Wow. Just wow.
This is *not* about playing the piano. But it is about creating music, and artistic dedication to a beautiful idea. The Wintergatan Marble Machine.
Composers
Consider helping a new composer
I received a request from Jeffrey Leiser to mention his Kickstarter campaign to fund a full orchestra recording of his new symphony, “The Summit”. I’m happy to pass along the request, with no particular endorsement. I don’t know Leiser, or other music by him. But he’s a talented fellow, having scored and sound edited many […]
Bach’s Crab Canon on a Mobius Strip
The first canon from Bach’s Musical Offering, BWV 1079, illustrated cleverly as a Mobius strip (wait for it to come about 2/3 of the way through the video). A crab canon is a form in which the notes are first played forwards, then in reverse order, then forwards and reversed against each other. Cool!
Denk on Ives by Denk
Jeremy Denk is a terrific writer, the best I’ve read among contemporary serious pianists. His blog, Think Denk, is erudite and funny, passionate and inspired. He recently published an article in The New Yorker. In it he recounts his experience making a professional recording of Charles Ives’s Concord sonata, with reflections on the frustrations, opportunities […]
Tagged blogs, performance, performers, writingOtomata: cellular automata music generator
Batuhan Bozkurt has created a simple cellular automata music generator that runs in Flash in a browser window: Otomata. You don’t need to understand cellular automata to play with it, and it generates fascinating, lovely music (he chose an interesting scale, and shapes the tones very nicely). Bozkurt has a lot of other interesting computer […]
Schiff on Beethoven
Over the past two years, Andras Schiff played the entire Beethoven sonata cycle in a series of concerts. As I recall, he played them only in Chicago, Ann Arbor, and New York (Carnegie Hall, natch). I attended all of the Ann Arbor performances. They were delightful: Schiff brought a different, very thoughtful and warm sensibility […]
Schroeder knew what he was talking about
Here’s a charming piece in the New York Times about the authenticity of the snips of Beethoven scores that Charles Schultz drew to illustrate Schroeder scenes in “Peanuts”. There were a “soundtrack” to the strip. Fun example: a strip showing Schroeder doing strength and stamina training before going to practice…the Hammerklavier.
Tagged books, fun, inspiration, writingHarriette Brower, Piano Mastery
Harriette Brower’s 1915 book, Piano Mastery, is online in a public domain Project Gutenberg edition. She recounts interviews she did with about 20 master pianists and teachers (e.g., Busoni, Paderewski, Goodson), includes essays on interpretation by William Mason and William Sherwood, and offers her own essay on technique (from hand position through practicing, memorizing, tone […]
Tagged books, online, teachingChopin resource center
InfoChopin, The International Chopin Resource Center, is filled with historical information, events, organizations, publications, etc.