Playing with a period piano

No, the mute is another thing... and I wasn't talking about the felt of the mute... But about a pedal that fell into disuse in the mid-1800s called 'sordino', since there was also the double sordino.

Someone also calls it the moderator pedal if I'm not mistaken, still the same one.

But did the score say 'sordino' or 'sordini'? The doubt arises in me...

Anyway, even on Beethoven's period instruments, playing the entire first movement of Op. 27 with the pedal depressed is unthinkable... Okay, the sound might decay sooner, but not that much!!! If you mix harmonies, it certainly can be heard.

maybe today it could be done with a... half pedal

anyway, it would result in a piece of a totally different conception (which personally I don't know if I prefer)

antares86 wrote:

The curious thing is that if the string pedal is mainly used to decrease the sound volume (even if improperly), apart from the Turkish music which consists of a series of Turkish cymbals and drums, all the other pedals including the lute pedal if desired (unlike the mute, it places a layer of parchment) are all effects and were not used to reduce/increase the volume, something that would actually be feasible both with mutes and with the lute; I imagine Beethoven prescribed not using the mute because at the time it was quite fashionable, as were the Turkish music elements.

is there no recording where you can hear a period piano playing with Turkish music? Last time I was looking for something but couldn't find any, I am curious

Mmmh personally I have never heard any turcherie, I believe I have a CD somewhere where the bassoon pedal can be heard.

«An unrecognized problem concerning the pedal in Beethoven's music is not how to use it, but where to avoid using it. It must certainly be true, as Czerny maintained, that when playing, Beethoven used the pedal much more than he indicated in his scores, but this does not mean he used it as much as Chopin or Schumann, or as much as today's pianists. (…).

(…) for Beethoven as for Haydn, the pedal was still a special effect useful primarily to produce contrast. Perhaps the only exception in his entire oeuvre is the first movement of the “Moonlight” Sonata, a unique essay in sonic colorism: here Beethoven wanted the entire piece with the pedal, i.e., performed delicately in pianissimo without ever changing the pedal, thus without ever lowering the dampers on the strings. Even on his piano, this produced a tenuously indistinct sonority and a magical sound atmosphere that can actually be reproduced on a modern piano provided that the pedal is changed with extreme subtlety halfway through in a delayed manner.(…)

(…) Beethoven writes in Italian at the top of the score “Si deve suonare tutto questo pezzo delicatissimamente e senza sordino”. (…)

It is one of the first works that takes into account the fact that the sympathetic vibration of the piano strings, when the resonance pedal is depressed and the dampers are raised, is not instantaneous but increases gradually and requires several fractions of a second to become clearly audible and produce its full effect. The extraordinary atmosphere of this movement is based on this subtle but traversable delay of the free string vibrations. By keeping the resonance pedal of a piano from Beethoven's era depressed, the attack of each new harmony does not take over immediately, but with a minimal hesitation as the free strings react to the new bass.

On today's instruments we cannot hold the pedal incessantly, as required by the composer; however, if the performance is sufficiently delicate, it is possible to reproduce the vaguely blurred sonority of old instruments by changing the pedal slightly late or using half-pedaling. Since every piano has different characteristics, the pedaling should be adapted to the various instruments being played. With a bit of sensitivity, the matter is less complicated than one might think. If in measures 32-37 one manages to maintain the pianissimo, resisting the temptation to grow as the harmonies follow one another, I have discovered that there is no need to change the pedal. Playing the accompaniment with the delicacy required by Beethoven, it is not necessary to change the pedal, for example, even in measures 53 and 54 between C#+ and F#- , although some adjustment should be made at measure 55. The crescendo at measure 47, though beginning in pianissimo, should be intense enough to allow the piano of measure 48 to be a subito piano.

The problem of the dotted rhythm of the soprano melody against the alto triplets, obviously, should not be resolved by making the soprano coincide with the triplets: the problem consists precisely in differentiating the sixteenth note from the triplet eighths without playing it so tightly as to make it banal. The real difficulty is maintaining the constant rhythm of the alto unchanged, without the slightest hesitation (one can accelerate or decelerate for expressive purposes), but the motion of the triplets must never be interrupted, even for a moment, to give space to sentimental nuances in the melodic line. The triplet must be, as Berlioz said, obstinée, unstoppable. Its inflexible winding should produce a hypnotic effect; the difficulty lies in making them unalterable yet at the same time discrete.(…)»

Excerpt from “Beethoven's Piano Sonatas” by Charles Rosen. Casa Editrice Astrolabio)

I hope I have written something pleasing. "

Here is the only Rosen book that I am missing

antares86 wrote:

Here is the only Rosen book that I am missing

Maybe... precisely because it is about Beethoven and his sonatas. Or not?

Ahahahah no actually because when I got the others that one was being reprinted.. I even have the one on the Romantic era! Which I think you can imagine interests me less than all the others combined, especially regarding sonata forms and the Classical style, but also on Beethoven's.

danielescarpetti wrote:

the movement of the triplets must never be interrupted, even for a very short time, to make room for sentimental nuances in the melodic line. The triplet must be, as Berlioz used to say, obstinée, unstoppable. Its inflexible winding should produce a hypnotic effect; the difficulty lies in making them unalterable but at the same time discrete.(…)»

very interesting.

Played in this manner, I have only heard it from András Schiff live.

A hypnotic effect, as if from sidereal distances.

Schiff, in his book on Beethoven's sonatas, to keep oneself away from romantic flights of fancy, suggests thinking more of a prelude in the style of Bach.

antares86 wrote:

Ahahahah no actually because when I got the others that one was being reprinted.. I even have the one on the Romantic generation! Which I think you can imagine interests me less than all the others combined, especially regarding sonata forms and the classical style, but also regarding Beethoven's.

... and to think that until recently you wanted to become a true Lisztian!

How people change....

Always in motion the future is! (cit.)

danielescarpetti wrote:

How do you change....

how do you change . . . .

Open content (youtube)