How Frédéric Chopin Played J.S.Bach 

Great to read, thank you so much!

That is great to read Patrick, and nice to know you! Don't hesitate to share elements of your findings on the channel or, through mail

Thank you so much, great to read and welcome here!

I agree! Please know your information AND your playing ability is VERY much appreciated, sir!

So great to read, Christopher, and welcome here, looking forward to reading you in the future!

Thank you for watching!

That's what energizes me, great to read, Matthew.

Thanks Scott, great to have you here on the channel!

Hi Ray, I can help you with that, you might want to see this video then: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fAx1Rkn6HUE.html (and more is coming on the subject). Best wishes, Wim

Thank you for saving me time searching for the music, Ray. Huge disappointment. Music is about sound not talk.

You do hear a few samples of the speaker's music, to be fair. I think what is more valuable about this video is how the speaker is presenting a perspective on Chopin that would sincerely require hours of research. He is serving as a musical historian, helping others to reproduce as closely as possible Chopin's music in the way it was originally performed (we must remember that no recordings exist of Chopin playing his music from that time. In fact, we scarcely have photographs of Chopin). P.S. not to be hurtful or anything, though you can always click a new 'tab in your browser and listen to virtually any Chopin opus, simultaneously.

Unfortunately I only read your comment after listening to 5 minutes of blabber. Thanks anyway. Someone should really tell this Authenticsound guy to stop blathering.

He's giving an intelligent lecture about history. Go back to your Classical Music for Relaxation playlists if you don't like it.

Thanks!

Great to read Robert!

Great to have you here, thanks for watching!

Thanks for the compliments Alexander, it is a privilege to be able to share this with you

Great to read!

:-) Must shoot a remake of this video with some sound examples

Thanks for watching, Piotr!

Thanks for listening!

Great to read!

Thanks!

Allow me to reply with some videos: on the 3:2 thing, there is this video: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-d4Ke5nvftZg.html (in that playlist right before there is another one on that topic), and on Czerny Bach: yes, you need to read them metrical, the 4/4 is one thing, the notation is the second layer of importance, with harmonic structure that goes over the 'common' use of 4/4, here is a vid on that that I need to redo soon : ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fAx1Rkn6HUE.html&list=PLackZ_5a6IWVP1Nb_Zxr-RfFHX62Nz9iQ&index=7

Thank you for sharing your thoughts! As pointed out several times, and in today's video I'll do it again, the tradition was not kept by copying the style of the teachers, but building upon it, following the stream of the 'improvements'. That generation of around 1900 destroyed (in our eyes) historical buildings by 'improving' their style while at the same time being proud of keeping the tradition alive; They had something else in mind than we do. They even demolished Bach house in Leipzig, so be careful to assume these traditional lines that in fact never existed (and still do not exist: Jos van Immerseel does not play like Flor Peeters...)

Thank you for your response! I think the main question here is not the "style" but how to read the score. Which is more about information, and has less to do with the taste, and can be more preserved. Even this C sharp major Prelude you show in this video is played in the "today's widespred" tempo around qu=55 or so (or at least as now I am hearing it inside) and there is the Czerny tempo indication, almost about two times faster. But on the other side, Czerny says that he follows the tempi of Beethoven, and people hearing Beethoven playing all say that he played everything much faster than his contemporaries. For me, qu=46 would not be the "wah, this IS fast" tempo for this prelude, and qu=92 would really be. So may be Czerny's 92 is a real 92 here. (And there may be examples where the tempi has to be slowed down, because of the things you are saying in many videos, but I do not think this was absolutely general...) Anyways, I really like your research around the tempi and all your historical work (which I followed since this spring), so you can account me to your "fan club". :)

Thank you so much for watching, Ryan!

i will, over the coming months! Certainly when the pianoforte is here : ru-vid.com/group/PLackZ_5a6IWVmL5HeEuF-LemxgtOC3RLH

By definition that would be impossible...:). i have made several videos on tempo, with digital examples as well, here's one you'll find interesting I guess: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fAx1Rkn6HUE.html

Yes, I was saying it in jest, of course and I have already seen the video you suggested, as well as the one where you discuss Anton Schindler.

O wow... would love to read more on your family relation ship. Von Bülow is such intriguing person to me (also in the research on tempo)!

Thanks for sharing, didn't know that!

Thank you so much for the nice words, they are so encouraging to read!

Thanks for watching, Tom!

Thanks Matt!

Hi David, yes that's true, with Moscheles! Changing perspective only a bit is opening such wonderful new insights. Fascinating!

I have never thought on that... it's a completely different world though. Perhaps i'll try some

Hi Paul, it's called Tempus Inaequalis, i demonstrate this from time to time, but here is a video with Lorenz on the topic: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-d4Ke5nvftZg.html&index=9&list=PLackZ_5a6IWU1zXuo_Qx-YrCCtaJcBiPO

authenticsound.org

Can imagine, of course I made over a 150 music recordings, but here it would be a welcome addition. End of May, the fortepiano will be here, and that will allow me to expand

Thanks Adrian, today I'll have Chopin on my clavichord (...), but that's not really an experiment with Bach. I have a video though where you'll find some aspects and make a new one next Wednesday. here's the 'old' one: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-fAx1Rkn6HUE.html

Interesting. I haven't seen those elements of change though myself, but that's not saying they weren't there. Certainly the way Bach played the fugues will forever by a mystery. Mozart however once wrote similar performance guidances for fugues to his sister, so that brings us already deeper in the 18th c. We keep diving :)

I have missed Mozart's letter to his sister, thank you for that gem of information.

In an April 10, 1782 letter to his father, Leopold, Mozart wrote, “I go to the house of Baron Van Suiten [Swieten, Emmanuel Bach's Patron] every Sunday at 10 o’clock and nothing is played there but Händel and Bach. I am making a collection of Bach’s fugues, those of Sebastian as well as Emanuel and Friedman [Mozart knew of the Bach family well enough to know the middle names that family and friends referred to the respective family members].-Also of Händel’s, and I don’t have those. I expect that you know that the ‘English Bach’ is dead? What a loss to the musical world!” Here is the letter from Mozart to his beloved sister for the benefit of your viewers: ''April 20, 1782: I composed the fugue first and wrote it down while I was thinking out the prelude. (my comment Prelude, some times called Fantasie, and Fugue in C Major, K 394). I only hope that you will be able to read it, for it is written so very small; and I hope further that you will like it. Another time I shall send you something better for the clavier. My dear Constanze is really the cause of this fugue’s coming into the world. Baron van Swieten, to whom I go every Sunday, gave me all the works of Händel and Sebastian Bach to take home with me (after I had played them to him). When Constanze heard the fugues, she absolutely fell in love with them. Now she will listen to nothing but fugues, and particularly (in this kind of composition) the works of Händel and Bach. Well, as she has often heard me play fugues out of my head, she asked me if I had ever written any down, and when I said I had not, she scolded me roundly for not recording some of my compositions in this most artistically beautiful of all musical forms and never ceased to entreat me until I wrote down a fugue for her. So this is its origin. I have purposely written above it, Andante Maestoso, as it must not be played too fast. For if a fugue is not played slowly, the ear cannot clearly distinguish the theme when it comes in, and consequently, the effect is entirely missed. When I get the time and opportunity, I will make another five and deliver them to Baron van Suiten; because I have to say, he really owns, while admittedly very small in quantity, but in regard to quality, a very great treasure of good music. And therefore, I ask you to promise me not to take back your promise, and let no man see them. Learn them by heart and play them. A fugue is not so easy to play after only hearing it. - If father has not yet had the works of Eberlin (Johann Ernst Eberlin, possibly the 9 Toccatas with Fugues for organ, imslp.org/wiki/9_Toccatas_and_Fugues_(Eberlin%2C_Johann_Ernst)) copied, then I would be very pleased- - I have gotten hold of them and - because I could no longer remember that, with a closer look, they are far too trivial, and truthfully, do not deserve a place beside Händel and Bach..." E Power Biggs included a piece by J E Eberlin in his A treasury of shorter organ classics collection, which I once possessed but gave away as a gift. E Power Biggs was a major force in the 1940's-1950's in the HIP movement (although not called such) and was involved in playing historical or historical based instruments. When Biggs was growing up, the frequently held opinion was the Organ works of J S Bach finally found the perfect instrument as played on the Organs of Aristide Cavaillé-Coll, the Symphonic Organs built in the 19th century. which an analogy to the J S Bach keyboard works only sound at their best on the Piano, a oft repeated opinion which has become an entrenched tradition. From wikipedia, (for what it's worth) Johann Ernst Eberlin (27 March 1702 - 19 June 1762) was a German composer and organist whose works bridge the baroque and classical eras. He was a prolific composer, chiefly of church organ and choral music. Marpurg claims he wrote as much and as rapidly as Alessandro Scarlatti and Georg Philipp Telemann, (a claim also repeated by Leopold Mozart, my comment L. Mozart moved to Salzburg in 1737 before starting his musical career in 1740 as violinist and organist) although ultimately Eberlin did not live nearly as long as either of those two composers. Eberlin's first breakthrough was in 1727 when he became the organist for Count Leopold von Firmian (then Archbishop of Salzburg). He reached the peak of his career when he was the organist for Archbishop Andreas Jakob von Dietrichstein. By 1749 he held the posts of Hof- und Domkapellmeister (Court and Cathedral chapel master) simultaneously, an achievement which his successors Michael Haydn, Leopold Mozart, and Wolfgang Mozart himself were not to match. Despite Mozart's father Leopold's great opinion of Eberlin, and having sent the young Mozart some of Eberlin's best known works, his keyboard pieces, the young Mozart later tired of them (wikipedia references the above letter which contradicts wikipedia's article).

Thanks Tristan, I wish I had three days in one... how cool would it be to have musicians on this channel helping demonstrating all of this, it's an idea that we're working on!

indeed, the 1st one one (C Major) is a kind of inverted version of the WTC 1 of Bach (also interesting to compare tempi here!)

what about the 279 recordings for free on this channel!

AuthenticSound I just ran across this one and had hoped for lots of playing examples. I do like your videos. Chopin and Mozart are my favorites.

haha, it is a Belgian Europspeak -try-to-be-as-good-as-I-can accent. Honored you listened to it as an accent!

Thanks Rod!

He indeed wrote music that often still is worth our time, his string quartets I don't know, thanks for suggesting

AuthenticSound This recording by the Sheridan Ensemble is quite good. Czerny: String Quartets: ru-vid.com/group/PLMwsd17Rl7x6yiVqsqcQ8sxCe2BnXKNGq

That's a huge compliment, thank you !

That's coming when the pianoforte arrives so bit of patience... you'll find dozens of videos on my channel talking and playing

great question, which... I don't know!

Thanks! Feel free to contact me through www.authenticsound.org

Hi Fred, I'll give you a video to start with, think about it this way: the metronome ticks back and forth and both together were considered as one count. So basically those metronome marks make total sense (as the other thousands early 19th c. metronome marks), if you take them metrical. So quarter note 120 is every eight note a tick in 120MM. Here is a video to start: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-2yd7LWi4wus.html

Ok, so I watched it for the 2'nd time. What I think I concluded is that an idea of "half time" appears to approximate or best describe a tempo marking that otherwise would result in ridiculous speeds. I was confused by your comment in the video above by what Czerny said about Beethoven's performance speeds. I suppose that these days most performers will adopt a speed that "feels" right. This would be a projection of the performers aesthetics. I am always reminded of Gould's speeds on some of the Mozart works and of course he knew perfectly well how to play them as if he was Wilhelm Kempf. He purposefully went out of his way to play at twice the tempo, mostly to shock his listeners. He knew that it was just ridiculous and he was highly amused by the reactions. What speed Beethoven would have played the WTC, I just don't have a grasp. I can't quite figure it out.

welcome to the channel!

It's hard to say, whether he wanted the correct speed or a different kind of rubato as we use. Much to study!

I certainly will Mirec, certainly when the pianoforte is here, that sonata still works on my clavichord, but really on the edge, it is a beautiful work, with a notation that can be said so much about

Wim Winters thank you very much. I'm very looking forward.

Thank you so much, Neonia!

;)

he was... imagine he would have lived a few years longer. if there is one thing I would be allowed to change, is to install a listening culture in which an artist is not judged on how much he/she corresponds with the listening habits/opinions of the listener, but on the musical story that is being reveled. Though I do have the impression that more and more people are in for this.

Didn't know that fucker didn't like Chopin. Another reason to not like him.

Gould did record a single Chopin sonata, so judge for yourself: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-UYUpTgl5VQM.html Apparently he was also a great admirer of Robert Casadesus's recording of the same sonata.

What's the "Proper" way, then? ;)

I guess the tradition of polemic buffoonery stretches back quite a long way, from Mozart calling Clementi a charlatan, to Leonhardt (furthest from a "clown" I know!) refusing to play Handel because he was not the "best", then. And some could argue that being stylistically informed isn't always a prerequisite to making a valid interpretation -- think Vaughan Williams conducting the St. Matthew passion. I've always found the discussions surrounding Gould's playing, and the surprising vehemence of his defenders or detractors, to be interesting. Reactions to a performance tell us more about the listener than about the performance itself.

I didn't realise Glenn didn't like Chopin, why whouldn't he?

+Nick Williams You should try the Czerny tempi once, also the original ones of the inventions and sinfonias (they were changed in later editions without mentioning). Most of the fast mov. make no sense in single beat or are impossible to play but work great in double beat. Chopin did copy Czerny's mm marks! Best wishes, Wim

AuthenticSound Did you come across von Bülow's comment about metronomisation in the preface to his Cramer studies edition?

ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-aZZMuX6-1Sw.html

yes!

Great to read!

Well, I suppose seen the fact that he copied every tiny bit of information, even cresc etc, I believe chances are really big he accepted Czerny as an authority. people were less individual than we are today, and Czerny was a giant name at the time.

sure, the opus 10/4 is very well possible.

Mendelssohn was a genius!

And thank to Karl Richter also!

not at the same time... !

Thanks for sharing your thoughts here Stuart. I'm working slowly on some of the opus 10/1 - on the Erard now. e.g. the f minor (10/9), has these 16th quintols at the end, no ritard. mentioned, is also a very good clue.

Some further thoughts on this, after trying a few of these at the piano. (I'm not Chopin scholar by any means and not familiar with the sources, so take this with a pinch of salt.) Interpreting the tempos as double beat (i.e. equivalent to 88 for op10 no1, 72 for op10 no2, 50 for op10 no3 etc), it does seem that these are a *little* too slow to make musical sense. I also agree that it's absurd to claim that the composers themselves are somehow getting the metronome numbers wrong in a systematic fashion. But do we have any clear knowledge of how the metronome numbers exactly arrived in the proofs? I've seen one person (here: www.angelalear.com/interpretingchopin/interpretingchopin/the_etudes.html ) claim that the original Chopin manuscripts contain very few metronome numbers and that those that appear in the first editions are often additions by other parties (the publisher, the copyist, Chopin's sister?). If so, is it possible that these other people are getting it wrong and e.g. Chopin is perhaps simply not reading the proofs with attention? Or not seeing the proofs? Certainly Czerny's studies sound perfectly sensible when played at the double beat tempo, which provides good evidence for the double beat theory for Czerny - but in the case of Chopin, the "musically sensible" tempos seem somewhere between those given by either a single beat or double beat interpretation - closer to those given in my Edition Peters copy of 104 for op10no1, 108 for op10 no2, and 60 for op10 no3 (where presumably the editors have ignored the MMs on the first edition and gone with what sounds good/what they think sounds good).

Double beat tempo interpretation is spot on for op10 no6 however.

yes it was! ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-w18esj7n8YE.html

well, it put you on the way of trying to understand what impacted Chopin for his Bach interpretation. It's obvious I'd say the title has not the claim of knowing how Chopin exactly played, nobody really knows, but it shapes the context.