This channel is simply AMAZING! I’ve been binge watching all the videos on your channel, I have a masters degree in performance and NEVER heard of this.
just bringing back 19th century performance practices would cause a revolution in classical interpretation. We play too perfectly where are the ornaments and improvisations?
Great to read! I'm working on a 4 pages sheet to give the core facts on a row, so you can make the argument in case questions are asked. Let me know how all of this works out!
Its amazing how this huge mass of information about interpretation has been literally in front of our faces all this time. Apparently Beethoven was a genius and could create the 5th symphony, however was too dumb to read the numbers correctly in a metronome!
I've been saying the same thing for the past year. However, like the status quo of any orthodoxy, it's going to take a while before it's completely accepted. Little by little though, double beat theory is inevitably going to revolutionise the HIP community -- facts are facts! Tempo has always been a topic of fascination for me. I've always felt a number of things didn't quite make sense when it came to the current supposed historically informed tempos; but with no concrete evidence outside of commonsense, I just had to trust the academics because, "how could the vast amount of musicologists be wrong! right!?" -- that is until Wim came along with his brilliant videos and started putting all the puzzle pieces together.
I teach copyright law at a university and have read some books about the royal patronage in the musical art of the 18th century. The music of early modern masters like Mozart and Beethoven was created for royal audience who were the patrons for artistic activities before the era of copyright law. The sort of music that the noble classes liked was usually slower and more leisurely in tempo than the folk music one heard in the streets. I also read somewhere that Chopin was a staunch royalist and it's conceivable that the music he created to charm and to teach the nobility, who were his patrons and students, should be more leisurely in style than the fast-and-furious virtuosity showpieces we hear today.
HAHA! Awesome on you, Wim! I went back to my o-o-o-ld "Revolutionary" and Op. 10, No. 1, and I played it at Chopin's MM marking using the "Period" (T) for the note, not the Frequency (f), and my daughters when nuts at how beautiful Chopin's music had become!!! You have given this old concert pianist new life, and I will forever thank you for it!!! Godspeed, Wim! :D
It's all relative to our time. Jets and modern automobiles vs Horses. That change happened in about 100 years. The Masters lived hundereds of years ago in the horse age, not the age where we send people to outer space and send unmanned vehicles to Mars.
@@robertbrown7470 Are you saying that because we're "faster", we should update the ancient music?; or are you saying that this is what is happening, and that we should continue to honour the composer and their times by playing the pieces with "AuthenticSound"?
So, even when trying to follow "single beat", performers fall back to "double beat" territory, when they want the music to have any emotional expression other than "virtuosity"!
I listened to Pollini's version right after listening your's and what was striking was indeed the changing tempo throughout his rendition. It reminded me of your previous video where you talked about trills in Mozart's work, and how it gives a clue how fast you should play - even how fast you could play. In Pollini's version those trills among other elements revealed that you can't possibly play at that tempo constantly throughout the whole piece. We have without a doubt better functioning instruments than 200 years ago. And we've had over 200 years to master techniques with piano. And piano is accessible for more people than ever before. From the millions of people who can play technically advanced piano, we're supposed to believe none can play as fast as masters of the past? Or maybe we've understood something wrong.
Brilliant commentary and scholarship. I've known this piece for over 40 years and I'm convinced that you are 100% correct. I could spend an hour explaining why but quite honestly I'd rather get onto another of your videos. This is fascinating stuff.
Regarding ritenuto and ritardando in Chopin: C.wrote in a letter that actual it was necessary and/or difficult to rehearse with the orchestra and that he needed to tell them, show them, where he needed these ritenutos. I read the letters in the English paperpack edition, there are more letters, but in that book there are some very interesting letters around his concertos (which are works of a teen-ager, incredible!) There are many more hints regarding his performances in the books by JJ. Eigeldinger.
Thanks for this. Schlag - how right you are. Then the 1938 Eduard Jeu - so clear, how can one disagree. Good point about repeated notes. This is gripping stuff.
Excellent, your explanations remains us that we are not machines, and for contrari al the things that we make came from the heart. Like Chopin and other, they expressed them self with music. So, i can express my self with her music on may way or in my tempo.
Horowitz stated that "there is no ONE tempo." He once recounted something that Artur Rubinstein told him about Rubinstein's teacher, violinist Joachim. Joachim and Brahms were rehearsing for a couple of days for a joint performance they were to play together. On the first day of rehearsals, Joachim felt that Brahms was playing too slowly and wouldn't increase the speed of his performance. At the end of that rehearsal, Joachim said he went back to his hotel sad and disgusted. At the next day's rehearsal, Brahms played faster than the day before. When they finished rehearsing, Joachim said he was delighted and asked Brahms: "Yesterday you played slow, but today you played fast. Why?" Brahms replied: "Fell my pulse. Today it beats faster."
yes, of course, that's how musicians think in practical life, everyone does. It's always a frame you're working in, not a strictstrict tempoframe. However, this should - in case one wants to reflect on what the composer had in mind- not be a free pass to do whatever you want (with the claim of reflecting on the original composer's performance)
Do you have an understanding of why there is so much rubato and added ornamentation in some of Bach’s pieces? Especially his Violin Sonatas/ Partitas and Cello Suites? If this is something interests you too I would be curious to hear what you have to say on the matter. Don’t get me wrong, I play the pieces as well, and I add my own flair to them, but I try to keep it balanced and not let the piece get away from me. In many performances that I have listened to the musician may as well have thrown the indicated rhythms and sheet music out the window with how different their interpretation is. It just seems weird to me that those pieces are consistently played out of time and it seems to be considered normal to do so.
It's an interesting topic, but not easy. In Renaissance music, there must have been a very rigid steady pulse, tempo, there even was only (about) one tempo, one Schlag, compare that to a Debussy piece. And then think about the evolution, that of course, did not start overnight. Bach sarabandes might be very revolutionary in this regard, earlier the Itialians of course, see also Mozart's Munchen sonatas, the middle parts, what a preview of actually romanticism, and before that, the sonatas by CPEBach, middle parts. Also accentuation by making notes longer, there is so much to be studied on this particular field.
AuthenticSound Awesome, well very interesting. It looks like I need to do some further research on the topic. Nice to know it’s tied to the evolution of the pieces. Seems natural, though I sometimes fear we may lose the ear/knowledge to understand how they were played originally. But thankfully you’ve got a great channel that explores that type of musical analysis.
Music to my ears, these nerdy analyses ;) Very important. The "it's a race" movement needs to take note here. To criticize the performance of one of the greatest pianists of our time, I had no issue with his tempo, albeit to me it seemed bordering on too fast. When I perceive incidental false hits in the fastest bars, to me it means you played too fast. The biggest problem in my ears is when solo piano Chopin is played for a large hall (about 1,200 people) on a Steinway D with a beautiful sound, but every volume indication is played two notches louder and f becomes fff. Far away from a pianist wooing a group of young women and their chaperones in the intimacy of a Paris salon where delicacy and storytelling dominate instead of banging out fastidious "no wrong notes" perfection (and not succeeding at that incidentally).
Interesting stuff and, as always, beautifully played! I find the topic of technical ability and tempo very interesting: for the same principle, also the "slow" version (speaking in general) poses numerous technical problems. Not maybe to a pianist, who does not have to breath or pull a bow to produce a sound, but definitely for singers, wind and string instruments. I wonder how arias like "Ah! non credea mirarti" or "Casta diva", published in the same years as Chopin Etudes, would be at all possible if sung "slowly". Tempo is a universal aspect in music and a universal approach towards all instruments (singing included) is mandatory. I am looking forward to some future video on Arias or pieces for other instruments than piano. In any case "Well done"!
Thank you so much Vito for sharing these interesting thoughts. Once the pianoforte is here, we definitely will at least try to involve other musicians/instruments. Comments and positive interest like yours keep us going!
This is a good question. There are many singers and wind instrument players who are injured due to our current performance practices. These people suffer from embouchure muscle problems due to the high speed and belting out whatever they can at extremely loud volumes. With my lessons and own studies now, I've been taking this slower approach to my music not only in practice time, but also when I'm just enjoying the music. This is like a breath of fresh air and has allowed me to discover missing bits in the music that get glazed over as we pursue the mad dash to the end. The slower tempos also bring up the accuracy in my performance as well because it's less difficult when facing those big leaps and runs common in much of the mid 19th century music. In the end it's like saying so this what have we've been missing all these years? From a piano standpoint, it's interesting playing on and comparing an 1840s Pleyel to a contemporary Erard. I was able to do this at the Frederick Collection. The Pleyel has a gentler sound as well, which is much different than the robust, though still very sweet sounding, Erard from the same period. Here's an interesting note that sums it up nicely: (Thanks to Pat Frederick at the Frederick Collection). "Liszt's preference was for Erard's more dramatic range of tone colors, while Chopin played both makes, preferring the more intimate sound of the Pleyel except when he was feeling ill and wanted a piano that would produce more effects with less effort."
Keep on going! Even though I have different ideas and tend to challenge you with sometimes provocative questions and comments, I will always support your work and your ideas!
Interesting point. My main point is that both the fast and the slow versions pose technical problems to the interpreter and any Manichean approach is, to my view, faulty. I have been rehearsing with my trio Schubert's D. 898 and the second movement cannot be taken too slow, unless the strings (mostly the cello) break the bowings. Same thing for singers, who often suffer because conductors or pianist accompany them just way too slowly. Those are just a couple of the many technical problems that the "slow system" poses to the interpreters.
so how would you for example play the second movement of Chopin's first piano concerto op11, where the metronome mark is 80 per quarter note? Half the speed? Try it :). In my view, 80 is too fast and 40 would be too slow, so why not just stick to the "Larghetto" indication and translate this indication into our time to make it sound "larghetto" for our listeners, rather than follow a metronome mark which in itself doesn't really mean a lot.
Well, performing his music on our pianos in huge concert halls is already quite far away from Chopin's world, don't you think? Furthermore, who really knows what Chopin's world actually was and if we knew it, would it make sense to replicate it on and on forever? Music is basically a language and such, just like every other language subject to constant change.- I find your approach interesting and it is certainly worth listening. I would be keen to listen to a convincing recording of the afore mentioned movement at 40 per quarter note.
@@AuthenticSound agree totally. It is a fresh and interesting look at his music, but it doesn't necessarily mean it is the only what we might call "authentic" approach. Tempo is not really as pivotal as other metrics in music, such as character, phrasing and articulation. I think we can speak a bit faster or slower as long as we can convey a message and it's poetic content, all within reason of course.
I'm exuse me for my English. The pourchase of arguments must be onest with her context. Pianists like Pollini, Horowitz and other are respecting the metronome marks with exception of the "slow", expressive, études. The question is not what they can do but whath they decide to do. For example listen to Richters rendition of étude 10/12 in a movie on youtube. For sure Pollini can play at this fast but he like it not. On youtube you can listen Horowitz at said, in a Interwieuw, that the tempo was faster at the time of old Winer Piano. Modern piano and big concert rooms needs more clarity and more slow articulate technique. Yes, 16-18 notes at second for every talented musician is a normal thing. A trill is the double beat of 8 notes for second for each of 2 fingers. That means that 8 notes for a octave passage, like some things in Tchaikowsky concerto, is normal. Any Beethoven sonata in actual performances is according whit this reality today, is that too slow? to fast? I'm at thinking that faster tempi of Czerny are a joke to inspire respect for the best virtuoso of her School but in alignement to the exceptional talent of Beethoven herself. This is for me, actually, the question. With best regard.
Bravissimo. I loved this essay. I kept on thinking that one of the reasons that Romantic era music in particular got to be accepted at such speeds, well we should start pointing fingers now. I start with Vladimir Horowitz, who had supernatural speed gifts and he used them to an obscene limit. When his colleagues called him out for why he was playing so fast, his response was to say, heh, isn't it amazing that I can actually pull it off? In other words, guys like Horowitz and I would have to add his idol, Rachmaninoff, they couldn't have cared less about what the composer put down for tempo markings. They wanted the crowd to leap to its feet and blast its gigantic roar. They wanted woman to pass out and legions of students to emulate their speed. Glenn Gould's (almost?) one excursion into Chopin made everyone laugh because he took a ten ton steam roller and squashed all of the guts out of the Chopin nuance, sneering all the while. Ok, maybe his Chopin is a bad example of tempo destruction. Maybe his Mozart piano sonatas are even more outrageous. But! Was Gould trying to make a point, a point that maybe Wim is leading us into considering? Never mind Gould's insane half tempo interpretation of Brahms' piano concerto, which Bernstein had to distance himself from in the live performance. More fingers should be pointing at guys like Pollini and even more so to Canadian wunderkind, M.A. Hamelin, who approaches the speed of light when he plays; sometimes. I told Wim that I had not known this Chopin Etude and I printed it off and have played through it a few times now. It is such a deliciously emotive piece and for us to listen to a Pollini version I think is doing the poetry of the piece a great injustice. Someone who was more closely in simpatico with Chopin was the very great Artur Rubinstein. His tempi while sometimes very fast, are not in the ridiculous stratosphere of Horowitz and thank goodness for that. I think that Wim's work here needs to be shared with current top level pedagogues, who can pay attention, informed attention, to his points about tempo.
But there are recordings by Gould where he plays sooo slow, even below double beat- a piece by Beethoven, but don't know which one- with an incredible tension. He followed his instinct and didn't care about any reaction, which is rare on that level
Gould was known for his erratic approach. With him you either accepted his interpretation for its artistic, aesthetic merits while at the same time ignoring what the composer wrote or indicated for tempo markings, OR you rejected Gould as an aberration. It is hard to love Gould when you put more attention, as Wim has been doing, on what the composer wrote or indicated. Gould, like Pollini, Horowitz or any other favourite, has his fans and to criticize his approach is often met with hostility. I mean, Andras Schiff, who knew Gould and greatly admires him correctly scolds Gould's fans for elevating Gould into a semi-music-deity. My feeling is that many of the great performers were not then nor are they now too interested in what the composer had in mind, given the time period in which they were composed, etc. Perhaps Wim is opening a new chapter in performance accuracy that will change the way mainstream performances are approached? Too early to tell.
Hi Graham. In my opinion, all artists have their gradations of greatness. The top artists have their misses but they are fewer and farther in between the total output. This is my view. I have heard exactly one piece, for example, by Beethoven, which for me is dreadful and a failure. It is an early piece and it is for piano duet. I heard it once and I couldn't believe how bad it was. Ok, so one piece. That's my opinion. I do not assume all tempos are genuine. For example, I differ with Czerny, with Wim and with my beloved Andras Schiff: I am not convinced that Beethoven really knew what the tempos sounded like when he passed into almost complete deafness. So, if someone presented him with a Peters Edition (?) of one of his pieces and it had a metronome marking, did he really appreciate the tempo like a person with hearing? On the other hand, using Beethoven as an example, Schiff maintains that Beethoven had exactly one piano piece that had tempo markings or metronome markings on it that HE approved of. Which means by default that all the other editions of his piano pieces were probably given metronome markings by Czerny and others who knew Beethoven. Are they correct? A lot of what Wim has been been getting us to see is that we all have preconceived notions of speed and they might be distortions from what the composer had in mind. When Gould came out with his first Goldberg it was not the first recording of the piece but it took the classical music world by storm, nonetheless. Part of that joyous accolade was for the Gouldian tempos which were very exciting. Was his the only correct version and what of his second recording and what of his live recordings of the Goldberg? they were all different. I am not elevating any composer or performer to a god-like level. However, the early 20'th century pianists, like Horowitz, formed an impression on the public and this public grew to accept and expect super fast speeds and heart stopping melodrama. Wim has been suggesting that maybe that tradition of tempos was not representative of the composers ideas.
Some metrically arranged piano rolls are marked with the overall performance time of the pianist, I have one 'approved' by Granados - pity these weren't around when Chopin was alive.
Yes that's correct, and in fact Liszt's students and even those pupils of Mikuli have been known to play very fast, but that might not be enough evidence to prove that Liszt, or Chopin, or any other composer from that time played their works at the time they composed them. For instance, it is possible that Liszt by the end of his teaching career was happy with his pupils playing faster than he himself did 40 years previously. I think Wim's aim here (if I may make an assumption) is to clarify what the composer's idea was at the time of a work's inception regardless of whether the composer changed their minds later in life.
I'm not ignoring anything, I'm merely discussing points. Of course Liszt's pupils recordings are important. There's also the point that when Lamond played Feux Follets in the presence of Liszt, it wasn't recorded, and when he did record it in the 1920s, it was 40 years after Liszt's death AND he may well have put his own stamp on it. There's nothing wrong with that of course - in fact it would be wrong for him to play as a carbon copy of his teacher - but we've still no idea if that's how Liszt might have envisaged the work in either the 1850s or the 1880s. I'm not actually saying that I think music should be played a certain way, I just think it's interesting to research, discuss, and hear different ideas and fresh performances.
Interesting thoughts! My point overall is that the MM are your time-machine... ! We'll have a segment on the Hammerklavier and Liszt soon. In double beat however, this becomes by far no sight-reading piece!
96 quarter note is 192 eighth right? Just not sure because of the weird time signature. But I just tried that on my metronome, and I don't see how the sixteenth notes are too fast. I'll try on my parents' really old piano from around 1900 to see if it has any trouble tomorrow.
it's 288 for the eight note (dotted 4th) if taken literally. That means you'll have to play about 5 8th notes per second, about 10 16th per second. it also means you'll have less than 0.1 seconds per repeated note on that place. So that...might be a miscalculation of your part! But it is often so and no blame to you, that people at first say: that can't be true, trying things out, but not really, hasty often. sitting down some days with open mind will change your view on this. Let me know how it works!
Oh, I didn't see it was a dotted quarter note. Just tried it on an electric. It was difficult to get it to register each note and difficult just to play, but it still seems within possibility. Whether it makes sense as a tempo, I can't say.
That in fact is written often (but I didn't see it either): the Germans say Tact + Tacttheilen. Note value in the MM = Tact = Schlag = up+down, the number is the speed of the Tact Theilen. Once you know this, you'll start seeing it everywhere
Where does the +/-30% -principle comes from? I'm aware that Widor did update tempo indications that way for the last edition of his organ symphonies, but how to get 30 percent decrease for fast movements from two-part tactus beats me!
The point is that for faster pieces that have metronome markings from this era, modern performances are often not at the single-beat reading nor the double beat, but somewhere in between. If you say a tempo is halfway between there, you subtract a third of the tempo (multiply by 2/3) to get the double-beat reading or add a third of the tempo (multiply by 4/3) to get the single-beat reading. 30% is an approximation to 1/3.
As Alexander points out, it is just a rough estimation, just to show people that also in 'single beat', we should consider a major correction to (on average) 30,....% increase of tempo. The story that 'double beat' will half ALL tempi simply is not true. Sometimes the differences will not be that big, sometimes bigger, but that's the same at the other side of the spectrum, only thing is that that correction in single beat is not possible any more, tempi are already now maxed in many cases
Thanks to both of you for the replies! To get your point without misunderstandings, it'd be great if you could give us an examplary interpretation of nos. 1, 4, or 8 from op. 10. Paderewski gives us same tempo to all three etudes, quarter note=176 (or half note=88), which is insanely fast. Should this tempo be halved, decreased by 30%, or is there another historical evidence based way to deal with it I'm not aware of?
Those m.m:s are actually from the first edition, so it might be safe to assume they had Chopin's blessing. Manuscripts are not found in web, but in Paderewski's edition - which I own - in the first pages there are photocopies of the beginnings of nos. 3 and 9. Strange thing is, that no. 3 has indication "Vivace ma non troppo" (in published editions "Lento ma non troppo) but no m.m.. That may indicate many things, but as I have encountered in several occasions, Vivace doesn't always indicate tempo per say like we often assume, but a character. In manuscript Etude no. 9 has m.m. of 92, same as in the first edition and your video's reference.
Wim is not arguing for tempo reduction on a piece-by-piece basis. He's saying that we should follow the indicated metronome markings from that time exactly as printed, only he adds the hypothesis that we use the metronome differently from back then. The argument is that the metronomes back in the early 19th century were accurate, and so the metronome markings from the musicians of that time should be taken at face value, not discarded because their metronomes were broken or they were all collectively insane. Wim argues that metronomes were used to indicate beats with two ticks of the metronome rather than one tick as today, which is why he puts out videos of pieces at "half" the indicated tempo. According this hypothesis, sometime in the nineteenth century, the single-beat metronome usage (one tick=one beat) became dominant, so applying our current usage back to the old metronome markings, we end up playing pieces twice as fast as intended by the composers (or whoever gave the markings). Either way, whether the correct reading of those MM markings is "single-beat" or "double-beat," you should respect the indicated metronome markings if you care at all about following the composers intentions. The comment about +/-30% adjustments to tempo was strictly about recordings, not printed metronome markings. Musicians today in many (most?) cases will ignore the metronome markings entirely and play pieces that have metronome markings from composers (or their contemporaries) in a tempo less than the printed metronome marks interpreted according to our modern metronome usage (single-beat), often significantly less. This is sometimes due to the fact that playing in tempo (single beat) sounds uncomfortably fast, or in other cases because playing in tempo is virtually impossible technically (Wim's favorite example is Czerny's op. 299, "School of Velocity"). Wim argues that a double-beat reading of the metronome markings solves both issues, by rendering technically impossible passages playable, and frantic tempos comfortable. Paderewski was a modern pianist, who lived into WWII, so you would assume all his markings are single-beat. I found a recording of him playing the Revolutionary etude. I don't know the metronome marking for it, but I doubt it is anywhere near a double-beat reading of whatever that is. ua-cam.com/video/UNlBp9TM2Pc/v-deo.html
HI Felix, try it with a lot of accentuation, think "Mozart" more than Rachmaninov. And start slower than the full beat MM. That'll restore the original feeling very quick.
I beg to disagree. There comes a point when Horowitz's ripping through such a piece just shows off his prowess at the expense of artistic taste. That was what he constantly got criticized for.
The Beatles used to be considered too heavy. Look up the history of heavy metal. It just gets heavier, faster, and louder, and what used to be considered heavy is considered weak, almost like a tolerance to spicy food. It makes sense that the people hundreds of years ago would consider today's tempos to be ludicrous. Just think about your own grandparents in this generation and what they would consider to be heavy. I think metal music is very similar to classical piano and can be compared easily. If anything is "opposite" of classical, it is probably rap music, or pop music that just uses sound from computers. Metal takes real musical talent, but people not accustomed to listening to it would be easily put off or maybe even offended by it. The nature of music.
As well as the problem of 440 hz. on tuning instruments, this reserch about the real use of the metronome makes me suspect abou some intentioal mistake introduced by someone at some point of the history and maybe with some specifics goals. Our hearing habits certainly will react against this anathema which tryes to switch the pulse of our musical lives. But if there is some trut on this, probably it will follow the usual path of the trut vis a vis the traditional lies taken as an absolute trut: crucifiction! Let’ s inquire about other ways to do music, cause maybe some people as I do, always wilI prefer a slap from the real than a kiss from the false. Thx, Win!
If, at some point in the early 19th century, artists started playing at half the speed and compositions and whole recitals took twice as long do you not think people might have noticed! Your hypothesis strikes me as quite absurd.
But if one pulse was supposed to equal a full back and forth of the metronome/pendulum, why were metronomes designed to click (so you can hear a pulse) every half cycle? It makes no sense. Interesting channel here nonetheless.
Sure it does! it is to emphasize the 'parts of the intended time'. Next to the second use of the metronome, that of a time-keeper, for practicing reasons.
But the other huge problem, as another commenter below noted, is that for some of his works, such as Op. 10 no. 4, tempo indicated "presto" and feeling "con fuoco", there is absolutely no way that it feels presto or con fuoco when you slow down the given metronome speed by half. ON THE OTHER HAND, the given metronome speed also sounds insanely fast and unplayable for all but top virtuosos, at least on a modern piano. I think the explanation might lie in the fact that if one is just playing a piece mentally, one can "hear"the piece quickly, in large chunks (kind of like you can think ideas faster than you normally speak them), so this idealized mental feel is what a composer tells an editor for tempi. That at least makes sense for someone like Beethoven, who was almost entirely deaf when he gave his metronome markings. Murray Perahia has also commented that he thinks that most composers' metronome markings are too fast. In the end, one should play what conveys a compelling musical message, which is of course subjective, and there are a range of tempi for most pieces.
Listen to music less than 100 years ago. It was so much slower than today's music its ridiculous. Regardless of virtuosos and musical geniuses, the music has to sound good to the ear. If it doesn't you will have concert halls where virtually no one shows up to listen. It's relative. I would not be surprised if the music of Bach and all the masters over 200 years ago was slower. We live in a world now with jet airplanes and cars that routinely travel at 70 mph. In their day, the fastest travel was by horse or by boat. People used to take vacations that might last a whole summer. Who does that anymore? If you're rich maybe but not for most people. The pace of things is so quick now it's ridiculous if you were to contrast it. I'm the same way. I've watched thousands of movies in my life. Now that you can watch them and stream them, I often move forward in the movie. Often times they are too slow in parts. Just an example of time.
I wonder, is it practical to have a click in between beats in a triple meter like Opus 10, No 9. I don’t think so. No musician on earth, except you, well, and your cult members, thinks this makes any sense
This channel is simply AMAZING! I’ve been binge watching all the videos on your channel, I have a masters degree in performance and NEVER heard of this.
Great to welcome you here!
This tempo research could cause a revolution in classical interpretation.
just bringing back 19th century performance practices would cause a revolution in classical interpretation. We play too perfectly where are the ornaments and improvisations?
Great to read! I'm working on a 4 pages sheet to give the core facts on a row, so you can make the argument in case questions are asked. Let me know how all of this works out!
Its amazing how this huge mass of information about interpretation has been literally in front of our faces all this time.
Apparently Beethoven was a genius and could create the 5th symphony, however was too dumb to read the numbers correctly in a metronome!
Dr. Gregory Hamilton - lol ... hear, hear! :)
I've been saying the same thing for the past year. However, like the status quo of any orthodoxy, it's going to take a while before it's completely accepted. Little by little though, double beat theory is inevitably going to revolutionise the HIP community -- facts are facts! Tempo has always been a topic of fascination for me. I've always felt a number of things didn't quite make sense when it came to the current supposed historically informed tempos; but with no concrete evidence outside of commonsense, I just had to trust the academics because, "how could the vast amount of musicologists be wrong! right!?" -- that is until Wim came along with his brilliant videos and started putting all the puzzle pieces together.
I teach copyright law at a university and have read some books about the royal patronage in the musical art of the 18th century. The music of early modern masters like Mozart and Beethoven was created for royal audience who were the patrons for artistic activities before the era of copyright law. The sort of music that the noble classes liked was usually slower and more leisurely in tempo than the folk music one heard in the streets. I also read somewhere that Chopin was a staunch royalist and it's conceivable that the music he created to charm and to teach the nobility, who were his patrons and students, should be more leisurely in style than the fast-and-furious virtuosity showpieces we hear today.
HAHA! Awesome on you, Wim! I went back to my o-o-o-ld "Revolutionary" and Op. 10, No. 1, and I played it at Chopin's MM marking using the "Period" (T) for the note, not the Frequency (f), and my daughters when nuts at how beautiful Chopin's music had become!!! You have given this old concert pianist new life, and I will forever thank you for it!!! Godspeed, Wim! :D
It's all relative to our time. Jets and modern automobiles vs Horses. That change happened in about 100 years. The Masters lived hundereds of years ago in the horse age, not the age where we send people to outer space and send unmanned vehicles to Mars.
@@robertbrown7470 Are you saying that because we're "faster", we should update the ancient music?; or are you saying that this is what is happening, and that we should continue to honour the composer and their times by playing the pieces with "AuthenticSound"?
4:20 choice of tempo is one of the moist important decisions ❤😂
So, even when trying to follow "single beat", performers fall back to "double beat" territory, when they want the music to have any emotional expression other than "virtuosity"!
Amen!
Someone should definitely make a site with all these proofs. I believe that put together they will be of overwhelming persuasiveness
Hi Roman, that exactly is what we are gonna launch. I'll make a video on the project soon, in which I'll ask for some helping hands!
I listened to Pollini's version right after listening your's and what was striking was indeed the changing tempo throughout his rendition. It reminded me of your previous video where you talked about trills in Mozart's work, and how it gives a clue how fast you should play - even how fast you could play. In Pollini's version those trills among other elements revealed that you can't possibly play at that tempo constantly throughout the whole piece.
We have without a doubt better functioning instruments than 200 years ago. And we've had over 200 years to master techniques with piano. And piano is accessible for more people than ever before. From the millions of people who can play technically advanced piano, we're supposed to believe none can play as fast as masters of the past? Or maybe we've understood something wrong.
you formulate part of the essential question!
Brilliant commentary and scholarship. I've known this piece for over 40 years and I'm convinced that you are 100% correct. I could spend an hour explaining why but quite honestly I'd rather get onto another of your videos. This is fascinating stuff.
Still blowing my mind! Excellent content, really really inspiring! Cheers from Brasil!
Thanks!
Regarding ritenuto and ritardando in Chopin: C.wrote in a letter that actual it was necessary and/or difficult to rehearse with the orchestra and that he needed to tell them, show them, where he needed these ritenutos. I read the letters in the English paperpack edition, there are more letters, but in that book there are some very interesting letters around his concertos (which are works of a teen-ager, incredible!) There are many more hints regarding his performances in the books by JJ. Eigeldinger.
Thanks for this. Schlag - how right you are. Then the 1938 Eduard Jeu - so clear, how can one disagree. Good point about repeated notes. This is gripping stuff.
Excellent, your explanations remains us that we are not machines, and for contrari al the things that we make came from the heart. Like Chopin and other, they expressed them self with music. So, i can express my self with her music on may way or in my tempo.
Horowitz stated that "there is no ONE tempo." He once recounted something that Artur Rubinstein told him about Rubinstein's teacher, violinist Joachim. Joachim and Brahms were rehearsing for a couple of days for a joint performance they were to play together. On the first day of rehearsals, Joachim felt that Brahms was playing too slowly and wouldn't increase the speed of his performance. At the end of that rehearsal, Joachim said he went back to his hotel sad and disgusted. At the next day's rehearsal, Brahms played faster than the day before. When they finished rehearsing, Joachim said he was delighted and asked Brahms: "Yesterday you played slow, but today you played fast. Why?" Brahms replied: "Fell my pulse. Today it beats faster."
yes, of course, that's how musicians think in practical life, everyone does. It's always a frame you're working in, not a strictstrict tempoframe. However, this should - in case one wants to reflect on what the composer had in mind- not be a free pass to do whatever you want (with the claim of reflecting on the original composer's performance)
"We are all one the same side" - good that you remind us, Wim!
Thanks Wim, great content as always.
Do you have an understanding of why there is so much rubato and added ornamentation in some of Bach’s pieces? Especially his Violin Sonatas/ Partitas and Cello Suites? If this is something interests you too I would be curious to hear what you have to say on the matter.
Don’t get me wrong, I play the pieces as well, and I add my own flair to them, but I try to keep it balanced and not let the piece get away from me.
In many performances that I have listened to the musician may as well have thrown the indicated rhythms and sheet music out the window with how different their interpretation is.
It just seems weird to me that those pieces are consistently played out of time and it seems to be considered normal to do so.
It's an interesting topic, but not easy. In Renaissance music, there must have been a very rigid steady pulse, tempo, there even was only (about) one tempo, one Schlag, compare that to a Debussy piece. And then think about the evolution, that of course, did not start overnight. Bach sarabandes might be very revolutionary in this regard, earlier the Itialians of course, see also Mozart's Munchen sonatas, the middle parts, what a preview of actually romanticism, and before that, the sonatas by CPEBach, middle parts. Also accentuation by making notes longer, there is so much to be studied on this particular field.
AuthenticSound Awesome, well very interesting. It looks like I need to do some further research on the topic. Nice to know it’s tied to the evolution of the pieces.
Seems natural, though I sometimes fear we may lose the ear/knowledge to understand how they were played originally. But thankfully you’ve got a great channel that explores that type of musical analysis.
Music to my ears, these nerdy analyses ;) Very important.
The "it's a race" movement needs to take note here.
To criticize the performance of one of the greatest pianists of our time, I had no issue with his tempo, albeit to me it seemed bordering on too fast. When I perceive incidental false hits in the fastest bars, to me it means you played too fast. The biggest problem in my ears is when solo piano Chopin is played for a large hall (about 1,200 people) on a Steinway D with a beautiful sound, but every volume indication is played two notches louder and f becomes fff. Far away from a pianist wooing a group of young women and their chaperones in the intimacy of a Paris salon where delicacy and storytelling dominate instead of banging out fastidious "no wrong notes" perfection (and not succeeding at that incidentally).
Interesting stuff and, as always, beautifully played!
I find the topic of technical ability and tempo very interesting: for the same principle, also the "slow" version (speaking in general) poses numerous technical problems. Not maybe to a pianist, who does not have to breath or pull a bow to produce a sound, but definitely for singers, wind and string instruments.
I wonder how arias like "Ah! non credea mirarti" or "Casta diva", published in the same years as Chopin Etudes, would be at all possible if sung "slowly".
Tempo is a universal aspect in music and a universal approach towards all instruments (singing included) is mandatory.
I am looking forward to some future video on Arias or pieces for other instruments than piano.
In any case "Well done"!
Thank you so much Vito for sharing these interesting thoughts. Once the pianoforte is here, we definitely will at least try to involve other musicians/instruments. Comments and positive interest like yours keep us going!
This is a good question. There are many singers and wind instrument players who are injured due to our current performance practices. These people suffer from embouchure muscle problems due to the high speed and belting out whatever they can at extremely loud volumes.
With my lessons and own studies now, I've been taking this slower approach to my music not only in practice time, but also when I'm just enjoying the music. This is like a breath of fresh air and has allowed me to discover missing bits in the music that get glazed over as we pursue the mad dash to the end. The slower tempos also bring up the accuracy in my performance as well because it's less difficult when facing those big leaps and runs common in much of the mid 19th century music.
In the end it's like saying so this what have we've been missing all these years?
From a piano standpoint, it's interesting playing on and comparing an 1840s Pleyel to a contemporary Erard. I was able to do this at the Frederick Collection. The Pleyel has a gentler sound as well, which is much different than the robust, though still very sweet sounding, Erard from the same period.
Here's an interesting note that sums it up nicely: (Thanks to Pat Frederick at the Frederick Collection).
"Liszt's preference was for Erard's more dramatic range of tone colors, while Chopin played both makes, preferring the more intimate sound of the Pleyel except when he was feeling ill and wanted a piano that would produce more effects with less effort."
Keep on going!
Even though I have different ideas and tend to challenge you with sometimes provocative questions and comments, I will always support your work and your ideas!
Interesting point.
My main point is that both the fast and the slow versions pose technical problems to the interpreter and any Manichean approach is, to my view, faulty.
I have been rehearsing with my trio Schubert's D. 898 and the second movement cannot be taken too slow, unless the strings (mostly the cello) break the bowings. Same thing for singers, who often suffer because conductors or pianist accompany them just way too slowly.
Those are just a couple of the many technical problems that the "slow system" poses to the interpreters.
I can't understand why everyone plays allegro like vivace. My metronome speed for this piece is only 76, not that fast. Love your channel.
so how would you for example play the second movement of Chopin's first piano concerto op11, where the metronome mark is 80 per quarter note? Half the speed? Try it :). In my view, 80 is too fast and 40 would be too slow, so why not just stick to the "Larghetto" indication and translate this indication into our time to make it sound "larghetto" for our listeners, rather than follow a metronome mark which in itself doesn't really mean a lot.
there is absolutely nothing 'wrong' with playing Chopin as one feels it today, though one steps outside Chopin's world a bit.
Well, performing his music on our pianos in huge concert halls is already quite far away from Chopin's world, don't you think? Furthermore, who really knows what Chopin's world actually was and if we knew it, would it make sense to replicate it on and on forever? Music is basically a language and such, just like every other language subject to constant change.- I find your approach interesting and it is certainly worth listening. I would be keen to listen to a convincing recording of the afore mentioned movement at 40 per quarter note.
the interesting element in this -for me- is that reconstructing his music based on his tempo indications results in a 'new' Chopin
@@AuthenticSound agree totally. It is a fresh and interesting look at his music, but it doesn't necessarily mean it is the only what we might call "authentic" approach. Tempo is not really as pivotal as other metrics in music, such as character, phrasing and articulation. I think we can speak a bit faster or slower as long as we can convey a message and it's poetic content, all within reason of course.
I'm exuse me for my English. The pourchase of arguments must be onest with her context. Pianists like Pollini, Horowitz and other are respecting the metronome marks with exception of the "slow", expressive, études. The question is not what they can do but whath they decide to do. For example listen to Richters rendition of étude 10/12 in a movie on youtube. For sure Pollini can play at this fast but he like it not. On youtube you can listen Horowitz at said, in a Interwieuw, that the tempo was faster at the time of old Winer Piano. Modern piano and big concert rooms needs more clarity and more slow articulate technique. Yes, 16-18 notes at second for every talented musician is a normal thing. A trill is the double beat of 8 notes for second for each of 2 fingers. That means that 8 notes for a octave passage, like some things in Tchaikowsky concerto, is normal. Any Beethoven sonata in actual performances is according whit this reality today, is that too slow? to fast? I'm at thinking that faster tempi of Czerny are a joke to inspire respect for the best virtuoso of her School but in alignement to the exceptional talent of Beethoven herself. This is for me, actually, the question. With best regard.
How fast would you play the "Minute Waltz" (Op. 64 No. 1) ? :)
You’re taking the name literally. Chopin didn’t call it that. That name was given later by a publisher.
Bravissimo. I loved this essay. I kept on thinking that one of the reasons that Romantic era music in particular got to be accepted at such speeds, well we should start pointing fingers now. I start with Vladimir Horowitz, who had supernatural speed gifts and he used them to an obscene limit. When his colleagues called him out for why he was playing so fast, his response was to say, heh, isn't it amazing that I can actually pull it off? In other words, guys like Horowitz and I would have to add his idol, Rachmaninoff, they couldn't have cared less about what the composer put down for tempo markings. They wanted the crowd to leap to its feet and blast its gigantic roar. They wanted woman to pass out and legions of students to emulate their speed.
Glenn Gould's (almost?) one excursion into Chopin made everyone laugh because he took a ten ton steam roller and squashed all of the guts out of the Chopin nuance, sneering all the while. Ok, maybe his Chopin is a bad example of tempo destruction. Maybe his Mozart piano sonatas are even more outrageous. But! Was Gould trying to make a point, a point that maybe Wim is leading us into considering? Never mind Gould's insane half tempo interpretation of Brahms' piano concerto, which Bernstein had to distance himself from in the live performance. More fingers should be pointing at guys like Pollini and even more so to Canadian wunderkind, M.A. Hamelin, who approaches the speed of light when he plays; sometimes.
I told Wim that I had not known this Chopin Etude and I printed it off and have played through it a few times now. It is such a deliciously emotive piece and for us to listen to a Pollini version I think is doing the poetry of the piece a great injustice. Someone who was more closely in simpatico with Chopin was the very great Artur Rubinstein. His tempi while sometimes very fast, are not in the ridiculous stratosphere of Horowitz and thank goodness for that. I think that Wim's work here needs to be shared with current top level pedagogues, who can pay attention, informed attention, to his points about tempo.
But there are recordings by Gould where he plays sooo slow, even below double beat- a piece by Beethoven, but don't know which one- with an incredible tension. He followed his instinct and didn't care about any reaction, which is rare on that level
Gould was known for his erratic approach. With him you either accepted his interpretation for its artistic, aesthetic merits while at the same time ignoring what the composer wrote or indicated for tempo markings, OR you rejected Gould as an aberration. It is hard to love Gould when you put more attention, as Wim has been doing, on what the composer wrote or indicated. Gould, like Pollini, Horowitz or any other favourite, has his fans and to criticize his approach is often met with hostility. I mean, Andras Schiff, who knew Gould and greatly admires him correctly scolds Gould's fans for elevating Gould into a semi-music-deity. My feeling is that many of the great performers were not then nor are they now too interested in what the composer had in mind, given the time period in which they were composed, etc. Perhaps Wim is opening a new chapter in performance accuracy that will change the way mainstream performances are approached? Too early to tell.
Could pianos of two hundred years ago even stand up to a Horowitz or Gould?
@Wim: Do you mean this one by Gould ua-cam.com/video/qIv5jLjN0Qs/v-deo.html ?
Hi Graham. In my opinion, all artists have their gradations of greatness. The top artists have their misses but they are fewer and farther in between the total output. This is my view. I have heard exactly one piece, for example, by Beethoven, which for me is dreadful and a failure. It is an early piece and it is for piano duet. I heard it once and I couldn't believe how bad it was. Ok, so one piece. That's my opinion. I do not assume all tempos are genuine. For example, I differ with Czerny, with Wim and with my beloved Andras Schiff: I am not convinced that Beethoven really knew what the tempos sounded like when he passed into almost complete deafness. So, if someone presented him with a Peters Edition (?) of one of his pieces and it had a metronome marking, did he really appreciate the tempo like a person with hearing? On the other hand, using Beethoven as an example, Schiff maintains that Beethoven had exactly one piano piece that had tempo markings or metronome markings on it that HE approved of. Which means by default that all the other editions of his piano pieces were probably given metronome markings by Czerny and others who knew Beethoven. Are they correct? A lot of what Wim has been been getting us to see is that we all have preconceived notions of speed and they might be distortions from what the composer had in mind. When Gould came out with his first Goldberg it was not the first recording of the piece but it took the classical music world by storm, nonetheless. Part of that joyous accolade was for the Gouldian tempos which were very exciting. Was his the only correct version and what of his second recording and what of his live recordings of the Goldberg? they were all different. I am not elevating any composer or performer to a god-like level. However, the early 20'th century pianists, like Horowitz, formed an impression on the public and this public grew to accept and expect super fast speeds and heart stopping melodrama. Wim has been suggesting that maybe that tradition of tempos was not representative of the composers ideas.
My mind has been blown by your work Wim. Thank You. Truth be told, I'm scared to find what is going to happen to Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata.
Moonlight sonata will be ...powerfull... don't be affraid!
Looking forward for the Pathetique miself, all those moody chords :)
Some metrically arranged piano rolls are marked with the overall performance time of the pianist, I have one 'approved' by Granados - pity these weren't around when Chopin was alive.
A link and info would interests me! (wwinters(at)telenet.be)
This has been wonderful, I'd love to do work on the Liszt Transcendental Etudes using historical evidence! Modern performances can sound very fast.
Yes that's correct, and in fact Liszt's students and even those pupils of Mikuli have been known to play very fast, but that might not be enough evidence to prove that Liszt, or Chopin, or any other composer from that time played their works at the time they composed them. For instance, it is possible that Liszt by the end of his teaching career was happy with his pupils playing faster than he himself did 40 years previously.
I think Wim's aim here (if I may make an assumption) is to clarify what the composer's idea was at the time of a work's inception regardless of whether the composer changed their minds later in life.
I'm not ignoring anything, I'm merely discussing points. Of course Liszt's pupils recordings are important. There's also the point that when Lamond played Feux Follets in the presence of Liszt, it wasn't recorded, and when he did record it in the 1920s, it was 40 years after Liszt's death AND he may well have put his own stamp on it. There's nothing wrong with that of course - in fact it would be wrong for him to play as a carbon copy of his teacher - but we've still no idea if that's how Liszt might have envisaged the work in either the 1850s or the 1880s.
I'm not actually saying that I think music should be played a certain way, I just think it's interesting to research, discuss, and hear different ideas and fresh performances.
Interesting thoughts! My point overall is that the MM are your time-machine... ! We'll have a segment on the Hammerklavier and Liszt soon. In double beat however, this becomes by far no sight-reading piece!
Everything too slow!
🤣 🤣 🤣
96 quarter note is 192 eighth right? Just not sure because of the weird time signature. But I just tried that on my metronome, and I don't see how the sixteenth notes are too fast. I'll try on my parents' really old piano from around 1900 to see if it has any trouble tomorrow.
it's 288 for the eight note (dotted 4th) if taken literally. That means you'll have to play about 5 8th notes per second, about 10 16th per second. it also means you'll have less than 0.1 seconds per repeated note on that place. So that...might be a miscalculation of your part! But it is often so and no blame to you, that people at first say: that can't be true, trying things out, but not really, hasty often. sitting down some days with open mind will change your view on this. Let me know how it works!
Oh, I didn't see it was a dotted quarter note. Just tried it on an electric. It was difficult to get it to register each note and difficult just to play, but it still seems within possibility. Whether it makes sense as a tempo, I can't say.
take some time for this, since it is way beyond possible, just try to imagine playing 12 repeated notes in one second. We can't even think them
What was that text 4:09? I'm curious...
It's Czerny opus 500 + Hummel pianoforte school
Thanks!
If only they could have said "just hit the eighth note subdivision button on your metronome" ;p
That in fact is written often (but I didn't see it either): the Germans say Tact + Tacttheilen. Note value in the MM = Tact = Schlag = up+down, the number is the speed of the Tact Theilen. Once you know this, you'll start seeing it everywhere
Where does the +/-30% -principle comes from? I'm aware that Widor did update tempo indications that way for the last edition of his organ symphonies, but how to get 30 percent decrease for fast movements from two-part tactus beats me!
The point is that for faster pieces that have metronome markings from this era, modern performances are often not at the single-beat reading nor the double beat, but somewhere in between. If you say a tempo is halfway between there, you subtract a third of the tempo (multiply by 2/3) to get the double-beat reading or add a third of the tempo (multiply by 4/3) to get the single-beat reading. 30% is an approximation to 1/3.
As Alexander points out, it is just a rough estimation, just to show people that also in 'single beat', we should consider a major correction to (on average) 30,....% increase of tempo. The story that 'double beat' will half ALL tempi simply is not true. Sometimes the differences will not be that big, sometimes bigger, but that's the same at the other side of the spectrum, only thing is that that correction in single beat is not possible any more, tempi are already now maxed in many cases
Thanks to both of you for the replies! To get your point without misunderstandings, it'd be great if you could give us an examplary interpretation of nos. 1, 4, or 8 from op. 10. Paderewski gives us same tempo to all three etudes, quarter note=176 (or half note=88), which is insanely fast. Should this tempo be halved, decreased by 30%, or is there another historical evidence based way to deal with it I'm not aware of?
Those m.m:s are actually from the first edition, so it might be safe to assume they had Chopin's blessing. Manuscripts are not found in web, but in Paderewski's edition - which I own - in the first pages there are photocopies of the beginnings of nos. 3 and 9. Strange thing is, that no. 3 has indication "Vivace ma non troppo" (in published editions "Lento ma non troppo) but no m.m.. That may indicate many things, but as I have encountered in several occasions, Vivace doesn't always indicate tempo per say like we often assume, but a character.
In manuscript Etude no. 9 has m.m. of 92, same as in the first edition and your video's reference.
Wim is not arguing for tempo reduction on a piece-by-piece basis. He's saying that we should follow the indicated metronome markings from that time exactly as printed, only he adds the hypothesis that we use the metronome differently from back then. The argument is that the metronomes back in the early 19th century were accurate, and so the metronome markings from the musicians of that time should be taken at face value, not discarded because their metronomes were broken or they were all collectively insane. Wim argues that metronomes were used to indicate beats with two ticks of the metronome rather than one tick as today, which is why he puts out videos of pieces at "half" the indicated tempo. According this hypothesis, sometime in the nineteenth century, the single-beat metronome usage (one tick=one beat) became dominant, so applying our current usage back to the old metronome markings, we end up playing pieces twice as fast as intended by the composers (or whoever gave the markings). Either way, whether the correct reading of those MM markings is "single-beat" or "double-beat," you should respect the indicated metronome markings if you care at all about following the composers intentions.
The comment about +/-30% adjustments to tempo was strictly about recordings, not printed metronome markings. Musicians today in many (most?) cases will ignore the metronome markings entirely and play pieces that have metronome markings from composers (or their contemporaries) in a tempo less than the printed metronome marks interpreted according to our modern metronome usage (single-beat), often significantly less. This is sometimes due to the fact that playing in tempo (single beat) sounds uncomfortably fast, or in other cases because playing in tempo is virtually impossible technically (Wim's favorite example is Czerny's op. 299, "School of Velocity"). Wim argues that a double-beat reading of the metronome markings solves both issues, by rendering technically impossible passages playable, and frantic tempos comfortable.
Paderewski was a modern pianist, who lived into WWII, so you would assume all his markings are single-beat. I found a recording of him playing the Revolutionary etude. I don't know the metronome marking for it, but I doubt it is anywhere near a double-beat reading of whatever that is.
ua-cam.com/video/UNlBp9TM2Pc/v-deo.html
Great essay. I have been having trouble interpreting Chopin's Revolutionary Etude at "half speed".. Any thoughts on how this piece fits in?
HI Felix, try it with a lot of accentuation, think "Mozart" more than Rachmaninov. And start slower than the full beat MM. That'll restore the original feeling very quick.
That's Nonsens !!!! Go practice and reach the quarter = 160, than you have the only right character!!
I beg to disagree. There comes a point when Horowitz's ripping through such a piece just shows off his prowess at the expense of artistic taste. That was what he constantly got criticized for.
Zou je niet beter aan je engelse uitspraak werken: de engelse "th" (equivalent aan de spaanse "z"). Er is een groot verschil tussen tree en three!
The Beatles used to be considered too heavy. Look up the history of heavy metal. It just gets heavier, faster, and louder, and what used to be considered heavy is considered weak, almost like a tolerance to spicy food. It makes sense that the people hundreds of years ago would consider today's tempos to be ludicrous. Just think about your own grandparents in this generation and what they would consider to be heavy. I think metal music is very similar to classical piano and can be compared easily. If anything is "opposite" of classical, it is probably rap music, or pop music that just uses sound from computers. Metal takes real musical talent, but people not accustomed to listening to it would be easily put off or maybe even offended by it. The nature of music.
As well as the problem of 440 hz. on tuning instruments, this reserch about the real use of the metronome makes me suspect abou some intentioal mistake introduced by someone at some point of the history and maybe with some specifics goals. Our hearing habits certainly will react against this anathema which tryes to switch the pulse of our musical lives. But if there is some trut on this, probably it will follow the usual path of the trut vis a vis the traditional lies taken as an absolute trut: crucifiction! Let’ s inquire about other ways to do music, cause maybe some people as I do, always wilI prefer a slap from the real than a kiss from the false. Thx, Win!
If, at some point in the early 19th century, artists started playing at half the speed and compositions and whole recitals took twice as long do you not think people might have noticed! Your hypothesis strikes me as quite absurd.
there was a gradual increase in speed that today shows a fairly large gap. Keep in mind we do not play in half beat today
@@AuthenticSound Well make your mind up - are you saying performers used to play twice as fast or not?
But if one pulse was supposed to equal a full back and forth of the metronome/pendulum, why were metronomes designed to click (so you can hear a pulse) every half cycle? It makes no sense. Interesting channel here nonetheless.
Sure it does! it is to emphasize the 'parts of the intended time'. Next to the second use of the metronome, that of a time-keeper, for practicing reasons.
But the other huge problem, as another commenter below noted, is that for some of his works, such as Op. 10 no. 4, tempo indicated "presto" and feeling "con fuoco", there is absolutely no way that it feels presto or con fuoco when you slow down the given metronome speed by half. ON THE OTHER HAND, the given metronome speed also sounds insanely fast and unplayable for all but top virtuosos, at least on a modern piano. I think the explanation might lie in the fact that if one is just playing a piece mentally, one can "hear"the piece quickly, in large chunks (kind of like you can think ideas faster than you normally speak them), so this idealized mental feel is what a composer tells an editor for tempi. That at least makes sense for someone like Beethoven, who was almost entirely deaf when he gave his metronome markings. Murray Perahia has also commented that he thinks that most composers' metronome markings are too fast. In the end, one should play what conveys a compelling musical message, which is of course subjective, and there are a range of tempi for most pieces.
🤍🖤🤍🖤🤍🖤🤍
Listen to music less than 100 years ago. It was so much slower than today's music its ridiculous. Regardless of virtuosos and musical geniuses, the music has to sound good to the ear. If it doesn't you will have concert halls where virtually no one shows up to listen. It's relative. I would not be surprised if the music of Bach and all the masters over 200 years ago was slower.
We live in a world now with jet airplanes and cars that routinely travel at 70 mph. In their day, the fastest travel was by horse or by boat. People used to take vacations that might last a whole summer. Who does that anymore? If you're rich maybe but not for most people. The pace of things is so quick now it's ridiculous if you were to contrast it. I'm the same way. I've watched thousands of movies in my life. Now that you can watch them and stream them, I often move forward in the movie. Often times they are too slow in parts. Just an example of time.
More matter with less art.
I wonder, is it practical to have a click in between beats in a triple meter like Opus 10, No 9. I don’t think so. No musician on earth, except you, well, and your cult members, thinks this makes any sense