their tempo radically later in life, but how plausible is that given that they were so proud of their education. Clara Schumann did not allow her pupils many liberties in how they played the piano. For instance, they were not allowed to use the una corda pedal or use fingering to make a passage easier. Therefore, it is inconceivable that they were allowed to play the pieces by her own husband in a tempo twice as fast. Do you really believe Clara Schumann played twice as fast as her husband? See ua-cam.com/video/FgrBgbPILuA/v-deo.html
@@the_wrong_note Assuming they used the double beat interpretation, then they have increased their tempi for all the other pieces of Kinderszenen by a considerable amount (some pieces more than double). That's even harder to explain. I know few examples of muscians who increased their tempi when they grew older (Toscanini was one of them, but only marginally, not 2x). Let's take the simplest explanation as more likely.
Thanks for posting it. Your videos about this subject are truly fascinating and helping me out a lot. I was always told and taught that the first metronomes owned by those composers were inaccurate, as if they were badly made or regulated. So, what teachers always told me to do was to ignore those tempi marks and hear different recordings to try to find my way through it. What always happened was that it brought a lot of confusion because the recording are generally too fast and even those players are unable to play those tempi out in every situation throughout their whole careers. Schumann's Traumes Wirren always intrigued me because the tempo given by the composer was impossible if read as single beat and the recordings are too fast even in a much slower metronome (in single beat). But the point is almost every recording of it sounds too fast with no time to be expressive respecting the composer's articulations. Same thing with Schumann's Op. 17. The recordings are way too fast to the point where some parts cannot be played a tempo, so the players have to abuse of rubatos, ritardandos and suspending the time giving to the music a floating time character or even "arrhythmic" sometimes.
Thanks for sharing your story here, Nuno!
I adore Schumann and he was a major focus of mine during my university studies. Very happy to see this!
My music history class called him "Crazy Schumann". I honestly didn't know that he didn't know what he was doing tempo wise. I wished my music teacher noted that to us. Thank you for bringing it to the forefront. Oh, ok, so the triplet meter in the ductus for No. 9 "Ritter von Steckenpford" is doing a "three against two" ductus. That makes sense. I like your performance of the No. 7 "Traumerei". Thank you for showing us these things, Wim.
I like this study of these works - the arguments are intriguing.
Träumerei is such a charming piece
I would like to hear your opinion about metronomic indications of Schumann's sonata no 2 . ''Fastest as you can ''
I see, again, conclusive evidence against the proposition that we misunderstood the metronome markings, in the very example chosen here: Traumerei. Obviously the thesis is that by the second half of the century (Godowski was born in 1870 and in 1879 he would have had plenty of exposure to metronomes, 1879 being very important as I will explain). There is one person who would have known very well if Schumann's metronome was faulty, Clara, his wife and celebrated pianist. Well, she did actually say that the metronome was faulty and too fast, but only be around 5-10% if I recall. But, more importantly (since we are dealing here with variations of far more than 5-10%), she famously edited, together with Brahms Schumann's music and her edited version with her edited metronome markings appeared for the first time in 1879. The speed indicated is 80, i.e. a little slower than Schumann's original, probably reflecting Schumann;s faulty metronome. But essentially she kept to the same overall level in terms of tempo. SO the question is what did she mean by 80? If we take Wim's theory and she meant by that, essentially, 'half speed' then how can a boy, which by 1879 was giving concerts around Europe, not have understood the same exact practice? Or conversely, if by 1879, when Godowski would have matured in his understanding of tempo, the prevailing understanding on hwo to count beats had shifted, why would Clara and Brahms persist with the "old" approach and confuse the edition. Further, if there were such rivalling potential interpretations of metronome markings (i.e. Clara had one understanding and young Godowski had another) why does the meticulously edited Clara and Brahms edition not provide a clarification - especially when Clara spent time to amend all the metronome markings? I think the answer is simple: because in 1879 Clara and Godowski had the same understanding of metronome markings, which was similar (but slower) than Robert Schumann's and, by extension, similar to a modern performance.
Clara was often criticized for being at the 'virtuoso' side, instead of on the 'classical' side as she was trained. She destroyed also late revisions and works of her husband.
Lovely. Your Erard sounds great!
Thanks Brendan!
Good evening.
I thought about the numbers on the metronome scale, for example 100, which indicates that in one minute the metronome makes 100 ticks, but, if they had reasoned according to the logic of the two ticks as a complete unit, it would not have made more sense that they had written instead of the number of ticks per minute (100, in this case), the number of complete units in one minute (50, therefore)?
Ammiro il bel pianoforte un suono chiaro che rimane riflesso nella memoria uditiva.Schumann acquista ed eseguita con tanto sentimento.I miei sinceri complimenti 🍾🎊🎈
18:44 wait, why would a composer indicate the tempo for half a bar if the time signature is *uneven* ?? Then there would be a tick between the first and the second quarter note - as if the metronome was a duplet. This would be very confusing for untrained ears, and it would not make any sense if everyone was supposed to count every second tick and divide the interval into triplets, if you could just count the whole bar, so one dotted half note - Schumann's indication.
4:00 Hahahahahahahahahaha 😂😂😂😂
I love this channel. Thank you for your amazing work as a musician and UA-camr.
That Erard just sings. Such a beautiful instrument.
Matthew Hume I'll be playing on it more... Maybe even a recording!
Brilliant. I so wish you could manage to engage Sir Andras Schiff in this discussion.
fred houpt Do you know Schiff's stance on the subject? Or do you say this just because of the way he talks about music?
Hugo: Schiff has developed into one of the finest teaching performers around today. He has devoted a great deal of his focus on what the text has to say, especially with Bach and Beethoven; in the case of Beethoven, Schiff gave a superb series of public lecture performances in Wigmore Hall and in those performances he has a great deal to say about tempi.
Wim has started a most wonderful dialogue and has opened our eyes to the important issues of tempi. I do not know what Schiff would say in particular about the pieces Wim was discussing. I was just imagining how even more exciting it would be to get his input.
Yeah, I actually know this and absolutely adore it, but wondered if you had something to say about his Schumann.
I'm actually looking for a recording of his Bach conference on the Goldberg variations. He gave a conference last year in Berlin but don't know if they have published it in any way as of now.
What I had to say about Wim's Schumann? It sounded quite convincing. Horowitz was renowned as a Schumann interpreter. However, he also was not overly interested in what the composer actually indicated for tempi. Horowitz was not a cerebral interpreter like Gould was. He played the romantic composers very emotionally and when you hear the thunderous and rapturous applause you know that he played to the crowd. Argerich however, is one of the most precise and analytical performers and is not prone to technical indulgences or flashy bits of technique. I would think her tempi would be uneventful. You listen to Wilhelm Kempf or Brendel or Schiff and they play the romantics in a conservative and balanced manner. I am not familiar with any new Schiff lectures but if they are in English I would enjoy hearing him speak.
fred houpt it was in English, and I asked the venue back then if there would be a recording which they said there would. But actually they have not answered to my questions since, so I have no idea if they have published it in any way...
I love this channel.
Thanks!
This is a fascinating subject. What are the implications for the old metronomic approach on the tempos of Beethoven's Hammerklavier? Do you already have a video about that? Thanks so much!
It is inconceivable that someone as talented as Schumann was clueless when it came to using a metronome, or that his was somehow defective and he did not realise it. I am sure someone would have noticed the discrepancy quite quickly if indeed there was one. Alternatively there has to be a simple and rational explanation of the metronome numbers which you have highlighted perfectly. Your playing (excellent as always) of these pieces in these tempi can only be taken as conclusive proof of the theory. Nice to hear the piano for a change although I do prefer the clavichord and thought scenes 1 - 6 were remarkably good.
It is because I admire your clavichord playing so much that I have been longing to hear you playing other instruments: and yes, that's a paradox, but paradoxes are wonderful things, in life as in literature. And so, at last, the Erard: it's a beautiful piano, and you play it (of course) beautifully. Can we possibly tempt you to play that organ, whose pipes are tantalizingly visible in the background? Seriously, to hear some Bach played first on the clavichord and then on the organ (as Bach surely played in private and in public, respectively?) would be so revealing. Your goal was to inspire other musicians: you succeed every time. I can only echo all the other comments on how valuable this channel is: I so wish I'd discovered it right at the start. Thank you!
Thank you so much John. The organ is not in a very good shape at the moment, and however it served me so well here in our house, its sound is really big for the room, it could use a... little church
It's interesting that in my edition (Wiener Urtext) Joachim Draheim writes in the critical notes that the MM were not from Schumann, but appeared in the first edition after Schumann had corrected the proofs. He was aware of the markings in the published version, but never objected to them. He also notes that other MM were later added by Otto Böhme and Clara Schumann. So, there seem to be 3 different MM for each piece with the exception of the first, which has only 2 - Clara's is the same as the first edition.
Your explanations are both interesting and compelling. I wish, however, I was not so thoroughly bored to death by the music of Schumann.
Very nice playing. My thoughts went to the Schumann house where dad was musically telling the children - in bed - their bedtime story so as to fall asleep (and wooing his wife Clara in one go). Then, another day, he told Clara, have you seen our child bump-hopping around on his stick horse? And "paints the picture" to her.
Listening to this again as I'm reviewing these as pieces to assign students, I think your reading of them sounds more right than the guessed at but unconsciously almost correct tempos of the great pianists on their recordings. I am totally convinced that your theory of Schumann's MM markings is entirely correct.
Given Brahms' relationship with the Schumanns, I wonder if he was a metrical composer as well. From what I know, he never gave metronome numbers, but his pieces are pretty dense and seem to require a slower tempo than commonly performed.
Brahms pieces do not sound as dense on the straight strung pianos contemporary to his time, (which are clearer) of which he had owned. Brahms was interested in the Baroque composers, plus Brahms owned a clavichord, with credible provenance that the instrument had belonged to Mozart. Brahms last compositions were Chorale Preludes for Organ.
I really enjoy all the tempo related videos on this channel, the topic is just so interesting! One question I am curious about is, are there any historical sources that describe both the single and double beat approaches in the same text, and compare and contrast them in some way? If the double beat interpretation was once dominant, then a shift from double to single beat must have happened sometime during the 19-th century, and at some point both interpretations must have been equally widespread. What did the people at the time thought about this shift? Were there any textbooks that warned music students about potential confusion that could result from applying the wrong kind of metronome interpretation? Or something similar to that?
The double beat interpretation is nonsense and I do not find a single credible reference to this anywhere. It's almost a google bomb: I find three references to this, one is a discussion thread in 2017 that has a dead link to some article on this and the other two are videos in this channel here. Even when Brendel was writing his essay of why he thought Beethoven's metronome marks for the Hammerklavier sonata were wrong, he blamed it on a defective device and never once mentioned this double beat bogosity. Evidently, he wasn't aware of it either.
Wim Winters is clearly not a dumb guy but he needs to start focusing on something else. Find any of his videos where he plays from a Beethoven sonata and his choice of tempi are laughable. It's not justifiable. According to him, no fast tempi exist in music.
@Tassilo: I love it when people see right through the complexity of history as a simple cartoon story! But hey, do me a favor, just play me Czerny's opus 299 (for students) in his tempi, and no, they were not goals, Czerny wants you to play them exactly in the MM he gave. Just do it. And then sit and reflect 5 minutes on those 1000's of MM that are waiting for you similar to these. But... it'll take you a bit more effort that Mr Google. I'm studying this now for over 25 years, have collected around 1500 books in German, French, English (yes, you'll have to understand those first), so ... o, and I never said fast tempi did not exist. If you would stand next to a pianist (don't even know if you play the piano) who played you Chopin opus 10 in his tempi (metrical) your mouth would fall open. It is really fast/
It shouldn't surprise us why no-one explicitly wrote on single-double beat etc, since both existed along each other. Even Vincent Novello in ca 1820 used single beat MM for his Mozart editions/ Surprisingly (or not- not to me), those MM are about half of those used by Moscheles for Mozart, the two lived in the same city, gave concerts in each others houses, even with Mendelssohn, and not a word on tempi issues. Novello was one of the first, if not the first btw, to use single beat as a speed indication, the metronome of course (as Maelzel even describes) was used as a timekeeper as well. But even later, see the vids we had with Marcel Punt, on Reger. Reger and Straube, friends, both editing Reger's work, Reger's MM double of those of Straube, and not one word of confusion until... some generations later when we started to look back on history. Don't forget: looking back is an absolute novelty, it was never done in history at least not with a reconstructive attempt! ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
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Your claim basically is that there were two competing ways of interpreting metronome markings in the days of Moscheles and both were used. Yet the whole point of these indications was to disambiguate the choice of tempi. So why did no one ever think of disambiguating the metronome markings themselves?
You also seem to be implying that Czerny's metronome numbers were in double-beat. Where would he have gotten that from? Surely not from Beethoven because if he had used double-beats in his Hammerklaviersonate, the slow movement alone would take 30 minutes. Did Mälzel give different instructions to Czerny than to Beethoven?
So op 299 consists of many pieces. I see for example half notes of 108. It consists of 16th notes throughout but the tempo is also presto. I see no issue with this. If this was double beats it wouldn't really be much of an etude.
As for the Punt videos, I've seen those. You and him are the only two people in the world that propose this double-beat theory. I do not a single historic document that would support it. It's merely something you are conjecturing.
Fascinating.thanks for another great video Wim.
Thanks Sean!
Can somebody explain the single and double beat? :0 Very Interesting!!!
This might help as an intro: ua-cam.com/video/6EgMPh_l1BI/v-deo.html
great video!
thanks!
*Finally your piano! I can't wait to hear future videos of you playing Beethoven, or Mozart on your great new instrument! I hope to share with you soon some of my music too. Greetings from Mexico Maestro Wim!*
Great analysis.
Excellent! This is THE CHANNEL for musicians.
Thanks!
The slower tempos enable one to also perform chords with a certain kind of “non-coordination”, deliberately not playing chords together at certain times for heightened expression. Sometimes it was a form of rubato in the early 20th century used by such performers as Vladimir dePachmann, Ignace Jan Paderewski, Ignaz Friedman, F. Planté, Josef Hofmann, Dame Myra Hess, etc.
This interpretation of playing was extremely interesting and certainly not boring.
Always interesting.
Bravissimo !!!
What were Schumann's 'marketing' considerations when choosing his tempo? Feeling under pressure to sell music, might he have decided (in a moment of weakness) to increase the tempo number to fit current musical fashions and make his music seem more exciting?
Very interesting and informative video, Wim! Do we actually know long the double beat metronome notation was in use?
It shouldn't surprise us why no-one explicitly wrote on single-double beat etc, since both existed along each other. Even Vincent Novello in ca 1820 used single beat MM for his Mozart editions/ Surprisingly (or not- not to me), those MM are about half of those used by Moscheles for Mozart, the two lived in the same city, gave concerts in each others houses, even with Mendelssohn, and not a word on tempi issues. Novello was one of the first, if not the first btw, to use single beat as a speed indication, the metronome of course (as Maelzel even describes) was used as a timekeeper as well. But even later, see the vids we had with Marcel Punt, on Reger. Reger and Straube, friends, both editing Reger's work, Reger's MM double of those of Straube, and not one word of confusion until... some generations later when we started to look back on history. Don't forget: looking back is an absolute novelty, it was never done in history at least not with a reconstructive attempt! ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
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Wow, really interesting stuff! You are a real wealth of information when it comes to this topic.
I love your channel
thank you so much John!
Seriously, I listened Schubert and Schumann recently and thought about your channel, how Schumann would sound like in historical tempo, and second thing I found your Kinderszenen video, and couple days later - this one.
Personally, I do not believe that every great composer was a complete genious. It would not surprise me if one of them were somewhat "lacking in judgment in deciding the speed" of their music. But as you demonstrate, Schumann's tepi seem to work just fine when read the authentic way, which makes Godowski's words seem exaggerated if not completely misguided. Thank you for sharing this!
I think in the case of the Ritter vom Steckenpferd the double beat tempo does not work. I assume that Schumann meant this piece to represent a child on a hobby horse. I'm an old fogey and as a child we used to play with hobby horses. The usual asymmetrical rhythm of play "riding" on a hobby horse (the steps of the child's feet) is given in the underlying bass (half note and quarter note ; yum tidum). Watch these kids on hobby horses ua-cam.com/video/gvcZ8yvWc74/v-deo.html . Incidentally, this is the same underlying rhythm used in the Peruvian dance "Marinera Norteña" whose steps are also based on imitating a horse. ua-cam.com/video/kMqP0gL5-YA/v-deo.html . At the speed you play it, the child would need to have the ability to levitate. If you try riding a hobby horse (you can use a broom) you will find that you can "ride" to the Argerich and Horowitz renditions but not really to the double beat speed.
Thanks for sharing! It's funny you know, my youngest daughter rides that kind of 'horse' all day long... but I believe Schumann had those wooden toy horses in mind -don't know how they were made at this time- where the horse was pulled by a rope and the head went up and down irregularly
@@AuthenticSound Nice to hear that your daughter can still enjoy that simple pleasure :-) So many kids now stay glued to their phones ! As for Schumann, I suppose we will never really know which type of toy horse he had in mind. I don't speak German so I assumed the translation of Steckenpferd referred to the Hobby Horse which is the simple stick with a horse's head type - so I may have jumped to conclusions if the word can refer to other types of toy horses. Thank you for your reply. Keep up the good work both as a musicologist and a father :-)
Thank you for this
Very persuasive. And it simply sounds right.
When I checked for any manuscrit on IMSLP, I was surprised to find none, only the first edition with the "attributed to Schumann's" metronome marks. Then, I checked the Clara Schumann Edition... those marks have disappeared. Either Clara thought that by the time she published her edition, everyone in Europe was accustomed to the right tempos and the pieces didn't need the marks OR she chose to get rid of what she thought a mere editor's wrong initiative. What do you think? Are there any proof about Schumann's intentions?
Hi Marc, thanks for this excellent question! There is so much more to be researched and put into a much bigger context. I have read (years ago) the three volumes of Clara's diaries (in German), I should have go through the dozens of annotations, but cannot remember having read much, if anything at all on her husband's MM. Also Brahms would have to be involved in that research. What for me personally is an approach in a situation like this is see if the MM are from the composer's hand. If they are and are published, as is the case here, they are a fact above all others. What Clara thought later, why she did not kept those MM is a separate research, which is interesting and could reveal a lot of information, but it would -in this case- not make me doubt Robert's own judgment. As a personal note: I really do not see why people have been complaining so much on those numbers, in the case of the Kinderscenen, in double beat, they work really fine. Clara, if I think about it further, is important to involve, she, right after Robert's death, burned some late works of him, to 'safe his legacy', the works might have been really ahead of his time. If we -just brainstorming now- would take the similar approach as to his MM, we would now say that these later works must have been terrible since they were destroyed by Clara. Which probably is a statement few would support (which on its own would be funny, since we will never know that music again). So, with the MM of Robert the same, Clara might have took another approach, which might be valid after all, as Godowski is not an idiot either, but, to close, it wouldn't change my opinion about Robert's speeds. If tomorrow there was a one time concert announced, at the same time in two halls, one by Clara and one by Robert, I'd die to hear Clara play, but would go to Robert's concert. And so we can continue a while... so fascinating!
Practicing slowly may have its merits at least with certain passages that really should be practiced slowly at first. However, one may refute this concept if an analogy might be made as to make a comparison, for example, to how a vocalist would practice based upon breath control for a lengthy phrase or, for example, how a violinist would bow a rather lengthy phrase or, for still another example, how a clarinetist would practice a certain lengthy phrase. If a vocalist or wind/brass instrumentalist needs a great supply of air for a long phrase or, If a violinist needs a certain kind of bowing that would be needed for a long phrase, there’s no way that slow practicing would help in those situations. Running out of air or running out of bow would defeat the purpose and so, therefore, slow practicing would be detrimental under those circumstances.
So, about learning a piece of music for a pianist, fresh from the start; and, perhaps practicing difficult, busy, or involved passages slowly at the piano may have some advantages such as practicing hands alone slowly, for example. However, after having learned the notes, practicing any leaps with quick positioning during slow practicing, it would then be advantageous to practice in the tempo that the piece is in. Then again, I have my own ideas as to what tempo I would like to play the piece in. There seems to be a lot of controversy regarding tempos whether they are the composers indications or the editors. Also, by the way, I believe that the urtext editions should be left alone and unedited.
I think I rest my case about this and hopefully the reader(s) would agree.
Very interesting and encouraging :) Thx
Thanks, great to read! yes, a reconstruction of that music in this way makes it approachable again for many more.
18:46 Ritter vom Steckenpferd- the knight of the hobby-horse. To me this tempo sounds so much more natural and logical of something a 17th century person would play.
Any clues why the interpretation of the metronome's pulse changed as dramatically as it did? It seems like however the change occurred, it must have spread rather quickly sometime in the late 19th century and/or early 20th.
Single and double use have existed along each other, single beat more for practicing (musical timekeeper), double beat from the historical way of measuring time (starting as far back as Mersenne). Even Reger/Straube's MM have a relation ship double/single beat, see also these videos: ua-cam.com/play/PLackZ_5a6IWU0SavYWvpaZydrCOwL5AkF.html
It occurs to me that any sane musician will immediately gravitate towards these slower tempi. They give infinitely more space for expression and more importantly the musical characterization of these wonderful childhood scenes. One only wishes the majority of professional performers would not be so snobbish about what they consider to be true. Thanks again for another awesome video!
Thanks Mohab
"One only wishes the majority of professional performers would not be so *snobbish* about what they consider to be true."
And earlier:
"It occurs to me that any *sane* musician will immediately gravitate towards these slower tempi."
...
I’m really fascinated by your ‘double-beat’ videos - beautiful playing and instruments too, of course! Just talking about Schumann for the moment, which movements do you consider unplayable in the ‘single-beat’ tempo given by Schumann or the first editions? I’ve come across many (in Schumann’s piano, chamber, and orchestral music) that I don’t believe can be considered possible in double beat ... Just one example: Op. 132/3, played here slightly faster than the single-beat reading (mainly because the clarinettist - a prize-winning, wonderful player - found himself pushed to extremes even in this tempo). OK, it’s said single and double beat readings might have been practised simultaneously by different and even the same musicians, but in my experience Schumann’s tempo indications do make sense in relation to each other.
I certainly don’t deny that many (probably most) movements are possible (even if not right) in either single or double beat, however it’s simply not the case that everything is fast in single-beat readings - many movements are, while others are rather slow. What literature would you recommend for a more theoretical, objective exposition of the double-beat theory?
ua-cam.com/video/ni7yiutFMRo/v-deo.html
Schumann is definitely to be researched more. For me, also these Kinderscenen are a first step into a new time (after Beethoven). As for many slow movements in earlier music (Beethoven, Mozart, ...) I longtime opposed the idea Lorenz Gadient posed of applying double beat also for the slow movements. My eyes opened when playing the adagio variation in Mozart's D Major Munchen sonata, only possible -according to Moscheles' tempo) in double beat. And then, many more followed, also a new way of performing. The latter is the most complicating, since it involves our taste, experience, experiment, subjectivity. I would recommend Lorenz' book to read. As for now, I'm working with him intensely to completely rewrite that and surround it by much practical examples, setting up a kind of 'mastermind' group to discuss and create a real platform for, what I think, is important research.
Thanks, I’m reading Gadient’s book (easy to find by googling antiquariats). My impression is once people have made their minds, it’s hard to present anything in a non-partial manner ... same applies to other metrikers, as well as Miehling of course. Or maybe it’s just that to play at a different speed one has to play differently ... as you say, very true.
Sure, the solution of taking single-beat figures for one (slow) movement, double-beat for the next (fast) is problematic ... So if it’s, as you say, either-or, it comes down to either some fast movements being too fast or some slow ones being too slow (like the one I showed and so many more). Until more theoretical evidence materializes, that is - looking forward!
What you said above of Schiff’s Hammerklavier tempo becoming (on modern piano) 116 instead of Beethoven’s 138 I find hardly more than the kind of difference of a ‘work desk’ tempo slowing down in actual playing - in my experience and that of many others (Harnoncourt often talked about this). Why do you think it tends to go the other way with ‘double-beaters’ (like on this video, demonstrating Steckenpferd at 100+ double-beat reading...) So far, I find the work-desk explanation more convincing.
Sorry, I've been terribly busy (organ projects etc.) these days so catching up with comments is hard! It would be better to talk over email, mine is wwinters@telenet.be
But I'm looking forward to talking more about this, it is all very interesting (and in need of research!)
In addition to yesterday -things finally come to a bit of slower tempo :-) at the end of this week: I was driving with Joris Potvlieghe to Zaandam -we've a collab project with Flentrop, I said we had contact through this video and he immediately answered that he still had good memories to your concert in Magnano on his Horn!
As said, lot's to talk about, and yes yes yes, no-one should be opposed by definition, but a perspective does not hurt either. Looking on the 'balance of evidence' if that's possible, I'd say there is a chance that for the double beat theory the package is (significanty) larger, but that doesn't mean there is not another side. Lorenz will rewrite his book -that is really necessary and fundamentally needed. He's doing that now, and under that layer, I very much would like to organize a layer of professional musicians, just trying out things seriously and over longer periods of time. Would love to talk with you if you feel for it, a video call is easy to set up for me, an email will do and I'll reply back. Take care!
Wim
Would be great to find period metronomes that tick-tock, like a clock. Would make everything make sense.
Bell metronomes existed, as silent metronomes and anything you can wish for. The Bell metronome was invented around 1835 with the clear goal to be used as a time-keeper (many of the inserted instructions talk about this), which is single beat use, different from the metrical speed indications. I've an episode on this with Lorenz: ua-cam.com/video/3W5zvIoKPqQ/v-deo.html&index=16
It does seem like the slower tempos are draggy. Playing them in the restored original tempos seems better, more flowing. I wonder if the modern performances also have done this with Wagner's Tristan and Isolde because it seems to beeeeeeeeee tooooooooo loooooooooong.
These slower tempos are actually what probably are "original"! But I agree, it takes time to adapt to a lot of them, even for me.
In my opinion the truth lies in the middle: in Traumerei the maximum speed is actually 100 per quarter, but with the natural slowdowns and accelerations of the musical declamation. Playing that work at 50 per quarter is like dragging it to the gallows (to me).
"Leichte Stücke" can be translated as "easy pieces" in the sens they are easy to play, but alternatively could mean they are "easy on the listener and do not tell heavy emotional stories".
What brand of piano are you playing? How old?
1866 Érard
I really appreciate your work and it has made me think about several things. I have a question regarding tempo and the idea that the composer had of his own pieces. I’ve heard many of those welte-mignon recordings and for instance Debussy’s written idea it’s completely different of what sounds when he recorded it and it’s hard to believe that it’s correct, because it seems so clear on the score, but when I hear it the text seems very incoherent. And several other composers as well, it’s seems too fast! Could you tell us about this recordings and how is it? Maybe it’s already in another video that I haven’t watched... thank you very much! you’re definitely inspiring many musicians around the globe!
Thanks Denner, for the nice words, really appreciate them! Welte Mignon... lot's to be researched, as are piano rolls. But overall, those ca 1900 recordings only reveal something of the playing around ... 1900. Piano playing changed so fundamentally from ca 1840 onwards (see my video on Don Giovanni Tomascheck or the one on Klemperer and Bach). Much of today's 'historical informed perf.
Great follow-up! Bedankt! En mooi gespeeld.
I don't understand. Please summarize to me that if we travel back in time to see Schumann play these pieces, say, Traumerai, would we hear roughly the same tempi we hear today? is the problem the fact that markings are different in those days?
Here's a video you may like: ua-cam.com/video/2yd7LWi4wus/v-deo.html&index=2
Wow. Ritter Vom Steckenpferd sounds so much better at this tempo. The versions I'm familiar with all sound like somebody cuing up a tape (some tape players had cue/review buttons where you could fast forward and rewind without disengaging the playhead.)
Dank voor wederom een interessante video. Een vraag die mij vaak bezig houdt is of in veel hedendaagse uitvoeringen 'haast' of 'ongedurigheid' die ik meen te horen ook meetbaar is. Oude opnames lijken kalmer, evenwichtiger. Het is of je de tijdgeest er doorheen hoort. Zijn er anderen die dit ook ervaren? En Wim, is dit te objectiveren? Kun je naast tempo ook andere dynamische aspecten meetbaar maken? Ik kan me bijvoorbeeld voorstellen dat in een romantische uitvoering bepaalde noten subtiel verlengd worden. Of een aanslag met een meer piekachtige karakteristiek ipv sinusvormig. Veel te ingewikkelde vraag natuurlijk maar zo hardop denkend is hij leuk om te stellen.
Heel kort: de spanningsboog over de maat heen (van sterk naar sterk) is nefast voor een 'klassieke' tempo-ervaring. Wat we vandaag nog altijd leren aan onze 7 jaringen in de solfège klassen, bv dat een 4/4 uit zwaar-licht-beetjezwaar-licht bestaat, is de basis van historisch tempobesef
Tempo is not important. The most important is the atmosphere you leave in the room, how you sing music, how you breath it. I suggest you to listen to Affred Cortot playing this piece.
I've been killing myself trying to play simple guitar pieces from that era in time all these years despite being able to shred like a thrash metal lead and now I learn it was all a waste of time lmao
Makes perfect sense. Great explanation and very convincing theory.
Except that Clara's acceptance of the modern conventions of her husband's timing is a conclusive proof that, no, in the lifetime of Clara Schumann (and in the lifetime of any other great composer/musician) we did not have a sudden shift from one form of timing to a doubling of effective speeds. If your theory is true don't you think that Clara would have said SOMETHING about it by 1896 (and she went on playing his music until an old age)?
Why would she? She adopted the same system.
@@AuthenticSound You cant have it both ways: either Clara used your approach, in which case you seem to suggest that as late as 1896 metronome markings were "authentic" (as per your definition) OR metronome markings did shift to the modern meaning in which case she chose to stay silent even as she edited or played her beloved husband's music (e.g. his concerto - which she went on to perform for decades) and allowed his music to be effectively doubled in speed - and did nothing about it.
Does anyone else think, as I do, that both Argerich and Horowitz make the opening C anacrusis in Träumerei only half as long as the composer wrote?
How does anyone know that those were his choices? Was it in his own handwriting?
I am currently working on Schumann’s Grand Sonata No.1 in f# minor, Op. 11. I so much prefer to perform this Sonata slower and I enjoy expressing it with slower tempos. I don’t like the so-called fast tempos very fast.
Is your piano still from original parts? Hammers, felts... Sounds just a little bit woody, lacking the soft felt on the base of the hammerheads, and sounds like let-off is a bit far from the strings. Do you know what distance there is from hammers heads to the strings on "no playing" position? Kudos for using it, it is a beautiful instrument!!!
You should have a close look to it, Antoine, I'll contact you soon btw for a broken string in the bass (EE). As far as I know, it is all orginal, the recording was setup up really quick, so it might not give a true representation,
Interesting - up to a point... Ultimately, it's a question of whether the performer is an outstanding musician or not.
Music is an art, and not a science, and only experience - not to mention sheer talent - can open the door to intuition and inspiration.
Otherwise, we might as well just let a computer sort out all the available scientific information on tempo and rhythm and tell us the answer to the riddles of Schumann's music. Good luck with that.
I loved the video!
Here's a small tip for your recordings:
While you have great instruments, the acoustics as heard in your recordings does not do them justice (its too dense in the mid range), it would be smart to design the acoustics to compliment your instruments better. With great acoustics, you can use a pair (or three) of small capsule omni microphones and position them in the best sounding spot in the room for a stellar recording. good luck!
Thanks for your tips! I definitely have to setup a nice mic position for the Erard, here - I plead guilty- indeed just picked two AKG's C3000's.
the microphone is not as important as the acoustics! great acoustics and bad mic is better than bad acoustics and great mic.
the room is indeed part of the instrument
His Erard piano is not tuned to A=440 but I suspect to a mid-nineteenth century tuning of 432 or 435.
Hi Jerry, it is lower indeed, don't want to give it more stress than necessary and ca 435 works fine. It can handle 440 as well (as it can be put higher). There were many many standards in the 19th century, in Paris around 1850/5 even 455.
Thanks for your response. I very much appreciate and enjoy your UA-cam presentations.
There are people that speculate that Schumann's metronome was faulty (that is the assumption in the research project I am working on about historical performance practice of cyclic piano works). I highly doubt that Schumann had no clue how fast his works should go or had them played at such weird tempi.
Hi Symbioticism!
Well, there's also the speculation that Beethoven's metronome was broken! But since Czerny, Moscheles etc. also give remarkably consistent metronome numbers (I'm working on an online metronome number database!), their metronomes must be broken too... and so forth. Especially since it is very easy to check if a metronome is calibrated, it must go 60 times in a minute, so it is unlikely that they wouldn't have noticed. So I think there must be much better explanations than the "broken metronome" one.
I can understand where you are coming from. I think we basically have to be very careful how we treat a source. Schumann/Beethoven/whoever are not necessarily reliable witnesses to metronome marks.
But these metronomes were literally ticking on the composers pianos! If we want to reconstruct the performance practice, there is almost no more direct data than the metronome numbers.
Plus: why would we take our today's opinion on tempi of their works more seriously than their ownes? Makes no sense. Always be careful indeed how to treat a source, but reject it only as a very very very very last option. If you'd sum up all the 'misprints', 'faults', 'apperent errors',... not much is left to base any research on... I'd believe we might be off as well, and perhaps Beethoven, Schumann, Czerny, Ries, Hummel, Moscheles, Chopin, and dozens and dozens of others... just right? Bottem line: don't let yourself fool by the idea that the metronome was not working, it was precise as a digital app is today, statistically spoken anyway, since a deviation of even 5 to 10% would not make a fundamental difference.
It depends what you are researching of course. Composer intention is only one part of music research in general and historically informed practice only one form of performance. (Our research project looks at performance strategies of the 20th and 21st centuries where we of course have an audible record.) Another problem I see is just the general treatment of numerical record as evidence of a practice. Yes it is evidence, but it needs contextualizing not only to the practice of the time, but also the variation of practice that a composer/players might have had within their own playing (surely R/C Schumann used differentl tempi on different occasions). So, it is a pretty cloudy picture: composer intention, performing tradition, metronomes (and their flaws) all interact with each other. I do think research like yours is very worthwhile, I just think we should remember how difficult it is to quote tempi as the true way to play.
fascinating!
I love this, you definitely should play more piano. As for the MM, I don't understand the triple meter tempo inequalis (sp?). Perhaps my sense of rhythm needs help.
That makes the two of us. I listened to that bit twice, but I am none the wiser :)
Also, if I may, the apparition of what looked like a holy image in the middle of the music stand was a bit unsettling :D :D
Also, I have been listening to a few "knight of the hobby horse" and they are pretty much played at the same tempo, about 45 secs in total (with the exception of Lang Lang's version, 35 secs), as opposed to your approx. 55 secs. It has to be said that it does make sense listening to it.
Just as well we are talking about easy pieces :D :D
ua-cam.com/video/d4Ke5nvftZg/v-deo.html&list=PLackZ_5a6IWU1zXuo_Qx-YrCCtaJcBiPO + the previous episode in this playlist
ua-cam.com/video/d4Ke5nvftZg/v-deo.html&list=PLackZ_5a6IWU1zXuo_Qx-YrCCtaJcBiPO
+ the previous episode in this playlist
Wim, Thx for the vid links; I'm amazed you respond to these posts.
To me this means triple meter short notes may be shorter than written and long notes longer than written...say in 3/8 time a 1/4 note followed by an 1/8 note, the 1/8 note will be more like a 1/16th because the inequalis put more duration on the 1/4 note? No need to reply, I'll work on this with my metronome.
Speed is relative in piano works. A brilliant pianist can play much faster without it sounding rushed. I on the other hand can make medium speed pieces sound rushed even slightly below tempo. I firmly believe Schumann was capable of making his tempos sound great. It was said that he played so fast the notes blended together and created piano effects that were unheard of. I recently compared almost 50 renditions of his "Fabel" from "Fantasiestücke" and every single rendition was very distinct form the other. There was a clear winner for me that stood above all of them by quite some margin: Sophie Pacini. A lot of renditions were quite painful because they are so far off what I consider this piece to sound like it was really interesting. Especially it is ruined when played too slow and also use of too little pedal (yes that is possible) makes it less good, although it is usually the other way around.
Another "geeky physicist" explanation is that great composers -- whether Schumann or Beethoven -- emitted a strong gravitation field which slowed down time and the metronome around them.
In fact, the opposite is true, and easy to fact check; tempi went up in the 19th c. not down
Ok, I should have worded differently. Due to gravitational force, the time around Schumann and Beethoven will have progressed slower. That means Schumann and Beethoven would experienced the metronome moving faster than them. Thus, if they set the metronome at 60, they experienced it as 90 to 120.
My reasoning also explains how Beethoven had enough time to write 32 freakin' Sonatas, 16 string quartets, 9 symphonies, and .... just one opera. Of course, I am not making a serious argument here :)
How about Liszt, do you ever try to do the same on Liszt compositions? Such as Mephisto Waltz or Grand Galop Chromatic?
Professor A. Goldenweiser (Moscow Conservatory) did exactly what you say to Mephisto Waltz. Another professor - Heinrich Neuhaus made comments on this particular performance: "It was the best FOURTY minutes of my life".
Great explanation, thanks!
BTW I liked the way you pronounced 'Argerich'. But actually an ending "ch" sounds just like a "k" ("Argerik"). Many catalan surnames lead to understandable mispronunciation: Bach ("Bak"), Bosch ("Bosk"), etc.
cadburries thank you for the correction!
Really good video.. I just wanted to make a comment about misconceptions around great composers writing children's pieces. A lot of great composers were exceptionally gifted child prodigies, so I imagine when a composer writes music for children, pieces described as "easy" could be say, comparing it to a Chopin Piano Concerto played by a 10 year old. I think the average music lover can have a distorted idea of a composer's understanding of what a composer thinks is suitable for children (ie a composer could be thinking more in terms of exceptionally talented ones) Just a thought around the tempo discussion
Hi David, I would say, make of those musicians/composer, humans again. Yes, they were talented, but the 19th century has turned them into real 'god's'. And most, if not all had an active life as a teacher, so very well embedded in the culture of the 'average'.
Have I missed something here? Traumerei is clearly marked quarter note = 80 and yet you play 8th note = 80. Similarly, he marks "Ritter..." equals 76 for the entire 3/4 measure. In neither instance is the marked tempo humanly impossible. Please explain.
It doesn't matter if something is humanly impossible or not. It's what they meant with it: ua-cam.com/video/6EgMPh_l1BI/v-deo.html
@@AuthenticSound
AuthenticSound
1 year ago
It doesn't matter if something is humanly impossible or not??
Wonderful playing! But I disagree about the tempos. I have played his violinsonats 1 and 2, and they are "un-musical" at half the MM. Many even play a bit faster than the markings. And I don't think that one single tempo is the correct one, if Schumann liked some faster and some slower than Godowsky it is perfectly ok for me.
I'm sorry, but i'm afraid i have to I disagree about your "un-musical", i guess you'd counted this on historically subjectivity, which in my opinion sadly occurs very often.
I based this on personal taste.
It takes a long time to adapt to the old metrical tempi, it is more than just changing a tempo, it comes with changing a complete culture of performance.
Nice to know Schumann and I have something in common!!.. X D ...LOL