The history is fascinating, and it all goes back to an Italian guy who decided to transcribe works by Bach for a modern piano. His name was Ferruccio Busoni and he had a real knack for creating music that remained true to Bach's original score while making great use of the capabilities of a piano.
For more about Ferruccio, check out this Wiki link. There is much information in there, including a lot of German words used to describe what he did. He laid out his philosophy, methodology and goals and now that I have slightly increased my understanding of who he was and what he was going for I have a much greater appreciation for his work.
First off, Itzhak Perlman playing BWV 1004. The chaconne starts at 13:50 for those of you who want to cut to the chase. Do his friends call him "Itzy"?
Once you have a passing familiarity with the source material, one can move on to what Signor Busoni wrote. This is a version played by Helene Grimaud, and I really like how she played it:
That is all - no tall tales today.
15 comments:
Couldn't get past her beauty. What classic features.
Schwarzenegger was interested in classical music so much he produced a picture.
I'll Be Bach.
Good one, ed - I guess Austria is not too far from Leipzig.
The Bruins game begins in 19 minutes, so I have enough time to listen all the way through. She plays like I do, except she hits the right notes at the right time. Beautiful piece.
I hear ya, WB - I play just like that, in my dreams.
I finally understood something about music recently that has eluded me up to this point. After one of the sonMs showed me how writing music was a similar in some ways to writing computer code, the shoe dropped, allowing me to understand what some people are listening for and hearing that may include but also goes beyond a sense of emotional engagement.
Trying to explain or quantify the songwriting process has always eluded me. I've got songs half-finished for decades now, while other times 20 minutes is all it takes. Beethoven composed while deaf. I can't comprehend that. Other musicians have made comments about how the mind of a musician works. Sometimes I can identify with them. Other times, not so much.
My sister-in-law is a highly talented musician, and was talking about the subtle nuances of dialects. She told me that of course I knew what she was talking about because as a musician I was able to detect subtle shades of sounds. Sometimes I can, but mostly not. For her, the musical abilities she possesses spill over into spoken language.
I've known people who approached music much like they would a math problem. My son is that way. He picked up a bass one day and was playing it on the church worship team two weeks later. Despite our shared DNA, I have no idea how he pulled that off. It's a formula for him.
Music is a wonderful world. Despite my participation with music, it remains a mysterious thing to me. I wish I had pursued it more zealously when I was younger. It's hard to play catch up later in life. People who play on the level like in the video are special. Many times they were also very lonely when they were younger.
edutcher!
Mama, it's all mathematical.
Music was the first language. It transcends dialect when emotionally felt. Even though, as mentioned, its just math.
Were it nothing more than mathematics then accountants would be great composers and musicians. The fact that they aren't puts the lie to that concept.
Sixty, Bingo!
Geeks are taking over sports w/ analytics. There is significant value in analytics. But sports are not entirely math. Why? Because athletes are people. Like most everything, a balance of analytics and psychology is the ticket.
Rhiannon Giddens makes a relevant comment in this clip. If you don't know her, she's worth the time to discover. She's from Sixty's neck of the woods, and in my humble opinion is the purest voice on the planet. Anyhow, she's many things musically--mostly highly talented, and beginning at the 1:10 mark, she talks about being able to read music, but she has to hear it with her ears, not just in her mind.
Without going all out whoo whoo here, music is emotional, physical, and spiritual. It meets people on every level. A balance sheet doesn't move people like Chopin moves people.
Reading comments like this, which flow along with one building on, enhancing, or encouraging another gives me a sense of movement similar to that which music provides. It was fun, and even more than that, uplifting to find them this morning.
Yes to it all, the mathematics, the mystery, language and transcendence, balance, ear and mind hearing, and the ability to meet at all levels.
The whoo whoo comes by itself, when people bring themselves, their gifts, knowledge, experience and awareness to the table. Prompted by Sixty going bach on an overcast afternoon.
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