wouldn't wish to change a note

Here is a trio of classical music performances that really capture the different moods of relationships just right. As Moriz Rosenthal said, "it's not servants of art we need, it's masters!" and these are all masterful interpreters.

For Russian singing these days you can't beat Anna Netrebko, in Rachmaninoff she is superb, also in Rimsky Korsakov; if this doesn't remind of your passsionate first love... as Anna de Noailles wrote, music promises more than love...

As for Rachmaninoff's friend Chaliapin, you can't beat this performance of Glinka for conveying the paranoid mood of the song to perfection, this really makes the hairs stand up on the back of your neck.

But if it's vocal style of piano playing you are looking for, Shura Cherkassky is your man, as in this setting of a Tchaikovsky Lullaby, transcribed by Pabst. When Cherkassky was asked what he had learnt from his legendary teacher Hofmann, he replied: "Pedalling, dynamics, general vibration". Well, his general vibration is sounding pretty darned good!

PIano technique

There is a technique which liberates and a technique which represses the artistic self. All technique ought to be a means of expression.

I’m currently compiling a book of favourite quotations by the great pianists of the past. This quote by Hofmann is one of my favourites! People get a bit hung up about technique, but really it is not the main thing to focus on; after all, if you are going out on a friday evening to meet a friend, you are probably not focussing on how the wheels of the bus go round and round…

Best YouTube piano videos clips part 1

Listening homework for my advanced piano pupils, Abhinav, Mike, Emmy, Maya

 Please set aside minimum 10-15 minutes per week to listen to great pianists.

Gradually you will get to know your favourite composers and performers, and so then you can explore them more. 
Please notice
+ horizontal forearm and flattish fingertips.
+ freedom of upper arm and forearm, while fingers stay close to keys.
+ upper arm and back muscles used when playing loudly (sitting not crouched over, not hunched)
+ Very intense concentration
+ very intense emotional expression

The Greatest Piano video of all time
Josef Hofmann plays Rachmaninov
Rounded movements. Beautiful hands. Inside the music.

Daniil Trifonov chopin scherzo 4
(slightly distracting facial expressions?!) Try and get tickets to see him sometime
in London in 2013. Possibly best young pianist alive (apart from my pupils!)

Ivo Pogorelich Chopin sonata 2 movt 1
If only I could copy his hairstyle! One of the most original pianists alive.

Gilels plays Rachmaninoff
Long pedals. Jumps around very fast and accurately!

Horowitz chopin ballade 1
Perhaps the greatest pianist of 20th century.
He makes you listen very carefully. Great concentration.
Unusually flat hands, much less curvy then almost everyone else! Expressive fingertips.

Mike and Abhinav

Zimerman Pathetique sonata Beethoven

Wonderful Brazilian Pianist

Guiomar Novaes (1895 - 1979) was considered the finest lady pianist of her day, and every bit the equal of Hofmann and Rachmaninoff. She was "A musician by the grace of God" according to the New York Times.

Just listen to a minute or two and you will become converted to the warm charms of this veritable Queen of piano playing, who sprinkles gold dust with every note.

Enjoy!

(for more information about this remarkable pianist click here)



Standchen, song by Strauss, transcribed for piano by Godowsky
(another version exists transcribed by Walter Gieseking)
"Sit down! The darkness is mysterious here / Under the lime trees"

Albeniz Tango, transcirbed by Godowsky

PIano Playing Awards 2009

Piano music is " An international language that every nation knows and feels. Schumann calls it the language of soul to soul"
(Simon Barere, radio interview, New Zealand, 1947).
Here are a few highlights for you to enjoy. In the next couple of months I will turn this into a competition for you to vote on your favourite item in different categories.

Best Composer's Piano Playing

First Prize: The Master of Twentieth Century Piano Playing
Rachmaninoff performs his own Elegie Op3:3. Genius Comes Into Your Living Room

Grieg plays his own PIano Sonata. Such naturalness of heartfelt expression, such alive phrasing.

Best Live Performance
Josef Hofmann, Chopin G Minor Ballade, Carnegie Hall 50th Birthday recital.
"There is a technique which liberates and a technique which represses the artistic self. All technique should be a means of expression". (Hofmann, "Piano Playing' 1909, publ. Doubleday).

Best piano playing
Vladimir Sofronitzky plays Scriabin. Married to the daughter of Scriabin after the composer's death. It sounds as if the music is being revealed for the first time, spun out by some mysterious alchemy.

Best transcription performance, three entries:
Josef Lhevinne plays Schulz-Evler's transciption of Strauss's Blue Danube Waltz. Such flawless and musical virtuosity. Those who claim the modern pianist is superior technically to the golden age pianists should study Josef Lhevinne.

Myra Hess plays Bach
A world war 2 legend: while england was at war, London's cultural activity immediately ceased; but pianist Myra Hess persuaded the National Gallery to open its doors to allow weekly lunchtime recitals of music.

Percy Grainger plays Tchaikovksy "Sugar plum fairy". Wonderful playing from the pianist beloved by Grieg.
When on tour, he used to jog from one american city to the next. Didn't he even care about air miles?

How to Play the Piano
Such freedom of the upper arm! Such naturalness! Such breath! Such lovely printed fabric! We bow.
Magda Tagliaferro Saint Saens Concerto 5

Most disturbing recorded fragment
Bela Bartok playing Chopin Nocturne in C sharp minor
Did a minor key ever sound this spooky? Did the bogeyman abduct the musician?

Loveliest tone award: after 0.50.
Alexander Siloti's was a favourite pupil of Liszt. Some said he was more than equal to the great Rachmaninoff, and this playing has such a warm, living tone, like the golden voice of a tenor, characteristic of the finest Russian-school pianism.

Erwin Nyiereghazy (at 6.53) Liszt Legend 2. I believe this is how Liszt himself performed - free, full of imagination, wild, strong, passionate, individual, spiritual, heartfelt, with never a care for the judgemental bourgeoisie.

Best virtuoso playing: (three contestants)
Alfred Cortot playing Saint-Saens Etude en forme de Valse
Horowitz went to him for a lesson but Cortot would not reveal the secrets of his lightness within power!

Ignaz Friedman playing Chopin Etude in C at 3.05

Dinu Lipatti making light work of Liszt

Best Chopin Nocturne
Moriz Rosenthal Chopin D flat major. Rosenthal studied with Liszt AND with a favourite pupil of Chopin's; so his style deserves to be treated with the greatest respect, even though it may appear too personal for the modern ear.
Ideal for the moonlit reverie with your beloved (and/or hot water bottle).

Best Folk-Style Playing
Ignaz Friedman Chopin Mazurka
Such rhythm and mood! Spot on! 100%. Now if this spirit and lifetime's learning could be sold in a bottle...

Bela Bartok plays his own Rumanian Folk Dances
How wonderful! How humble! How truly civilised! Such musical phrasing! Bravo Hungary! (And Rumania).

Best 2-piano Playing: Arensky, Waltz from Suite, played by Harold Bauer and Ossip Gabrilowitsch. Wow! Did you know that Ravel dedicated Ondine from Gaspard de la Nuit to Harold Bauer?

Best Left Hand
Simon Barere plays Blumenfeld's Etude for the Left Hand in A flat major opus 36 at 2.45